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.

The most recent solution-in-search-of-a-problem championed by the local media is regionalization of government services. Sewers. Fire. Police. Schools.

Now, I am sure there are some savings that can be found when you have over a dozen municipalities occupying an area roughly the same square mileage and population as Jacksonville, Florida.

But the justification for regionalization now seems to be that this will help stem the tide of young adults leaving Cape Cod. Like maybe lower taxes? Or better schools because they’re bigger and cheaper? Sorry, I’m trying to play devil’s advocate here, but coming from a small town with a very low tax rate, by this reasoning we should have tons of young families. Instead, we’re the oldest town in the state. Maybe we’re just not doing it BIG ENOUGH?

This is how I summed up a query on Facebook, posted to friends who grew up on the Cape but have since moved away these two questions:  1) Why did you leave? and, 2) What would induce you to return?

The answers were not terribly surprising.  Not having any 4-year institution of higher learning in the area, many said they went away to school and then became ensconced wherever they were.  They liked what they found in the wider world.

It may sound heretical in this resort community, but yes, there are many, many other beautiful places in the world.  They are as much in competition with us for tourists as for that most locally-undervalued person – the full-time, year-round, wage-earning 25-45 year-old resident.

But, greater, was a theme of opportunity.  Specifically, one respondent answered why she left Cape Cod:

• a) Nowhere to work
• b) Nowhere to work in winter (yes, two things entirely)
• c) No career opportunities (see a and b)
• d) Its once cool austerity and grittiness has been replaced with cheesy gift shops and “quaint” cuteness imported from cities in an attempt to make it something it’s not
• e) Arts, shopping, etc.

She went onto explain, “I’ve lived in NYC for over 16 years. My living space is extremely small, my housing expenses astronomical and taxes are through the roof-BUT I have opportunity here — to make money, work in any industry (almost) I choose. Almost everything is accessible. I sorely miss the ocean, but the benefits outweigh the costs. Lower taxes and better schools would never entice me to move back. Even if housing were free, it would still make more financial sense to pay $90 per square foot and live some place where I could make a living. Simple as that.”

As for what would get her to move back:  “Jobs, jobs and jobs.”

Another friend who has worked both on and off-Cape (and likes performing those small town self-services like bringing his own trash to the dump), has the skills to earn much more elsewhere.  But the opportunities just aren’t there for his highly-trained spouse.

Talking directly to my concern, he observed, “Regionalization of services is a partial solution to budget woes, but it’s long-term and painful, and it’s not at all a reason someone moves to an area.”

Now, certainly this is an unscientific sampling, and I do not pass this off as representative of a cross-section of the Cape Cod Diaspora.  But they are for the most part well-educated, high earning, upstanding, responsible adults.  Just the sort of people you would want living next door, who on those rainy days when you get back from the supermarket and are trying to get everything inside, offer to lend a hand.  Or when the power goes out.  Or to check on your house when you’re on vacation.

The media here on the Cape have failed its expatriate children by failing to ask them what THEY WANT.  Instead, powers-that-be have announced what they are willing to do: make local government more efficient by making it bigger.  I’m reminded of a quote from the movie “Contact” – “First rule in government spending: why build one when you can have two at twice the price?”

Specifically, and to its credit, The Chronicle has deflated the argument that there will be any reduction of costs by regionalizing Chatham and Harwich schools.  That there would be a greater benefit to students by more educational programs is, however highly dubious.  Perhaps marginally, but no serious claims are being made that SAT scores will jump, or we’ll be getting state of the art gymnasium or science lab.

Worse, the “big schools” idea flies in the face of reams of studies that suggest what parents and teachers want most, and the environment in which students thrive best, are small, neighborhood schools with low teacher-pupil ratios.  So even if the argument is that better schools will attract more families to move here, we’re offering a Chevy Suburban when the customer clearly wants a Toyota Prius.  They want smaller, not bigger.  More control, not less.

I am concerned that what really is going on is yet another lurch away from Town Meeting control of any budgetary issues.  When regionalized, a bill for the service is simply rendered upon the Town.  Voters on the floor of Town Meeting do not have the chance, as they do with a purely-municipal budget item, to pick apart the budget, item-by-item.  With regionalization, those who work for the larger bureaucracy serve a larger population — and thus, are accountable to virtually no one.

In essence, we would be going in the opposite direction of what is most desired by those we so righteously protest to help.  But if we are serious about returning to a more balanced community, welcoming those of all ages, the answer bears repeating: “Jobs, jobs and jobs.”

Read this and other columns online at The Cape Cod Chronicle.

Ginger likes her sweater.  I think. Now, I’ve never been one of those dog people who dressed up their dogs to look like little versions of themselves.  No leather jackets.  No sweatsuits emblazoned with a sports team logo. No doggy raincoats, with matching rain hat and rubber boots.  Come to think of it, since the buttons of the last one rusted off, I haven’t even owned a raincoat.  So that’s not exactly an accurate comparison.

But last Christmas, Sofie asked about a present for our two Cardigan Welsh Corgis, Ginger and Colby.  They are sister and brother, but from different litters, and have served not only as surrogate siblings to Sofie, but as comedy team, always ready for her amusement.  Used for herding cattle and ponies in Wales, the breed are working dogs that get a little antsy when they can’t keep an eye on us.  When Sofie was just learning to use a real bed, Ginger slept on the bed while Colby slept underneath.

So when Sofie expressed a desire – no, the expectation – that she should give them a gift for Christmas, it only seemed right. Standing there, in PetSmart in Hyannis, faced by all sorts of dress-up gear for the latest fashionable toy breed.

Oh, sure, they have short legs, but they are otherwise medium-sized dogs.  Colby’s head is almost as big as a German Shepherd and I’ve seen him turn things like femurs and brake handles into tiny bits in the blink of an eye.  So they clothing that caught Sofie’s eye were on the disappointingly small size.

The only thing we could be certain of was a pink and purple striped sweater.  Fully aware of Ginger’s gender, Sofie agreed this was just the thing. Colby could have an extra cow hoof in his stocking, to make up for it.  Nature provided him with a much heavier coat, anyway.

So on Christmas Day last year, I became A Guy Who Dresses Up His Dog.  It fit, which was a relief, I suppose — not like there was any other clothing we could exchange it for.  Ginger didn’t try to get out of it, she didn’t carry in mud and leaves from outside (any more than on her feet), and it didn’t shrink.  In fact, she seemed less agitated and more restful, which I chalk up to drowsiness – always a good thing in the other occupants of a writer’s home.

And then a couple weeks ago, we took a walk down to the Chatham Bakery, with Sofie handling Ginger’s leash like a pro. Because of the dog, we ate our Gingerbread cookies at the picnic table out front.  With all eyes at the booths inside the bakery looking out at us, it was clear I had become THE Guy Who Dresses Up His Dog.

Oh, the shame of it all.

It is just a long, slow descent into a world of rhinestone leash with matching collar and tiara, patent-leather Mary Janes, and fancifully-flowered sunhats.  I flash-forward to a day not too long from now, when I would be clipping Ginger’s claws and wonder if it would ruin her French manicure.

Really, this anxiety is all after-the-fact, of course.  As a father’s indulgence to his five year-old, the cost to my male pride was fairly insignificant.  You pretty much have to set aside all pretense when you have a child, more so with a daughter. Even more so as the single father of a little girl.  I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve left the house forgetting that just a little while earlier I’d had my hair done up.  Sofie’s insistence notwithstanding, pink barrettes apparently do NOT complement my eyes.

Still, I’m looking for Colby to redeem the male-ness around here.  Christmas may have come and gone, but the sales are just beginning.  Big black leather collar with plenty of spikes should do it — something coyote-busting.

Yet, it is not that easy, when considering Sofie.  Such an accessory would put an end to her near-hourly hugs that squeeze the pulse out of him. I’m more worried about the underside of her mattress getting torn up.  We might have to pull it back a little.  Aviator sunglasses?  Nah.  A shoulder holster?  Might work.  A black Led Zeppelin T-shirt?  Not bad.  But I draw the line at rhinestones.

Over a dozen years ago, when I was on a research trip to Vancouver, BC for “The Bostoner,” friends invited me to a dinner party. At some point in the evening, I looked down and realized I was the person out of the six seated at the table who still had food on my plate. While everyone else had been eating, I’d been talking.

Quickly, I apologized for gabbing on so, and dug into my food. Our hostess quickly dismissed this by saying, “Oh, no, it is all very entertaining.” Then she turned to her other guests, explaining, “You see, he comes from a cold, dark little land where all the people have to get them through their miserable winters is to tell stories to each other. They’ve developed quite a gift for it.”

How’s that for an image of the Cape? I would have nearly bit my fork in half if there hadn’t been a fair bit of truth to this. Spinning yarns, fish stories and more than good-natured ribbing are hallmarks of those who have spent a good deal of time here.

Part of it is that history goes back a long way here, relative to the rest of the country. Some families have been here for well over 300 years. The first hundred would have been accompanied by a single book, the bible, for diversion. That leads to a great deal of invention outside of that medium.

Then there’s the relationship with the sea. There’s always something unexpected happening out on the water, which means something to talk about. On the other hand, while one is working, talking can make the time go faster. When clamming with Jamie Bassett, we’d get to analyzing some movie or changing the lyrics of popular tunes to reflect clamming culture, when all of a sudden Scott Eldredge, our patron, would forbid us from speaking another word.

We would look up and realize our chatter was causing other diggers to creep closer, to hear what we were saying. That’s a compliment to our entertainment value, but when you’re working a productive flat, the last thing you want is close company. This pre-dated waterproof headsets and iPods.

Then, of course, there’s the fact that when the world comes to stay with you for the summer, they want to know about the place. That can lead to stories. Many is the young local who has found himself invited to a rather posh cocktail party with his survival dependent upon his ability to talk entertainingly about what growing up here was like. More than likely, our real estate industry seems to have used this approach as a business model.

We tell good stories. For the most part, we don’t need to make anything up, either.

I was reminded of this yet again during a documentary scouting trip to the North Shore. Returning to thesubject of “The Bostoner” – the Columbia Expedition of 1787 – it begins with another great storyteller, Captain John Kendrick, who grew up on the shores of Pleasant Bay. One of the expedition’s two vessels, the sloop Lady Washington, was supposedly built on the Essex River. So I found myself at the Essex Shipbuilding Museum, interviewing their researcher, Justin Demetri, while two other of Chatham’s native sons were working at telling the story. Even though they are using the latest technology, Matt Griffin as cameraman and Chris LeClaire as set photographer were doing no different than generations before them.

Setting the scene. Telling stories about the sea, ships and the people who sailed them. Me, I just yak away with whomever is put in front of me. It takes real talent to step back, assess the situation, and focus on exactly the best way to convey what is really going on.

The technology of digital imaging, through still images or video, certainly allows users to go from neophyte to semi-pro in the matter of weeks. But there is no software program for talent. There is no hi-tech gadget or web site that confers creativity upon the user.

This homegrown resource is unique, and for the most part, completely overlooked and uncultivated. At best, young, talented and creative people are told they should leave to pursue their craft. Any other place this side of the Middle Ages would be falling all over themselves to find ways to staunch the brain drain. Yet a few hang on.

Let’s not kid ourselves, though. They remain for their own reasons, not ours. Our storytellers are willing to continue here not because of how we have preserved this place, but despite our inability to do so.

Here’s a practical lesson that the current incarnation of our Charter Review Committee can take from last week’s election:

Last spring while stuck in a slowdown on Route 28 in East Falmouth, I decided to stop idling the car and to pull into Mahoney’s to get a little greenery for our yard. Since our place was built, a sloping escarpment of bare clay has taunted me through the kitchen window. Vegetables didn’t quite work there. Sunflowers looked nice, and the passing birds loved them. But I grew up on Oyster Pond, surrounded by wild berries of all kinds, so it was not surprising I walked out with a small thornless blackberry bush.

Two weeks later, I swung into Crocker’s in Brewster and picked up a mate, just in case it needed a pollinator. Later in the season, we harvested a grand total of four blackberries. I hadn’t planned on any the first year, so this was a real treat.

All this summer, Sofie and I have watched our bounty grow. From the kitchen counter, while nursing bowls of cereal, we have seen these two sprouting hydras blossom and produce clusters of red berries. Waiting for them to ripen into sweet black fruit seems to have taken forever. But two weeks ago we were finally able to find a few that came off the stem with the slightest tug. Terrific taste — and no thorns — and perfectly formed fruit. We end up with a couple handfuls every other day.

I made a bet with Sofie that all our blackberries would be done by the time she started kindergarten. It is a good thing for me that we didn’t actually wager anything. They just continue to come, apparently feeding on nothing more than sunlight and dew. As the wild blackberries we find along our bike rides pass away, our own domesticated bushes continue to produce dessert after dessert. One can only imagine how profuse next summer and fall will be.

If only our local economy showed such adaptability. Throughout our history, inhabitants here learned to be flexible. The soil is relatively poor, the location is off the beaten path, and the harbors are shallow and bounded by sandbars. If it hadn’t been for the fish, nobody would have been here to greet the Pilgrims. And most of their descendants got out as soon as they could, too.

Farming didn’t last long. Salt works lasted until mines were found in Pennsylvania. Whaling worked until the oil came along (and whales didn’t anymore). We had a naval air base until peacetime precluded the need for it. The railroad brought tourists here until the automobile killed that. And now our tourist-based economy is in its throes.

Note that I do not say “death throes.” Just massive changes. These changes are completely beyond the control of the local or state tourism entities, and the forces that drive them are as sympathetic to the plights of an innkeeper or restaurateurs as a hurricane.

Gas costs at least twice as much as it did just a few years ago. People do not have disposable income, so they cut back on trips to the Cape, or on the extras once they get there, like eating out and shopping. On the other hand, Europeans have flooded in with a healthy euro-to-dollar exchange rate. Establishing a business model on a favorable international exchange rate is as wise as it would be to base it upon a finite supply of imported labor whose entry is controlled completely by a federal security bureaucracy. From a gardening perspective, that’s like replanting your entire yard with annuals every year — it is going to look like hell if your garden shop runs out of inventory.

Meanwhile, consider this investment. If Sofie goes to Chatham public schools until she graduates, that will be an investment of at least $100,000 of the taxpayer’s money. Driving over the Sagamore Bridge on Labor Day (a very light traffic count), I saw a few cars loaded with bags destined for one college or another.

The kids in those cars are almost certainly never going to return to live here permanently, and that is an entirely rational decision. Why go deep into debt for college just to come back to a place where breaking your back is required to just get by? We’re losing millions and millions of dollars of long-term capital investment every year. Meanwhile every year our wholesale dependence on a seasonal economy that can be disrupted by something as simple as a few rainy weeks grows more precarious.

Our supposed affluence, measured in what someone from California or Washington, D.C. is willing to spend to buy your modest ranch or Cape, has brought very little lasting benefit to our middle-class families.

We need to diversify our economy to recapture the investment we’ve made in human capital. We need to see that the way to empower people is not impose limits on their income so they can qualify for health insurance and housing. We need to find new avenues that allow people to remain in Chatham year-round, to make the same paycheck they do in January as they do in July, to afford a home without public subsidy, to go out to restaurants and otherwise spend their money here, at home.

Consider that just across the Canal, a huge film complex, Plymouth Rock Studios, is being built that will transform the economy of Southeastern New England. Now at current gas prices, that’s too much of a hike from Chatham. But what local venues will be used for movies and television shows filmed there? There’s a short list: Provincetown, Woods Hole, the National Seashore, Route 6A. Oh, and Chatham. Not for one film. Not for just one time in a few years. More than likely on a regular basis.

Moreover, this is an industry that spawns numerous cottage businesses through subcontracts. With the advance of film technology, there’s no reason why some of what is shot here couldn’t be further developed right here. A non-polluting, non-disruptive, well-paid knowledge and creative economy. Year-round.

That is not at odds with the tourism sector of our economy. It supports it. This is but one example.

Too often when discussing economic development, the public (and sadly, our leaders) thinks in terms of heavy industry. But that’s not where we are going, locally or nationally. Not everything works well forever. Not even blackberries.

This week’s featured op-ed at The Cape Cod Chronicle.

I’m not sure about the garden this year. Last year, we attempted green beans but something’s changed in the soil around our place and the fertile spot that, as a child, kept me well-stocked through the fall and winter now produces, at best, scraggly weeds.

Perhaps I could find another spot in the yard. With food prices going up, up, up, and quality heading in the other direction, there’s a good motivation to grow our own. But age and necessity have provided another option, and its proven a real hit with our house: bread.

While our family was stationed in Germany a few years back, we had plenty of opportunity to enjoy the high quality and low price of food found at the regular supermarket. Massive heads of Boston lettuce for less than a buck. Scores of potato dishes or frozen vegetable mixtures that you’d have to go to a five-star restaurant to beat. A single aisle dedicated to yogurt — none of it low-fat, and all of it better tasting than any pudding or ice cream. The only thing they couldn’t seem to manage were simple orange juice and a decent steak.

But it was the bread that I remember the best. I don’t even remember how many varieties there were at the tiny bakeries on street corners, never mind the ones inside the large supermarkets (even Walmart). All of it fantastic, and all of it cheap.

Three long pepperoni twisted rolls for less than $2. Baguettes with no preservatives that stayed fresh for days. Large crusty white rolls, which proved a godsend to a teething Sofie, for only 10 cents. And sunflower seed bread so dense with kernels that it was referred to as an “egel” (hedgehog).

Main ingredients: flour, salt, water, yeast. Not very hi-tech. But even the worst bread here costs twice as much as another First World country, that at the time had almost $4 gas but managed $1 bread.

But I put up with it. That is until gas went above $3. Some switch must have tripped been tripped, and I broke out the until-then-unused German bread recipe book. First up was the sunflower hedgehog. That required sourdough. Real sourdough. Couldn’t find it anywhere, so I finally found a recipe to make it.

I never knew it could take so long and so much effort to make something go bad. Once we added it to the bread batter, the question arose whether it had gone bad in the right way. What if it went bad 
badly? Would it make us sick?

Being the only man in a house full of women, the only answer I could come up with was, “Heat kills everything.” Besides, I was hungry.

And it does. We ended up with an oblong brick, which while tasty, was heavy enough to be classified as a deadly weapon if raised in anger. It takes two rounds on our toaster set on high to get it warmed up enough to spread anything on it. And, as far as I can tell, it has bran or any other fiber beat — use with caution.

Our attempts at white bread have been even more tasty, but far more benign and breathtakingly simple. With an active and hungry five-year-old around, this stuff goes quickly. It also makes a fun Sunday morning ritual — baking day. Kneading is the best part.  There’s little better for a kid than to sink their hands into sweet-smelling goo.

So reflecting on the possibility of the garden, it may lie fallow this year, replaced by the bread stone. I’ll happily trade away the damage done to my back and knees in a garden for a few minutes of pounding dough. The onset of old age may have been the reasons human went from hunter-gatherers to baking grains in the first place.

Now if we can just set up a barter this summer with a gardener with an excess of cucumbers, tomatoes or green beans…

First, I should point out that my brother, Stephen Buckley, is running for Selectman in Chatham. That said, I don’t speak for him and he does not speak for me. There are two other candidates, V. Michael Onnembo and Leonard Sussman. Mike Onnembo ran for selectman here before, and was very supportive of my run for State Rep. in 2006.

Sussman, an architect, has lived in town for five years and is now chairman of the Planning Board. Over the past year, I’ve heard him make some statements that seem to show a certain distance from reality, or at least the reality I tried to represent when I was on the Board of Selectman. Like his claim that the number of people in town has not increased in 30 years. Or that there has been no increase in the number of professionals telecommuting.

Now I can differ with someone, for sure, and still respect them. But it was his absolute certainty in his point of view, to the exclusion of anyone else’s that I have come to find disturbing. And more than a hint of condescension.

So it caught my attention when, at the Selectman Candidates Forum, Democrat Len Sussman questioned whether Chatham even wants a year-round economy, believing a poll should first be conducted. As if this were some strange and foreign concept, and not something the Cape Cod Commission and other demographers have had on the front burner for the past decade.

Sussman went on to say that more affordable housing should be built to attract hi-tech workers making $75,000 to $80,000 (despite their not being eligible due to their higher incomes).

This really is quite sad, because this shows of indifference or ignorance that there actually might be people who have to work for a living in Chatham and struggle to do so in the face of similar costs of living as Boston but on 40% less pay. Meaning, families here end up having to work harder to make more money just to keep out of poverty — but once they do, they are ineligible for low-income housing that counts towards the state-mandated cap under Chapter 40B.

Chatham has a good track record of supporting housing for working families, giving special preference to those with a strong local connection. Lately, however, the Board of Selectmen has allowed its eye to be taken off the ball, and has come to incorrectly believe that such preferences are illegal and unconstitutional. Rather, they are less profitable for developers looking for government subsidies given for low income tenants only.

While increasing supply of units is helpful, it would be encouraging if the town would return to the idea that better jobs mean a better community. Since I graduated from high school in 1984, I don’t think a child attended Chatham Schools who hadn’t wished that there was a better hope for a job than waiting tables or pushing a mower.

I would prefer to live in a place where people had jobs paid enough to afford buy a home (or even rent). Instead, the new attitude of wealthy retired and semi-retired professionals who came to Chatham for an affluent lifestyle that I never knew or agreed to be a part of, could make that snobby reputation we so-richly did not deserve real.

Young college-educated professionals can’t find a life here? Let them eat cake.

Thus our middle class — those at the heart of our community — whither.

At the Easter Egg hunt in Chase Park, I ran into Tim Wood and Rowan and asked if they’d seen Sofie. Having just turned five, she’s just a little younger than Rowan. So Tim’s alarm was understandable, figuring I had lost her somewhere in the crowd.

I allayed his concern, explaining, “No, I dropped off her and Chandra here and then parked around the corner.” Glancing about at the gathered masses of kids and parents, I added, “It shouldn’t be too hard to find Chandra in this crowd.” To which Tim had to agree.

And yet, I still had a problem finding the woman I’ve been seeing for three years now – a black woman – in a small park in Chatham. She has the ability to effortlessly dematerialize, which may come from her growing up in Dorchester. It was particularly uncanny in this day’s sea of otherwise pale faces.

So as the candidacy of Barack Obama has risen, and then taken on directly issues of race in America, it has come at a time of increasing seriousness in my relationship with a professional, masters-educated journalist and health care writer, who is also black. Both having a great interest in politics, but being of opposite parties, we’ve become each other’s sounding boards for discussions on television news, talk radio and blogs. Closer to home, however, race is an issue in talking about our future.

The theme common to both the presidential campaigns and any future Chandra and I may have is that race is an unresolved issue in America. Not just in East Crackerbarrell, Georgia, but here on Cape Cod. That makes people uncomfortable. It makes me uncomfortable. But in a small place, it is pretty clear when someone is being treated differently.

One early summer evening two years ago, while I was handing out balloons at a Cardinals game in Orleans, Chandra took Sofie to the playground at the opposite end of Eldredge Park. As expected the place was crawling with kids, parents and grandparents. Done with my campaigning, I came over to relieve Chandra from watching Sofie, who was playing with another little girl. I was dressed well, as was Chandra (as always). She went over to a large planter surrounding a tree nearby.

As she did so, the father of the girl Sofie was playing with looked up, looked over at Chandra, looked over at his wife and yelled to her to move their bag, which was eight feet away on the other side of the planter in plain site. This, after she had been there half an hour already with God knows how many other people around. Perhaps the guy realized that he had left his personal possessions exposed – but it took the presence of someone dark skinned nearby to them that flipped his mental switch.

I’d never seen this before. Not blatantly. Perhaps that’s the beauty of growing up in an almost 100 percent white town. You never get bald-faced bigotry demonstrated to you for the simple reason there are no potential victims.

But before the smug that-doesn’t-happen-here attitude kicks in, consider this: More than a few times, we’ve been out at the beach or playground with Sofie – my blond-haired, blue-eyed Alpine princess – and when it has been time to go, another parent will refer to Chandra as Sofie’s mommy. It is not the same parent every time. But every time it happens, the person is white, and is from a large metropolitan area much more diverse than here.

Contrast this with Chandra’s reception here by locals. She’s followed around stores by otherwise inattentive clerks. She’s asked what inn she works at. She’s solicited for cleaning Saturday changeovers. In the fall people ask her when she’s going back. Friends of mine who would come from Jamaica for summer work said this was regular rapport with white people here. So when Chandra is with Sofie, she’s often asked if she is the new au pair. Too often, her experience being black in Chatham has been to be seen first as a servant.

For a person who grew up in the poor all-white town of Chatham, I see that as quite a step. Backward. If that is uncomfortable to read, it is worse to live with. And like concrete, once set, a public perception is tough to change.

When she studied in London, Chandra saw a city where interracial couples were practically the rule. To a lesser extent, it is becoming more common in the U.S. So, as Barack Obama said, the situation is not static. Attitudes are changing, slowly, on both sides. It may take a whole generation of biracial children to break the silent stalemate between those who say “Let go of the past,” and those who answer, “But it just happened five minutes ago – again!”

I hope for that. At some point, being black in America will be no different than being Italian or Irish. Or, like Sofie, part Mexican, part Austrian, part old-line Yankee. Someday. It has taken longer, though, and that’s because they were the original easily-discernible underclass. The nation, as a whole, has had two chances to get it right – first with the Constitution, and second after the Civil War – but ditched it for political expediency.

To be fascinated by American history is to be fascinated with the issue of race. It is a stubborn thing, and an uncomfortable thing. Though I want it to be assigned to history – and history alone – as I go forward with Chandra, the question of race come down to this:

If Sofie were to have a brother or sister, would that son or daughter of mine, more likely to look like her mother or the junior Senator from Illinois, be treated the same by my country and my community?

I’d like to say yes. But the answer today, uncomfortably, is no.

Note:  This column was written and submitted just prior to the announcement that the H2B visa cap had been reached on January 2.