Thanks for reading my blog - I get more readers every month and it's very exciting. I would love to hear from you with comments or suggestions. I would especially love to have some more contributors. Would someone be willing to write recipe posts every week? Restaurant, book, movie or music reviews? Reviews of stores, businesses or services in the Upper Valley? Would someone like to write for the court reports? I have a fulltime job and cannot cover actual court proceedings - but if someone wanted to do that, it would make the blog more meaningful. I can only cover the arraignments. It would be interesting to be able to follow a couple of the cases through to completion.
I try to post a history and a court report every Sunday. Sometimes (like this week), I'm really busy and don't get to post until later in the week. I look forward to posting on Sundays so that I can see how my readership has grown from the week before. Things have been hard the last couple of weeks and this blog is a bright spot in my life.
It would be even better to see some comments. And really, post or email me at uppervalleyanonymous@gmail.com if you would be willing to contribute to the blog. Everyone in the Upper Valley has something to contribute. It's not about the ideas, it's about the time.
I have been spending a lot of time in Manchester, New Hampshire, helping someone out who has been recently released from prison. The more time I spend down there, the more I realize that the Upper Valley has amazing services for the people among us who are having problems. The Listen Centers are really helpful. I've been shopping at Listen for 20 years, and totally take it for granted that we have amazing thrift stores here. Not only the two Listen Centers, but the Good Buy Store and the Salvation Army. Other places don't have this, and people with less resources are forced to stick to Wal-Mart and K-Mart, where you spend a lot more money for a lot less quality.
It is so amazing that we can ride around the three towns on Advance Transit for free. I have also used Advance Transit in the past, and it is a fun and free way to get around. When I was riding the bus a lot I made friends with the other riders and with the drivers. Another thing we take for granted.
And our libraries. I have been a library hound for years and always feel welcome every time I go to a library. Now I have high speed internet, but when I didn't, I used the internet in the West Leb library- what a beautiful place that is -, the Lebanon library, the Hartford library, and the library I actually belong to, the Norwich library. I have always felt comfortable and valued in all of our libraries. In Manchester, you have to have a library card to use the facility, and in order to get a library card, you have to have a state-issued picture ID, and there are signs up everywhere stating this. There are two places to plug in your computer in the entire place. Both the Norwich and Hartford libraries have way more plug ins than that, and they are small libraries.
Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the free community dinners in the Upper Valley. The Listen Center hosts a community dinner in Hartford every week and a community dinner in Lebanon every week. The Baptist Church at the top of the green in Lebanon hosts a weekly free dinner as well. At the Listen Centers there are always boxes of free bread and rolls.
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