Harried Potter

It's always interesting when you learn about a little sub-culture of the world around you. It happens a lot in the journalism biz. One day, you know nothing about the world of competitive ferrett shows, or whatever, and the next day, you find yourself spending hours in it, learning more than you ever thought possible, and then writing about it. Suddenly, someone else's reality, which you never conceived of before, is made very real for you. It's refreshing, and it keeps you tuned in and open to life's infinitely rich pageant.

My family and I thrust ourselves into one of these worlds last Saturday when we held a tag sale. I had long been aware that the culture of tag sales is a big thing for a lot of people around here, but it's different to experience it, and it's a very different experience to hold a tag sale. In essence, you lay yourself open to being the stage on which these tag salers walk, the canvas on which they paint, the eco-system in which they live and breathe.

It was a busy day, but in between selling and schmoozing, there was time for a little people-watching, and it makes for a fascinating study. Once you start watching, you notice the different species in this world — the professionals (they jump out of their cars at 7:30 a.m. and snap up things they think they can make a profit on; they're knowledgable, a little insistent, and big spenders); the casual browsers (they don't buy much, they like to look, I think it's like going to a museum for them; some of them feel guilty if they don't buy something, so they do); the bargain hunter (these people make you feel like you're performing a service; they are local folks of limited means for whom tag sales are a huge help in getting by); the collectors (these people are out looking for certain things — thimbles, milk bottles, McDonald's toys). I'm sure there are other creatures, too.

A great aspect of holding a tag sale is meeting people. These are social events. Friends and neighbors stopped by to chat and draw conclusions about us based on our stuff. We met a nice lady who lived up the road, and in the course of a half hour or so, we became fast friends. I met a fellow Civil War buff, my wife chatted with a lady who knew the people who lived in our house before us. The social side of tag sales is very much about the glue which holds small communities together.

We also met a cute little tiger-striped kitten who stopped by to hang out and found our stuff great fun to play with. He livened up the day considerably, although we did worry about where we had come from. Concern for the kitty prompted one tag saler to put us in touch with a woman who had lost her kitty. Our guy wasn't hers, but we had a nice time chatting and we wished her well. Later, the tiger-kitty's family stopped by looking for him. By that time, the kitty had left us, but about an hour later, all were happily reunited. But not before they had dropped $1 at our tag sale.

In the end, the day was exhausting, slightly lucrative and all in all, pretty rewarding in nonmonetary ways. In that way, my trash is my own treasure.

Today, we saw our daughter off to school, the first day of a new school year, her first day in second grade. It's a big day for us, and there was an expectant, festive mood in our house this morning.

My daughter was pretty cool about the whole thing. She's been through the deal before, and she had her outfit all picked out. But it was a big deal for my wife and me, who were among many parents milling about the school, acting really excited, snapping pictures, seeing their kids off ... marking another small milestone in the family history.

The whole experience snapped me back to my first day of first grade, back in the early '70s. It's a day I still remember with clarity. My folk were pretty conservative, and they always kept my brother and me looking that way - short hair, etc. When I walked in to my classroom of first grade at this all-boys school in New York City, I saw a slew of kids with long hair that was so in at the time, and I thought, gulp, they were girls! I remember confronting my mother with this obvious betrayal - "you told me there would be no girls." She reassured me that, in fact, these were boys whose parents had different notions of length of hair. I calmed down, and, far as I know, had a pretty easy time adjusting - a lot easier than the nervous kid in the back who kept throwing up.

Anyhow, it's funny what you remember, even from 35 years ago. I wonder what my daughters will remember about their first days of school. I hope, whatever it is, they still appreciate what a big deal today is. Do you have any first day of school memories? If so, tell me about them.

When I was a kid growing up in New York City, my favorite thing to do on a Saturday was go to the Natural History Museum. I must have gone 1,000 times, and it never got old. Seeing that herd of elephants, or the dinosaur bones or the giant blue whale suspended above me ... it was all wonderful.

But by far, my favorite thing about the museum was the hall of African animals, two floors worth, mounted and backed by those cool dioramas. After a while, I got to know the animals so well, going to the museum was like visiting old friends. And after a while, my curiosity led me to study not only the animals, but amazingly detailed art of the dioramas. They really made you feel like you were right there, and there was such drama in the details - a wildfire off in the distance on the savanna ... a thunderstorm rolling in ... vultures circling in the background.

So, it was with considerable delight that I found out Fred F. Scherer, whose art will be exhibited at the Crowell Gallery in Newfane's Moore Free Library, had spent more than three decades of his life painting many of those dioramas. I found this out from his daughter, Deidre Scherer, a well-known artist in her own right, whose work will be exhibited alongside her father's - along with that of her step-mother Cicely Aikman in an exhibit titled "The Family Tree." Deidre was more than pleased to point the spotlight away from her and toward Fred and Cicely for this exhibit.

Deidre confessed that the Museum of Natural History was a favorite place of hers to play hookie. The museum remains a must-visit for me whenever I return to the city - just ask my wife.

For all these reasons, I'm particularly excited to meet Fred F. Scherer at the opening of "The Family Tree" exhibit Saturday from 1 to 3 p.m. in Newfane. It's safe to say he may have been the single most important artistic influence on me at a young age.

Ken Hiratsuka doesn't just leave his mark upon stone; he seems to transform it from something hard and impersonal to something softer and more meaningful.

His work at the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center, part of the "From Street to Studio" exhibit there, caught my eye; it totally enthralled me the first time I saw it, and it has moved me every time I've seen it since.

So it was with great interest that I watched Hiratsuka work Thursday and Friday, carving a pattern into the granite sidewalk on Elliot Street right outside of Boomerang.

The first thing I noticed was how hard the work was. Hiratsuka would pound a few strokes with hammer and chisel, inching the design along mere inches, before stopping to catch his breath and reflect on the work.

It was interesting to see people's reactions to it. Some would walk past with a confused look, some would politely step around it, some would walk right over it, and some would stop and ask questions about it (Hiratsuka would answer graciously, but he's very soft-spoken while he's working in.

The end result is a neat work of art that will be on Brattleboro's street for all to enjoy for a long time.

That Hiratsuka was able to do this is being heralded as a significant step in collaboration between the town and its arts community. Scot Borofsky, a local son and one of the artists featured in "From Street Studio" has long been an advocate of public art, and he praised town officials and other players for being so agreeable to the project. What's next?

Maybe if we put up a large nude sculpture somewhere, people would lose the urge to go naked themselves. Or not?

My wife and I took the advice of Brattleboro Reformer movie columnist Nathan Hurlbut and went to see "Once" last Saturday.

Nathan had raved about it, and he was right. "Once" is a rare and special film that manages to be warm and charming at the same time it is utterly fresh. Depicting the powerful connection between an Irish street musician (Glen Hansard of The Frames) and a young Czech woman (Marketa Irglova), "Once" is sweet without being saccharine, endearing without seeming to pander.

It also accomplishes something I didn't think possible. "Once" is the only musical I can think of that doesn't require you to suspend your disbelief. Through the songs they write together and apart, Hansard and Irglova comment on and give context to their burgeoning connection in an utterly believable manner, one that is made all the more real by director John Carney's decision to film much of the movie with hand-held cameras in faux-documentary style. The fact that neither Hansard nor Irglova is a professional actor adds to the sincerity of the film.

In all, "Once" is a film that stays with you for days afterward and moves you in ways films rarely do. It's a special gem, and it's easy to see why it was the favorite of Sundance audiences.

Saturday's Lawyers vs. Guitars concert was just plain fun.

Featuring nearly a dozen members of the local legal comunity and some very talented family members, including four teenagers, the concert was a fundraiser for four local youth arts organizations — the In-Sight Photography Project, Vermont Jazz Center, Brattleboro Music Center and River Gallery School.

Some 150 people turned out to The Church in Brattleboro to lawyers put down their briefcases and pick up guitar cases for an evening. The music was diverse - spanning some five centuries - with a heavy concentration of folk and rock tunes from the '60s and 70s. What was impressive was that most of these lawyers had pretty good chops and pulled tunes from a pretty cool range of sources. Any concert that has songs by Tom Waits, Iris DeMent, the Beatles, Neil Young, the Grateful Dead, Elvis Presley and Motown can't be all bad, right?

There were many appreciative whoops and hollers from the audience, a lot of smiles to be seen, and, most important more than $1,600 raised to be split between four appreciative and worthy organizations.

The concert establishes ample precedent for another one to be held. Let's bring it back on appeal.