WE GATHER TOGETHER by Edward L. Woodyard

We Gather Together Chapter Forty-Seven

Sam McCulloch backed his car out of the garage into a turnaround, then drove straight down the driveway. Before turning left onto Pleasanton Road which would take him the five miles into the village of Castlebury, he waved to Charlie DiSimone, a long-time postman who was just starting his rounds in his mail truck, beginning at the Pleasanton line and then traveling back toward town. It was a good time for Sam to drive the county road into town; the morning commuter traffic was over and the school buses were parked back at the bus lot until they were dispatched again for afternoon dismissal.

As he drove into town, Sam looked to his right at a meadow on a low slope; first growth oaks and maple saplings stood beyond it atop a hill, shed now of their leaves. The hillside looked barren except for white pines and spruces which stippled the hilltop. The meadow had been threshed for silage, but it would bloom with hay grasses, clover and wildflowers in the spring. Among Sam's earliest memories as a young boy in Castlebury was running as a three-year-old with his younger brother through the spring wildflowers, squealing and giggling as they rolled down the hillside to the delight of their watchful parents.

Just past the meadow, Sam passed a four-acre pond where he and his brother had learned to skate – and where he had taught his own four children how to skate. What he loved best was playing pond hockey with his kids and their friends after school and on weekends. The goalie nets weren't nets but two-by-ten boards laid flat on the ice. There were only three rules; the first rule was: no going on the ice unless an adult was present. An augur and yardstick were used to make sure the ice was thick enough for all the weight. The second rule was: once the puck was dropped and play started, no lifting the puck to score. And the third rule: no figure skates, especially on the girls.

On cold winter weekends, Sam recalled, there could be ten kids to a side and the boards pushed back to extend the size of the "rink" to a quarter-acre so everyone could play. Other than that, the boundaries were the edge of the pond toward the hillside and somewhere in the middle of the frozen pond itself. Sam swore that he and the other fathers had more fun than the kids, especially when he and Bob Lundgren would be opposing goalies, so the kids could improve their slapshots for their youth hockey teams.

Often Marian Barclay would come by with two large Thermos bottles of hot chocolate for the players; she felt compelled since she had four sons making up half a team. Sometimes, when they were so inspired, Rick Murray and Keith Nelson would set up a small charcoal hibachi to grill hot dogs for everyone, usually in mid-January. They would create their hot dog stand while others shoveled snow off the ice. One time, Larry Roland thought he'd use his snow blower as an ersatz Zamboni, but when it fell through the ice, that idea wasn't tried again. While the snow blower was sinking, Larry Roland was insisting to everyone that the gas cap was on securely and it wouldn't pollute the pond. To which Keith Nelson said, "Larry, don't worry about it. It's not going to start again. The engine is probably flooded."

As Sam drove past the pond, he wondered if Larry Roland's snow blower was still in there. He knew that there had to be at least a hundred hockey pucks at the bottom, which everyone in town swore was the cause of its pond algae that bloomed in early August.

Sam was passed on the county road by several drivers traveling in the opposite direction. With the privacy glass on the cars, he couldn't recognize who was driving; however, when drivers waved to him and honked their horns, Sam instinctively waved back and beeped.

Sam had seen a lot of change and growth in the area, especially in Castlebury. He thought that the loss of the bowling alley and Rennick's Farm Market to development, and the Log House nightclub to fire, changed Castlebury from a small village into a suburban bedroom community for New York City. Long active with various community groups to preserve the historic character of the town, Sam cherished the slow pace and selfless citizenry of Castlebury, He felt that the quality of life in Castlebury was represented by the Episcopal Church at the fork in the road leading into town, standing as a sentinel to all that was good, honorable, steadfast and honest about the town and village. With its square spire and Doric columns, St. Simeon's was situated at a juncture, allowing drivers to take either way to get to Main Street; the decision on which way to go was often determined by which way one wanted to park on Main Street, facing east or facing west.

When Sam got to the intersection by the church, he knew his options. He could go left on Pleasant Ridge Road through the historic district with its antebellum Federal homes and high arboreal canopy created by 250-year-old oak trees that sheltered the street during warm summer months. Or he could get onto Main Street by going right onto Chestnut Street which looped between the churchyard and Founders Park with its duck pond and landmark Eastlake gazebo nestled in hundred-year-old spruce trees.

When Sam went right onto Chestnut Street, he saw two town parks department foremen, Don Foley and Elliott Brandeis, working with four younger crewmen to get the park ready for the Christmas tree lighting which would culminate the Christmas parade festivities on Sunday evening. He could see workers on ladders and in a bucket truck stringing Christmas lights on an arch bridge over the duck pond, lampposts that lined a walk along the pond, and the gazebo itself in which the annual Christmas tree was placed, joined on either side by a menorah and a star and crescent.

Large metal lighted snowflakes were already installed high in the grove of spruce trees; it had been Julia's idea to refurbish the former urban street decorations and have them placed in the park as part of the village's holiday decorations. People drove from three states to experience Castlebury during the holiday season. They often said it was like a Christmas card or a lighted miniature snow village come alive, especially when the lights of the snowflakes and the gazebo were reflected in the brook and duck pond, along with the arch bridge.

As Sam drove past the park, he slowed down and lowered his passenger window, yelling at the two parks foremen, "Don, Elliott. It looks great!"

"Thanks, Sam," shouted Don Foley.

"Have a wonderful Thanksgiving," Sam shouted back.

"You too, Sam," shouted Elliott Brandeis.

As he drove past an old brick firehouse that was repurposed into a community center, Victorian homes that had been converted into offices and businesses, and a new supermarket in the center of the village's original sheep pasture, Sam knew one thing: he loved his hometown.

Someone had once said that Castlebury was a town of uncomplicated souls, to which Sam agreed; it had few complications and lots of soul. It was small town America at its best. He had experienced every human emotion possible by living in this town. He didn't have to travel the world to find everything he needed; it was all right here.

He acknowledged that a small town had a long memory, this small town having given him some wonderful memories of some outstanding people. And it persisted in giving him even more wonderful memories every day. He felt blessed.

Castlebury, New York had been settled by Quakers fleeing Massachusetts during the ascendancy of Puritanism and was originally part of the Oblong, that western part of Connecticut which was ceded to eastern New York in 1683. Subsequently, Castlebury had always deemed itself more English than Dutch in its attitude, with its white clapboard architecture, hierarchical government and strict social sensibilities. Castlebury had produced more Loyalists during the Revolutionary War than it cared to acknowledge in retrospect. Since then, its citizens had volunteered to fight to free the slaves, to make the world safe for democracy, to defeat fascism, and to achieve peace with honor. It was also where J.J. McCulloch decided to erect a granite block building in a pasture on his parents' farm west of the village toward Hudsonville, into which J.J. placed a linotype machine which he had had transported by a flatboat up the Atlantic Coast from Baltimore before World War I. Castlebury continued to be good to the McCullochs.

Sam found a parking space on Main Street under a towering oak tree in front of the post office. All of his errands could be done within the one and a half blocks of the central commercial street in the village.

His first stop was around the corner, back on Chestnut Street, at the old Harrington home which had been converted into two medical offices, one on each floor. Sam wanted to stop in to see Doc Kaplan, to find out if his test results from last Friday had come back. He hadn't told Julia yet, but there was a slim chance that his cancer may have returned.