6/22 A day in Barre

Yesterday, Susan and I decided to travel around my home town of Barre, and see how the local business’ were doing. We started out at The Wayside on the Barre-Montpelier road, where Susan just got off the phone with our campaign manager, John. Jeb Spaulding had just endorsed Shumlin calling him a moderate, and apparently some in the media had already started predicting that the entire world was going to collapse around the campaign.

Susan and I decided the best way to deal with the oncoming political apocalypse was to go in and eat. Literally as soon as we walked in the door, one of the staff at the Wayside, a woman named Theresa, came over introduced herself and said she was a supporter. I guess she didn’t get the message our campaign was doomed.
After a good meal from the Wayside, we headed out to downtown Barre, and I was happy to have recruited another volunteer.

The first store we stopped at was Boisvert’s, but they were extremely busy so we headed one down to Nelsons Hardware. At Nelsons, Susan met a few people, and we headed down to Poolmart, where we met someone working there who I had gone to high school with. He said he was in the Air Force and was about to drive down to Texas in about a month. Susan and I must have talked to him and the store owner for over a half-hour, about everything from how business was slow, to what to do about the number of ex-convicts in downtown Barre. We stopped at all sorts of places for a education in how businesses are doing in Barre City. Barre Books, Lubianas Bridal and the new Bridal store in town were all doing well which was encouraging. We also had many stores tell us that this year wasn’t great, but they were holding on, and it was better than last summer. I guess with this economy that can be considered good news.

The highlight of the trip was the last two places we stopped at. Susan had never been to the Local Agricultural Community Exchange (LACE) which opened up a few years ago. She was thirsty and so we went in and I had a root beer. We were enjoying good cold soda on a hot day when she pulled out her Blackberry and read the final version of the press release that her and John put together, “ …. Being a moderate is about your approach to finding solutions and building consensus. A moderate bases decisions on information, not ideology and looks for solutions without preconceived ideas” I don’t think anyone who knows Susan would disagree that’s how she is. I thought it was well done.

After LACE, we passed by Studio Place Arts and decided to see what was inside. I am not an artsy person but they have just a fantastic display of all kinds of historical art about the anarchists of Barre. Perhaps it was just my love of history, but it was really cool. On the other floors we saw some beautifully done stain glass windows, and I guess you would call it, 21st century art on skateboards. Arguably most impressive was some of the local art drawn by kids at Barre Town and Barre City Elementary school. As someone who still struggles with stick-figures, I could not believe how talented some 4th-8th graders were.

Andrew Desmarais
Deputy Field Director
Susan Bartlett Campaign