“They keep feeling like long weekends,” Sofie said this Monday morning as she picked up her backpack and headed out the door.  “Why?”

I remember the first time she uttered the dreaded three-letter word.  It was my birthday a few years back, and she was just getting into her evening bubble bath.  It started off  as several different questions, “Wha-who-howwwwwwwWHY?”  This truly was the death knell for the last shreds of my parental sanity.

On the other hand, Monday morning’s WHY was definitely worth examining.  The previous weekend we had started off with baseball practice, a bike ride, then heading to Hyannis for our long-delayed digital television purchase, some indulgent investigation of our new HD channels, then the next day’s riding for the Pan Mass Challenge in the Brewster in Bloom Parade, a late lunch at Friendly’s, some helping in her neighbor’s garden, and finally watching a movie on that new HDTV.

Her assessment the next morning was that it felt like a five-day weekend.  And this morning, her aforesaid observation, and wondering about that.

I replied, “Well, maybe with the nicer weather, we can do so much more.”  Might be that with my seven-year-old Barbie Tomboy now passing four feet in height, her world of possible activities is growing as fast as our well-watered yard.

Last week I introduced the concept of “Time flies when you’re having fun.”  I’ll hold off for now on the related idea, “Summer is why we suffer through nine months of winter here.”

When I returned from Germany with my baby girl, alone, in 2004, it was with the desire to have her grow up much as I had.  In a safe small town near the water, surrounded by a large extended family.   And while she’s had a fairly active childhood, with summer rec programs, soccer, skating, tennis, South Beach campouts, and all the rest, I think there’s a certain shift in consciousness that comes about this age following first grade.

Now proficient in reading and math, she not only understands the concept of putting money into her savings account – she can make a sign for the much-anticipated cash cow of a lemonade stand.  She’s started writing her own stories, which leads to a desire to explore.  And unlike when she was younger, she has a greater physical ability to explore in relative safely.  I don’t have to keep an eye on her 100 percent of the time, although I am definitely the preferred playtime companion.  Still.

In February, when we had to take three different flights to get to Munich, I got a preview of this new level of confidence.  She was frequently ahead of me with her carry-on, as we navigated from one side of a large airport to another.  She could read the signs for the terminal or gates, and in reading the clocks be able to tell how much time we had to get there.  The concept of currency exchange still was tough, but then again I’ve traveled with a few adults who after a week were still struggling.

So if this is how we are heading into summer, I can only imagine what I will have on my hands by the end. By Labor Day, I am probably going to be looking back at countless skinned knees, bug bites, bruises, cuts from stepping on shells or sea glass, burns from getting too close to the grill or campfire even though I said stay well away, near-misses with oblivious drivers, sugar high crashes, episodes of getting separated in large crowds, jellyfish stings, waterlogging, stepping in God-knows-what and tracking it in the house, ice-cold garden hose rinse-offs after the beach, slips over the side of the boat or canoe, grumpy days from “sleeping” out in the tent the night before and not getting any rest, bugs eaten while berry picking, rashes from experimentation with poison ivy resistance, a few cat scratches, two bee stings, and at least one random dog bite.

That is, if we are lucky.  Given that she will likely survive intact, the greatest challenge she may face is remembering to regularly write at least some of it down.  This may be the year of the summer journal — to remember why we’re here.

Yes, this year I got behind on pulling the boat.  I usually run a little late on getting it out before the Oyster Pond (a salt water inlet off Nantucket Sound) freezes over.  This fall, however, preparations for and the trip to Cape Verde took over my schedule.  And then there was the issue of the boat itself.

See, in years past, we’ve had Novi skiffs.  They’re the best all-around work boat for around here because they don’t have a deep keel (great for all the shallow water around here) and they are steady.  Not speed boats.  And they are self-bailing — in that the deck is high than the water line, so all the rain just washes out the stern.

But this year, I had to resurrect an old dory from the back yard.  Fixed her up and gave her the name “Li’l Boots”, nickname of my daughter, Sofie.

Li’l Boots was a mixed blessing.  Advantage:  free.  Disadvantage — not self-bailing.  So after every rain, it needed to be emptied of water.

Now, this boat was light enough to pull up on shore rather than leave on the mooring.  So every once in a while I’d just walk down and pull the plug on the stern and empty it onto the shore. BUT, this made things tough for moving it since I couldn’t pull the plug until it was low tide.  But then the boat was too heavy to move until high tide came up and floated it away.

I never quite timed this right — empty Li’l Boots at low, push it off at high — and coordinate with my father to get the trailer hooked up to his dump truck and then drive down to the town landing to pick the boat and me up.  It was either raining.  Or snowing.  Or the sun had gone down too early.  Or I was working or away.  Or the pond had frozen up earlier than usual and made rowing impossible.

But I finally did this time. Yessir.  High tide was in the morning.  Li’l Boots was floating. Weather was January Thaw-mild.  Remembered to go down in the afternoon, get the boat fully emptied.  Then heard the weather was going to change drastically, temperatures would drop to the teens during the day, and that meant the pond would definitely freeze.  Perhaps for a good long time this time.  One winter it froze in December and didn’t thaw until March.  So this could’ve been my last chance.

This morning I went down to the shore.  Sunny, but 17 degrees Fahrenheit with 33 mph winds making the wind chill more like 1.  What’s more, it was a strong West wind, meaning it was driving everything down the pond.  But that was to my advantage — it was the direction I was heading.

So I dropped the oars down at the boat, called my dad to tell him I’d be leaving soon. He’d meet me at 10:45 or so down at the landing.

Now, the thing is, the engine in the Li’l Boots is the same age as the boat.  33.  We had it checked out thoroughly this spring, and it ran well.  Until it decided not to.  Then, given half an hour, would start up again and run fine… for another half hour.  We pulled the boat back into the yard.  Mechanic came, checked it out, and it ran fine.  No problems.  Put it back in.  Same problem.

In short, it wasn’t running in January.  So I’d be rowing.  But not so far.  Might take 15 minutes.  With the wind, even less.  All I had to do was hug the shore for a quarter mile.

Two socks.  Jeans.  Old raggedy fleece pants over the jeans.  Black rubber boots.  Faux Under Armor long sleeve shirt.  Turtle neck.  Sweater.  Patriots hoodie.  Fleece hoodie over that.  Over all that, I donned my really cool mariner’s coat which is not only warm and dry, but has foam in the lining, making it a Class III flotation device.  Just in case.

On the way down the path to the shore, I heard someone yell out. It was a construction guy, working on my neighbor’s house.  He asked if I was heading out clamming, and what was the price.  I told him I was just moving the boat, but if he heard a splash…

And then it was simply a matter of wading through the water in my black rubber boots, pulling the anchor, and shoving off from the flooded meadow bank.  Except the anchor didn’t want to come up.

It was stuck under the meadowbank.  The only way to get it out was to get into the boat, push off from shore, then pull from the opposite direction and it would come up.  As I did so, I realized that I really should not have worn the ski gloves.  Sure, they’re warm, which is important on a bitterly cold day like today.  But in handling the anchor line, it became quickly obvious they were not waterproof in the slightest.  My hands were soaked.

I have a great pair of gloves just for this, too.  Actually, they are like super-gauntlets, made of thick plastic, insulated, and run all the way up to the shoulder, and attach to each other by an elastic strap.  Great for winter work on the water.  And I had forgot them down in the basement.

But no big deal.  It was a short row.  Off I go.

Another thing to mention.  The oars.  These are only 6 feet long.  Li’l Boots is about 5 feet wide.  So when I sit down to row, very little of the oar blade actually dips in the water.  To get any purchase on the water, I have to extend them out, but that diminishes the leverage I have.  Not the best things to be using, but I got a wind pushing me.

The wind was pushing me.  But it wanted to push me towards the middle of the pond.  I wanted to stay close to the north shore of the pond. It became a struggle to point the nose of the boat back to shore.  Didn’t need to row forward so much.  Just wanted to aim the boat back towards my destination.

The left oar jumped out of its oarlock.  So I set down the right oar, grabbed at the left one to put it back in its lock.  And that’s when I heard the clunk.

The right oar was in the water.

It took a little time for this to register.  There was the oar – one of the two oars necessary to row a boat – off on its own, with no means of me to get to it because, after all, I would need it to complete the set of two needed to row to it.  Which I did not have.  I had one, and one oar is about as useful in rowing as one hand is for clapping.  Which is to say, you can still use it somewhat effectively, like to smack yourself in the face.  For clapping, that is.

So there was the oar, floating along down the shore, but not as quick as I was.  And the wind, now having Li’l Boots at its mercy and deciding I made as good a sail as any, pushed us further along and out – out – out towards the middle of the pond.  The oar continued on its trajectory, and would hit the landing eventually.  Perhaps that explains it – it had determined on its own to get to the landing, saw that staying with me and the other oar was going to involve a lot of work, and thought, “Hey, I can get there just as well myself without doing much at all.  I’ll just hop over here then…”

And abandoned ship.

I should not complain.  This oar clearly has a genuine Cape Cod attitude.

And it was about this time the wind started to pick up more.  Of course it would.  Having far too much experience with lost oars, the Oyster Pond, west winds and such from boyhood, I kedged.  I pulled out the anchor and heaved it as close to the oars as I could.

Then I pulled it in.  Slowly, the boat  swung around to the opposite direction, facing into the wind.  I was stopped, and the oar continued its slow progress.  All this time, the strengthening wind saw me standing up in the bow, trying to throw something, then pulling on the anchor line, and decided to have fun.  Lots more waves hitting the boat.

That’s about the time I discovered that there had been a small amount of water left in the bottom of the boat from yesterday, and it had frozen.  Slippery.  Slippery deck I was standing on.  My wet gloves were starting to freeze, too.

At this point in our story, I recalled the story of a Captain Ryder of Chathamport who, after going off on one of those multi-year round-the-world voyages, returned home one night in a gale.  He was rowing his dory to shore when it overturned, and he died within a few hundred feet of his home.  They found his body the next morning on the shore.

Getting up to the anchor and pulling it up, all covered in heavy black mud, I had to rinse it.  And off Li’l Boots raced again, with nothing to hold her fast against the wind.  We passed the oar, but too far to reach, and further away from the shore we went.  I threw again.  And pulled.  Threw again.  And pulled.  And it a mooring buoy.  And pulled again.

With that happy thought in mind, I threw one more time, and was able to face the bow toward the shore, and swing around… and alongside came the oar.

Yay!  Now, with two oars I saw the waves were now breaking here, towards the center of the pond.  If I could just get back towards shore, I was nearly at the landing.

My father’s big red dump truck arrived at the landing, with the boat trailer.  I was directly across from him, a mere 100 yards.  But the boat would not turn.  I kept moving further down the shore, passing the landing, and the wind just kept me moving forward.  Two oars or one, they were just too short to do anything.  I threw out the anchor.  Tried to kedge to shore.  The waves were higher now, and I was risky overturning the boat.

I was able to signal to my father what was going on.  He yelled something, but over the wind I couldn’t hear.  I told him I’d have to let the boat go down to the other end of the pond and he signaled okay.  He’d meet me there.

Standing up, I was ready to get this three-hour tour over with.  The wind pushed me quickly along toward the Oyster Pond Beach.  Approaching, I saw that the first of the sea ice was forming, and gathering in crescent of slush along the sand.  As I neared the beach, I started rowing toward the center. From there, perhaps the truck could back down with the trailer.

The sea slush was the consistency of oatmeal.  Not what I was expecting.  The waves lifted it up and down, making slow progress in rowing.  I stepped out of the boat into a foot of water, meeting my father who has just arrived.

So, now, here we are, on a town beach in the middle of town.  High visibility.  Full daylight.  And we want to bring a 40 year-old dump truck down onto the sand, with a trailer, to pick up a boat.  And with a few people in the parking lot, sitting in their cars and trucks, drinking their coffee.

And so we do.  Working the truck and trailer back down to the frozen beach, we got it into position.  Trailer was just in the slush.  Truck rear wheels at the shore, on the crunchy sea ice.

As my father cranked out the line used to draw the bow up the trailer, I brought around the boat.  Three-foot waves of slush pushed the boat sideways to the shore while I was struggling to get it nose-on to the trailer.  I got it in position once, but the hook from the trailer line was cranking out too slowly and wasn’t long enough.

The boat swung around in the mean time, but I was able to get the hook on it.  Once I did, it would simply be a matter of lining up the boat with the trailer and draw it in.  Then we could get the hell off this beach before someone from the town came along and asked why we didn’t use the town landing instead.

With this in mind, I stepped further into the slush and maneuvered the stern.  Waves slopped up over and into the boat.  Slush at last started filling my boots.  I knew this would happen.  But we’d be on our way soon.

Slowly, the crank pulled the boat up.  My toes were getting very cold.  The wind tried to push the stern sideways.  I stepped further into the slush.  My toes were numb.  Slowly, the boat gained on the trailer.  I stepped out of the water, my boots filled to the tops with slush, and relieved my father from the cranking.  Closing the gap a few more feet, I locked the line into place.  Then I went to go empty my boots.

I could get the left one off by using the right boot.  A gallon of slush spilled onto the frozen sand.  I couldn’t feel anything in my left foot, so I could not use it to get off my right boot.  I couldn’t pull it off myself, so my father had to.  So I walked soaking sock-footed over to the passenger side and got into the truck.  I could feel every grain of sand and every shard of ice through my socks.

My father got in, started up the truck. Shifted into first.  Wheels turned.  Truck didn’t move.  Wheels turned.  Truck didn’t move.

He got out.  Looked at the wheels.  Came back.  Stuck.

I’ve never gotten stick in this truck.  It has four rear wheels.  I’ve driving in all kinds of mud in a stump dump with it.  But it couldn’t handle the high tide saturated sand and the weight of the boat on the trailer, and the sea slush.

Now, in broad daylight, weekday, noon, stuck on a town beach.  But my most immediate concern was my feet.  What I could feel, which was not much, was pain and stabbing cold.  Or stabbing pain and cold.  I had only risked the dousing of sea slush because I knew I’d be off the beach and home soon.  Now it was indefinite.

Then I saw Tim Wood, editor of the Cape Cod Chronicle, drive by. He didn’t seem to notice what was going on. He didn’t stop. He didn’t take a photo. He didn’t put it on the front page of the paper. So things were looking up.

Calling, I asked my mother to stop into my place and bring down a pair of socks and my hiking boots.  Then I called Matt Griffin to get ideas on who might have a truck to pull us out.  No answer.  He doesn’t leave his phone on at work.  So I called the head of the DPW.  He was in a meeting, but said yes we could call someone to get us off the beach, but no, a town vehicle couldn’t do it. We called my brother to see if he could find someone, and all this time I was gingerly pulling my two pairs of socks off my feet, rubbing my toes to get some feeling back in them (didn’t work) and finally putting the dry socks on. It took 10 minutes.

When I finally got my shoes on, I stepped out of the truck to see how deep the tires were.  Too deep. Halfway.  No getting out on our own.  We could drop the trailer there, and leave it until low tide.  Then the guy came up.

Cool guy.  Big guy.  Asked if we needed help.  I was walking back and forth in the sand, getting my circulation going, and said, yeah, yeah, we could.  While he brought his 4×4 truck down, I took a shovel from the truck and dug out the tires, both sides.

He hooked up a chain, my father got in the truck, started it, put it in first gear, and the tires just spun.  I told him to wait.  Then the tow started up, and he put in gear again.  Off they went.  Great.  Then the trailer went into the ditch the tires had dug.  And up out of the ditch and up into the parking lot.

His name was Craig, and he was working at a house nearby. Saw us on our lunch break.  Definitely came from somewhere off-Cape, outside of New England. More Appalachian, I’d say, from his accent.  Other guys in big trucks were still looking out their windows at us.  I yelled out, “Show’s OVER!”

Drove the truck back to West Chatham, where we left it, boat and trailer hooked up in the yard.  When I got back home, after checking in, I soaked in the tub for half an hour.  It took me two hours to get all the feeling back in my toes.  There were whole winters I’ve spent shellfishing, in waders, up to my chest in water.  But I’ve never felt this kind of permeating cold.

While it may have seemed stupid to have gone out on a day like today, I blame it all on the wrong gloves.  If had been able to hold onto those oars as I needed to start with, I could’ve stayed closer to shore.  Instead, I ended up with a tale of mid-winter recklessness so typical of the Cape.

There’s a conversation that continues to come back to me, nine years after it took place in the downstairs meeting room of the Chatham Town Offices.

The topic up for discussion was vehicle passage on North Beach. At the time, the beach was, of course, still a peninsula. The thread of barrier beach attached to Orleans by which the few lucky camp owners and ORV drivers would access the Chatham section had problems – exactly where the vehicles should actually pass through here. Some camp owners felt the traffic was eroding dune protecting their homes. Federal and local officials felt otherwise.

As a Selectman, I took a fairly traditional view. No, a primitive view, really – screw the cars, and take a boat or walk. But, having grown up on the Nantucket Sound side of town, I never developed an appreciation or familiarity with life out on North Beach. I did understand the need for camp owners to get quickly out to their properties when weather conditions made boat access impossible.

I think about this Selectmen’s meeting now, especially in light of the newest chapter in the South Beach saga. Namely, that two property owners south of the Lighthouse are now claiming property rights out to Chatham Harbor, and thereby ownership of swathes of Lighthouse Beach. In interrupting the town’s contiguous rights from Lighthouse Beach out to South Beach, this claim would effectively be a roadblock in the middle of what has been viewed for 18 years as one public property.

One the one hand, this certainly solves the whole safe-or-not to swim issue here. Or greatly diminishes it. The town won’t have to agonize over how much to pay for patrols this summer for a beach no one can get to.

On the other, it raises almost quite literally a roadblock to any question of vehicular access to South Beach. Recall that in the bitterly cold winters of the past few years, commercial shellfishermen, frozen out of all the harbors, have been granted permission to drive down the beach to access the waters nearby.

That suggestion, however, triggered my memory of that Selectmen’s meeting. Camp owner Russell Broad was proposing an alternative route for summer traffic on North Beach. Effectively, his front yard was right up against the backside of the beach, right on Chatham Harbor. His grandchildren would play in the close-by intertidal zone, but trucks would come whizzing down on the wet sand at high speeds. In effect, at low tide, there was a very broad highway in front of his camp. As the tide came up, the road narrowed bringing the speeders closer and closer to his house, and closer and closer to his family.

Yet, this was his property. Why should he have to put up with this? Would anyone put up with people driving through their yard just because it was the easiest route?

Town Counsel Bruce Gilmore, present at the meeting, pointed out the Massachusetts Colonial Ordinance that passage through the intertidal zone was open to the public for purposes of fishing, fowling and navigation. Therefore, he continued, all one of those trucks and SUV’s would need to do was put a fishing rod or clam rake in the back, and voila! The intent of the law is fulfilled.

If that were the case, I pointed out, how long would the Town stand aside if the same thing happened down along the shores of the Mill Pond? It would be as equally true for Hardings Beach, too (not well known, but from the entrance of Hardings to the immediate shoreline is actually a town landing). Would fishermen be able to drive anywhere along the shore in Chatham as long as they had a defensible excuse like a rod,, rake or shotgun? But while this was a valid question, it was not one that anyone cared to entertain at the time.

Perhaps now is the time to revisit it.

There is a town landing that runs from Morris Island Road, south along the Chatham Beach and Tennis Club, to the harbor.

And as for where the intertidal zone is on Lighthouse Beach and South Beach, well, having filmed down there during the hurricanes of this summer and documented the storm surge, it’s pretty clear this is most of the area the public uses anyway.

That leaves very little stable ground upon which to erect a roadblock.

A long haul, but worth it. TACV, the Cape Verde national airlines, is the only airline flying direct to Fogoin the  Cape Verde from Boston. All others, costing at least half again more, run via European cities like Portugal. The drawback, though, is the limited twice-weekly schedule. Tuesdays and Fridays only. So it was either go for a week, or for two to three days.

But for us at Hit and Run History to follow the Columbia Expedition as it made its first stop on its first-ever American voyage ‘round the world, it meant not only coming to the capital city of Praia. It also meant taking a side-trip to the neighboring island of Maio. The ferry schedule being what it is, we had to take a week. So back in September, it looked best to head out on the second weekend in November.

It was less than two weeks ago we learned of the dengue fever outbreak and epidemic in Cape Verde. Unknown in the islands before November, it was allowed to spread before anyone recognized the illness in the wake of the only two rainy months of the year - September and October.

A national effort to eradicate the disease, led by the prime minister, was recently reported here on Cape Cod Today. The mosquitoes spreading the disease in this dry country became public enemy number one. Still, by Friday the 13th - the day we left Boston - the island nation reported over 12,000 infected, six dead.

It was only through information posted to the Hit and Run History fan page on Facebook that we learned of the relief efforts of the Brockton Neighborhood Health Center. Things we take for granted, like Vitamin C, mosquito repellant, acetaminophen, and hand sanitizing gel - all needed to fight infection and the effects of dengue - were practically non-existent in Cape Verde.

Knowing we were determined to go, Hit and Run History offered to help in any way we could. A crew member having previously dropped out, so we were able to work with TACV to offer that ticket to Luisa Schaeffer, the outreach worker coordinating the relief effort in Brockton, who not coincidentally happened to be a native of the Cape Verde island of Fogo.

Upon our arrival at Logan Airport on Friday evening, we quickly saw that our fellow travelers were bringing their own supplies. Checked baggage pushed the limit of two 50-pound bags. FAA regulations were also restricting the amount of aerosol spray to two cans. Subsequently, there has been a run on repellant wipes and lotion in this New England November.

Luisa was able to use her checked baggage allotment to bring over more supplies, destined for the hospital in Fogo. Now we are in Fogo, having brought more supplies over from the capital of Praia, where we landed Saturday morning. We will have the chance to speak with the doctors there, and see how the supplies are being used.

Initial word is that 16 children are sick here, but countless more adults are overwhelming the hospital. While this island is clearly dry even following t

he rainy season, many mosquitoes have found places to thrive. The first line of defense - DEET-based spray - is our constant companion.

“We do not have a housing problem.  We have an income problem.”

I was glad to hear this coming from Chatham Selectman Sean Summers recently.

In 2001, the first meeting I attended as a newly-minted selectman, outside my own board, was for the affordable housing committee.  I had always been proud of Chatham’s support for efforts to retain its working families.  It stood in such stark contrast to the out-of-town stereotyping that CHATHAM = RICH = CONSERVATIVE = HEARTLESS SNOBS.

However, over the years I’ve seen plenty of the housing for working people in town get redeveloped into high-end second homes, little by little, with little if any regard as to the cumulative effect on the community.  “What difference is just this going to make?” goes the argument.  This is how a town dies.

Meanwhile, as housing costs doubled, tripled, I saw wages stagnate and even fall.  More and more of the town was being covered in living space, and less and less of it was intended for or within reach of the people who lived and worked here.

I write this in the aftermath of our last town meeting.  But I raise this not to talk about the failure of affordable housing amendments to pass.  Rather, there’s a more important impact on Chatham’s housing that did pass – sewers.

Just as town water coming to a neighborhood allowed houses to be built on lots without regard to the proximity of a septic system to a well, by addressing our wastewater needs, we face some very serious side effects. With sewers, homes can now be built without worrying about the impact of their septic systems on the environment.

Yes, in years past we’ve seen a bylaw amendment enacted that would prohibit greater building on a lot that is newly sewered than was allowed prior to its sewering. But then, we’ve recently seen that Dunkin Donuts is not fast food, and an attempt to push poor families into our industrial zone (established because such uses were incompatible with residential areas).  There is a very human urge to fully exploit a public convenience when given the opportunity to make a private profit.

Hence, density will increase.  It is necessary to plan for the impacts, yet we seem stymied by a system that the public perceives as too closely affected by large property owners in town, and driven pell-mell towards a goal of 10 percent affordable housing so as to fit into a one-size-fits-all mandate by the state. In other words, not just doing the right thing for the wrong reason, but looking as if it was being done it for all the worst reasons.

There are many good reasons to assure that working people can live here.  Continuity.  Stability.  Fairness.  Hope.

But sadly we’ve continued to address just one side of the equation: lowering housing costs to match what our current local economy pays.  There seems to be no effort whatsoever to improve and diversify the economy.   Any talk of it seems to have the greatest thinking of the mid-20th century behind it, “General Motors is not going to build a factory here.”  That’s no news flash.  As if heavy industry is the only solution to improving a local economy.

Our national economy is changing.  We need to adapt.  We’ve heard time and time again that young people – whose education we’ve spent good money on — are leaving the Cape because they want more than waiting tables, swinging a hammer or making beds.  There are plenty of expensive, gorgeous places in this country where smart people move to start businesses because they are encouraged by these communities.

Meanwhile, there just seems something very wrong that two of the largest employers in town are Chatham Bars Inn and town government.

If asked, most people here would agree that any healthy town needs more balance in its economy and its people.  Educationally, we’re not a backward town by any measure, but there seems to be mulish unwillingness to look any further than addressing state mandates with short-term fixes.

We should not be looking to solve the problems others say we have.  We should be planning for what is inevitable (a rapid growth in density), and for what we all agree is a public priority (a way people can afford to live here).  If we start a public dialogue now, we might just be able to come up with some creative solutions, perhaps many small ideas, that can put us back in charge of our future.

MARSHFIELD – It was standing-room-only at the Ventress Memorial Library this past Wednesday.  Like nothing we ever expected, the premiere of the first installment of Hit and Run History: The Columbia Expedition went off with a bang.

With the first of the daffodil shoots foolishly poking out from the until-now frozen earth, Sofie and I have returned to the back yard for our major activities.  Clearing the sleds from under the blue spruce.  Trimming back the weaker of the branches on the pear trees.  Making a final decision on the location of that next thornless blackberry bush.  Picking up remnants of dog toys, and rescuing those still intact from the inevitable mower blade.

It is a time for spring cleaning.  Having spent the fall and winter on a creative project, I am faced with the myriad tasks that must be done — best be done now, than to be discovered in the summer in a panic.  Where is the tent?  I thought we had charcoal in this closet… somewhere.  The bicycle pump, you say?  I know we have two of them.  Try under the Christmas lights.

Not to even get into boat-prep issues.  That’s a column unto itself.

As described a few months ago, when working alone outside, podcasts like American Public Media’s Marketplace keep me company.  It has really kept me on top of business and economic issues just as they are at the forefront of public consciousness.  So it is an astounding contrast, too, the degrees to which some public officials seem to be far, far behind the curve.

There appears to be a complete unwillingness to see the current economic conditions as anything more than a departure from the norm.  Something that will “gotten over” in the matter of a few months, rather than a major correction — by that term meaning we now quickly return to the way things should have been all along.

This is not a departure down; rather the recent prosperity was a departure up.  Consumers stopped saving anything in the past decade and borrowed too much.  Optimism to spend, as recently prescribed by a sadly-misguided County Commissioner Bill Doherty, is not going to pull us out of this situation.  Toxic assets will become safer when all borrowers actually pay their debts off — first.

The sad reality is that plenty of service-based businesses were founded here and nationwide, based upon increasing affluence.  We have come to realize that much of this affluence was an illusion.  For example, buyers were willing to pay $2 million for a second home on the Cape because a) the value of their 401k was expected to only increase, b) the Cape house could always be rented seasonally at a high rate, and c) the buyer’s primary residence would fetch a high price when sold for the inevitable retirement here.

Now two of those legs have been kicked out from that three-legged stool (and the third may be just as illusory).  Optimism had brought the home price to a level as unsustainable as the rest of the economy.  As reality sets in, the price has dropped to a truer value set by that smaller pool of buyers who still possess the resources to purchase.

Yet too many of leaders in government, to varying degrees insulated from the gyrations of the private economy by the inviolate perks of public benefits, still fail to grasp three basic truths:

First, their constituents now have less money.

Second, that any money their constituents struggle to earn in these tough times should be saved.

And third, this is how it is going to be for a couple years, at least. As Olivier Blanchard, the IMF’s new Director of Research, told The Economist just last week, “We are closer to the beginning than we are to the end.”

Once this sort of mental spring cleaning — looking at what is actually around us, what we have and what we don’t, what still works and what is irreparably broken — hopefully will lead to some serious planning for the knock-on effects of what is being called our “Deprecession.”

For example, history tells us that in tough times, more shellfish permits are issued.  Yet the price of shellfish has stayed stagnant or even gone down, partly due to a lack of economic planning for increased supply.

Or with decreased household income, expect that many more local high school graduates will attending Cape Cod Community College (regardless of whether they were accepted to four-year schools off-Cape).  That means more 18 to 22 year olds here through the winter.  They will be needing jobs that provide a regular income.  Regular, as in a regular wage with regular hours, not seasonally tip-based gigs.

(Note:  They will not be needing housing.  They’ll be saving money by staying at home.)

These are but two examples, and are not the usual bad economy-homeless shelter-food pantry concerns.  The needs of middle class people who live here – yes, residents – are calling out to be addressed by our towns.  Now.

Nostalgia for the goods times won’t cut it, nor will unfounded optimism.  Spring is the time to re-assess.  And we need to get to work.

Or, “For What?”

At half past five the other night

After long work hours and sleeping tight

A call awoke me from sound sleep

To tell me news of snow too deep.

Too deep for school, so we must not

endanger all our tiny tots.

The voice of Dr. Lanzo said,

Read from a text pre-recor-ded.

Delayed, her message, school will be

To ease our morning misery.

Yet after only five hours slumber

I saw a test — which was dumber:

To heed an off-Cape weatherman

And, like a gaped, unthinking fan

Take as gospel his frantic warning

Of drifts chest-high, come eight next morning,

Or, instead, remember here

In Chatham, with Gulf Stream so near

It is as sure to pull the mercury

above freezing, with no threat to me.

No threat to me, no threat to us,

No threat to children on a bus. 

So, now, awake, I lay in bed,

And watched a sky, without fear or dread.

Concern, instead I felt for thee,

Who art compensated hourly.

Those parents who, with grit and grime

Make privately money with their time.

So when it rained, instead, this day

The pointlessness of the delay

Hit home most painfully, you know 

By those who aren’t afraid of snow.

We are not scared, it does snow here.

This is New England, which is most clear.

We have the smarts, we have the tools,

To keep the roads up for our schools.

This timidity runs counter to

A tougher people here who grew

Up bearing skiffs into the sea

With every bit of dignity.

The safety argument does not fly 

We had snow here in days gone by

But then, no antilock brakes, no air bags

And still school commenced, without these lags.

Please, let us be a town that works

Instead of where suspicion lurks,

For in dire times you come to ask

Us to fund your educational tasks.

In budget times this spring you’ll say

You need still more cash to pay 

For programs and the salaries

Of you and your employees.

So here’s a fact of school delayed:

If we don’t work, we don’t get paid.

That you cancel school in this season, 

For mere threat of snow is beyond reason.

You waste our money, you waste our time

So we may not be able to spare a dime.

Every public servant should be awares

Of their constituency’s needs and cares.

But still, if you must heed the forecaster’s lies,

Set a good example and apologize.