Jetsons meets Little House on the Prairie

When I was little, I was immersed in the Little House on the Prairie books and TV show. Living in Arden, I sometimes imagine I am living in Walnut Grove--but with electricity. Like Laura, I live in a rustic house that looks like it was cobbled together by elves or someone's Pa. We are nestled outside a forest with other houses that look like they came into existence in a similar magic fashion--and are held together in a ways that have baffled home inspectors. We have a creek or two, neither of which is quite a fishing hole material, but one is playing host to a family of beaver this summer.  And when the winter was really bad two years ago, we all banded together until the train came through with supplies and food.  Okay, the thing about the train didn't happen, but we did act pretty neighborly toward one another.

I would say that the way that my life most resembles the Little House books has to do with the community spirit. We don't have sing-alongs, spelling bees or church picnics. Instead we have the Arden Concert Gild, Saturday dinners, and the talent showcase of ACRA summer camp. People walk the narrow streets to get to the events. We chat and catch up. Gossip a little. Ask after the health of a neighbor. Report on a tree down on one of the paths. And yes, we have our very own mean-spirited Nelly Olson who sometimes makes life miserable for those who cross her path. I don't have to name names. Nelly is an archetype who makes her own presence known.

It would be the quaintest of lifestyles except for all the technology. My husband is an IT guy. While I was reading LHOTP books, he was hacking the very early video games so that he could trounce every high score his brother obtained rightfully. Mark's predilection for programming means that above our rough hewn fireplace mantle we have Hue lighting which he can control by his iPhone. I can control them, too, but I haven't found the practice as convenient or user friendly as Mark has. What was wrong with our dimmer switches? In addition we have home security, house cameras, dead bolt we can activate with our touch if our iPhone is on our person. We drive electric or hybrid automobiles. From under our carport, built in the peg fashion, the blue light of our chargers glow against the backdrop of the dark forest.  Computers. Tablets. We have all the gadgets, sans the new iWatch. I am not entirely comfortable with the new technology. It isn't that I am a technophobe. It is just that I don't like the fact that my life changes so quickly before I get used to it all. For example, last week, I  rented a DVD from a grocery store kiosk only to come home and find out that we don't have a DVD drive anywhere anymore. My computer doesn't even have a drive. Mark said he would come home and hook one up, but I had rented the DVD to watch in his absence, knowing he had an after-work engagement. I was so mad that I paid to stream it, cursing that I just paid twice to rent the same mediocre movie.

When I feel that technology is closing in, I sometimes do something that takes me away from it. I read a book, the kind with actual pages made from the pulp of a tree. Or I can some homemade salsa. I sew a skirt. Or I poke a stick at my garden (I am not a great gardener, but I make stabs.) Mark, too, seeks refuge in the natural world after his day working as the head of an IT Department. His latest battle, one that Pa would approve of, entails wrestling our modest leasehold away from the grips of invasive plant life. He is working to eradicate the bamboo, ivy, and lesser celandine which is the bane of village gardeners and the Arden Forest Committee. And jointly, we go for our hikes. The back and forth from nature to technology creates a balance--mostly. 

I am typing this blog post on my MacBook Pro while wearing socks I knit for myself. The windows are open, the breeze is blowing in. It is getting dark in my living room, but not quite knowing the best way to turn on the lights, I will sit in the dark until it is time to walk to the ACRA Summer Program Open House. 

Slow the F*k Down

Harvey Road bisects Arden and divides Ardentown from Ardencroft. It starts off as Grubb road and is the main drag that takes folks from Naaman's Road down to Foulk Road, past Marsh Road where it changes names to Harvey, through the Ardens and eventually to I95 or Claymont. In that stretch where it enters the Ardens (you will notice it becoming heavily shaded by trees at this point) the speed limit changes to 25 miles per hour. Almost nobody does the speed limit here. Brooke, the queen of our safety committee lives on Harvey. She and her committee were instrumental in getting one of those light-up signs--the kind that tells you just how fast you are going--along this stretch of road. It helps. It helps me at least. I tend to forget, and it is a reminder. As is Brooke's ascertainment that slowing down here means only a minute of your time. We have only been here for less that two years, and we can attest to the number of accidents along this road in a short time--especially at night.  It's enough to make you want to hire Samuel L. Jackson to do shout-outs to the speeders using the same voice he used to read the satire of a children's book, Go the F*k to Sleep.

"I mean it, sh!thead. Slow the F*k down!" 

I'll get the safety committee right on that.

Everything is about speed in this society. I know people who use to ride bike for exercise around here who won't do it any more. It's too much of a risk with traffic. But it isn't just traffic. Our society wants everything faster. Give us high speed internet, fast food, 7-minute workouts, speed dating, fast-drying nail polish, high-speed rail, faster processors on our already super-fast computers.

In Arden, you are forced to slow down. Even if you are someone who ignores the Harvey Road speed limit signs, if you turn onto one of the winding streets in the Ardens, you will discover that you really can't go the speed limit of 20 miles per hour. The roads just won't let you. They are narrow, in some places only wide enough for one car. We have random speed bumps. It is true that one woman in Arden set up her own speed bump--a line of rocks across her road. She sat to one side of it in a folding chair and watched her handiwork in action. Arden town founders and planners agreed that the roads would not be the direct grids of most great cities. They purposely designed the roads to meander. The walking paths, some hidden and almost secret, are actually the direct paths. They encourage people to walk to their destinations, which is also an intentional slowing of everything save one's heart rate.

Years ago, I was a proponent of the Slow Food Movement. Started in Italy, the group aimed to preserve regionalism  and the old ways of cooking instead of the industrialization and globalization of food. For my part, I believed in the home-cooked supper and the family dinner time. It was sacred to me as my kids were growing up. We rarely ate out. Here in Wilmington, we dine out more often, but we also eat food cooked by our neighbors with our neighbors at long tables of the dinner gild. The local markets know all about the dinner gild and they bend over backwards to get us what we need. The dinners are leisurely, often going late until they morph into another leisurely activity, such as board games or poetry recitations or a concert or teens playing Kan Jam in the parking lot.

Though not a direct Arden activity, we have also benefited from our slow downs on Sunday mornings. Our hiking group goes all over the area. We are almost like those search and rescue teams going over each square mile with a fine tooth comb. While we are hiking we notice everything. If Joe isn't taking a photo of another drop of dew hanging off of some new plant tendril, then Linda is picking up some bone she found to add to her collection of natural objects to draw. She also points out all fungus growing on dead trees. Susie makes art out of natural found materials, so she is always scoping out the stuff at the sides of the trail that nobody else would notice. My slow attention happens as I walk, but also afterwards as I put together the photo albums of photos that the group, and mostly Joe, takes of our wanderings. It is in the making of the albums that I get to see and play with the patterns that emerge from our outings.

Mark and I are considering a vacation later this year to commemorate our twenty-five years of marriage. Those twenty-five years went by so quickly it seems. And the trips we are looking into now are walking trips. We have checked out such trips in places such as Colorado and Wyoming and even as far away as Italy. We have done fast-paced travel, and now we want to see what happens when we explore an area at a crawl. These trips are the kind where you take a small backpack with you, and your luggage gets transported on up ahead. You walk and meander, lunching at a winery perhaps, moving on until you are famished again from your exertion. Then you dine at a local trattoria or share a family style meal with other hikers at a lodge. Nothing is a done deal; we are just in the planning stages. We might even stay home and do a few short outings from here. But we know enough to know that life comes at you fast. If you don't take the time to slow it down, you may miss the whole experience.

Learning New Tricks

Closing in on two years in Arden, and I am starting to understand the pace, the calendar, the way things work. I am in the groove. I was recruited to be on the Arden Community Recreation Board (ACRA) in January 2014, just months after we moved in. If you ask other board members, they were snagged early in their Arden career as well. That's the way of it; all committees are always trolling for fresh meat. This committee seemed a good fit for me. I enjoy helping to plan recreational activities. I have creative flair and lots of ideas. Though don't ask certain people. It was partially my idea that had us gluing cotton balls and small mirror disks to fishing line to hang in the Gild Hall to simulate snow and ice during the Holiday Party. You have no idea what it is to transport and hang 60 such lines at 14' a piece. I may never live that one down.

The biggest piece of the ACRA calendar is the Summer Program. It is a five-week program, three hours a day/ five days a week, for all kids of the Ardens. And it is all run on donations. In general, the  program gives kids about five or six options of activities for the morning hours. They choose what they would like to spend their time doing. The art room, outdoor activities, playground are always options. In addition,  the committee brings in guests from the community to interact with the kids and supply other activities. An excellent way to build community ties across generation, ACRA Summer Program has be in existence since well---forever?? That's an exaggeration, but of all the adults who I know who grew up in Arden, I have yet to meet one who didn't participate in Summer Program as a kid. Last year when I ended up on the Summer Program committee, I was a little intimidated. I didn't even know the mechanics of it, much less the people who have run it for years. It took me a while to get up to speed. Terri (one of those adults who went to the program as a kid) gave me the job of securing playground monitors, and I even did that badly. I talked to a few people, got them signed up for the first week, but relied on the program registration process to recruit the rest of the (mostly) parent volunteers.

As I was learning what the program was all about, I hung out at the Buzz: volunteering for the playground myself, teaching journaling as a club, and interviewing staff to see that their needs were being met. I began to get a feel for this crown jewel of Arden activities. I helped out with the history hunt as kids got clues at various historical spots around Arden. I, too, learned facts of the town. I saw the cookie baskets that the kids prepared for the over-eighties Ardenites and realized the lengths this town goes to connect its population, to involve those who are at risk for feeling shut-in.

Fast-forward to this year. I am on the committee again, and I am emailing and calling folks all over town to come and spend the day at the Buzz-- asking them to showcase artwork, lead groups in drumming, build forts, teach drawing, garden--sharing any and all skills they have with the young people. I know who to call and have thought up some new people to involve. I am astonished at the network and the understanding that I have developed in such a short time being immersed in this community. It almost feels like I have broken the code on a foreign language.

I addition to my duties with ACRA, I am helping create a sign for the G-Arden that will be on display for the House and Garden tour that is coming up. This weekend, I will take a route and go door-to-door soliciting donations for ACRA. Tonight, I am going to the Civic committee meeting to talk to them about a project that Keri and I would like to initiate in Arden (more on that after the meeting).

I am not writing this to toot my own horn, but because I am amazed at how useful I feel in this community.  They have taken me in and put me to work. They are using me in ways that are natural for me (sign design) and ways that are completely out of my comfort zone and make me grow (going door-to-door asking for money and calling people up on the telephone). I love to cook, but I have never cooked a dinner for a group of people in triple digits as I did when I was lead cook for Dinner Gild.

I am forty-six years old. I am learning new tricks. (Connect your own dots on that saying.) I knew I would come to Arden and have to learn my way around--find a new pharmacy or favorite date night restaurant, for instance. But I had no idea how much this community would challenge me. How I would have to step up to meet its expectations. I am not the same person I was when I came here. I have more confidence in myself. I see possibilities in areas I never knew before. Arden is fashioning me to become more useful to the community at large. Girl's got skillz. I apologize for the 'z'  but I am feeling some extra pizazz. Translated back into 46-year old, white woman speak: I am going to need to update my resume.

Arden in May

We first encountered Arden in May six years ago. It really sucks you in. The trees are iridescent green, boisterous in their new foliage. And flowers. It is a gardener's paradise here. Every year I am here, I see new species. Arden has many specimen plants, the kind for which collectors go wild. It is hard for me to discern whether the new things I am noticing are different to me as someone who lived fifty miles north in a slightly different plant zone or if they are rare to everyone.

In May, the warblers are back, bringing the sound that is so nostalgic to me. I am remembering summers at camp most of all. I was a girl scout who went to day camp the week after school left out, but I also went to Lutheran Bible Camp in the Poconos.  Of Lutheran camps in the area, I insisted that my parents send me to the Lutheran camp that was farthest from home. At age eleven, I picked Mt. Luther for the architecture. I wanted to sleep in an A-frame. It is funny how walking around Arden can dredge up memories such as that for me.

I am not the only one who understands the magic that May brings to the villages. Dozens of neighbors went out to the their mailboxes and front doors on May 1st to find small decorative bags filled with flowers. May Day! What other town does that? And May Pole dancing? We didn't have the May Pole this year, but I participated in the ritual in years past, even if it didn't always land on May Day.

Onto May 2nd which is World Labyrinth Day and World Naked Gardening Day. I have not seen any naked gardeners. The rumor of nakedness in Arden is highly overstated. Don't move to this town if you believe the rumors that it is a nudist colony. I keep waiting, but everyone remains clothed. As for the labyrinth--Keri del Tufo and I made a pact on the night we bought their house that we would bring a permanent labyrinth to Arden. Today, we got up early and created a pop-up labyrinth out of flour on the green. It will last until it rains or gets overcome by the dew. Perhaps a day or two at most.  We are working on a proposal to make a more permanent labyrinth for everyone to walk.

After we finished with our civic mischief (gift?), I headed over to the Memorial Gardens where the annual cleanup was already in progress. I would guess that we had forty volunteers from ages 3 to 84 in attendance, beautifying the grounds, weeding and mulching around the graves. Ruth Bean, who gave us our official welcome when we moved to Arden, was the grand marshall. She is the unofficial caretaker of the gardens, as her property butts up against the Memorial Garden.  Families join together to clear the gravesite of their ancestors and loved ones. The best part of helping with the clean-up is all the stories we hear of the deceased, those Ardenites who came before us and lived storied lives. Last year, I had the honor of sprucing up the plots belonging to the Brooks family who lived in our home many decades ago.

As I was working this year, I saw the tiny cottage where Mark and I first stayed that fateful May weekend in 2009. The little house was nestled across the fence from where we were working. It seemed to nod and wink at me, a co-conspirator whose job it was to see that Mark and I landed in Arden. Aching back, I'll admit that I didn't work at the Memorial Garden for more than an hour-and-a half. Then again, many hands do make light work. I took off early with Toby who wanted me to consult on a sign she was making for the G-Arden. The community G-Arden, too, is in high gear. The frost date in Delaware is May 7th. We gardeners are busy, both with the prospect of vegetables come July, but also because the G-Arden is on the House and Garden tour in a couple of weeks. Alex and Clay are busy constructing all sorts of hard structures for the G-Arden. Folks have volunteered to put in the community squash plot and plant the decorative  window boxes that will top the fence.

May will tax me with the job of trying to capture all that is going on in this community as I strive to keep up with all the activities I am doing myself. Tonight, I will head to the final Dinner Gild dinner of the season which is put on by the playground committee. They are serving sliders as they raise money for the new slide. Sliders. Get it? Then, the kitchen will shut down for the renovations for which we have been raising funds for the last year. I must go now and text my daughter to make sure she is back in time to go to the dinner. She has been rollerskating and biking around town today with her boyfriend, Joey.

Already I surrender to May, and it is only the second day.

What makes a weekend?

I woke from a dream of all these little kittens attacking me. Biting, clawing. They were all over me-- even in my mouth. So much for sleeping in on the weekend. Weekends have meant different things to  us over the years. We had other rituals. We spent many Friday nights with the Steeds who used to be our neighbors. When they moved, we continued to drive to see them or they drove to us--until the kids' schedules got too crazy. They were our wine friends. And Buckeye friends. If it was college football season, we would drive back to their house on Saturday for the Ohio State Football games.

When the kids were little we would have breakfast on Saturday mornings at the Pancake Farm in Ephrata with Mark's parents. The kids ordered chocolate chip pancakes in the shape of Mickey Mouse--until Jonah discovered waffles with a side order or sausage. That ritual died away when I started training for my one and only marathon which I ran with my sister-in-law in Chicago. Saturdays were our long training runs. We had church in Lancaster on Sundays which we hit about 2 or 3 Sundays a month, stopping for coffee and pastry along the way. While Gramps was still alive, we sometimes made the trek to Elizabethtown on a Sunday night to visit with him and my parents. It was a haul, so we didn't do it often. During the years we had HBO, we were faithful to watching Sopranos or Six Feet Under. Movie night could be any night of the weekend. Having kids, we didn't go out much. Mark got projects done on weekends. He likes to be busy tinkering. And naps. We like our naps. That is probably the one thing that hasn't changed since coming to Arden.

We have our patterns here, too, but each weekend can be different. We started this weekend off slow. Friday night was just us, our new sectional, Ben and Jerry's, and a Netflix movie. Then the attacking kittens. Whoa. They ushered me into Saturday in a most startling way. Mark and I had a full docket of projects lined up. He was painting. We had decided to paint a wall in our living room which is a bit traumatic since we are painting over paneling. Usually if you don't like a color, you can go back to the way it was. Meanwhile I set up a temporary sewing station in my daughter's bedroom (HA! We shall see if she reads my blog now.) I sewed two skirts for spring. Then it was on to the garden to help spread wood chips and prepare the soil. It was a planned event so many people were there helping.

While I was spreading wood chips with Dave, he was telling me about his dream which involved music and The Buddha. I contrasted that with my dream about the demon kitties. Dave is trying to get a dream interpretation group at the Buzz. He looked at me with curiosity when I told him about the kittens. Then he told me what an animal bite means in the shamanic tradition: It is your calling, trying to get your attention. Toby came over and added her spin. She specified spiritual calling. I thought about all my spring projects vying for my attention. It seemed to me that this is what the dream was about. Still, it was fascinating to discuss with others. I may have to consider this dream interpretation group when it is realized. Mark brought the trellis frame he built for climbing vegetables. I then had to string it, which is time consuming. But it kept me rooted to the spot, listening to the conversations around me. I heard bits and pieces. People coming together with ideas in the most synchronistic way. I couldn't help but think that vegetables are the least of this garden's bounty.

Plenty of fresh air and plenty of work. We had no time to nap, because we had to get to the Dinner Gild early. This week's menu was a 50's themed dinner. People showed up in costume. Mark and I considered pulling his letterman's sweater out of storage, but thought better of it. We didn't want to embarrass ourselves trying to put it on. The last time I had worn Mark's sweater was in high school, and I was swimming in the thing. The menu included chicken a la king, Chex mix, assorted stuffed celery and jello among other offerings.  Early rock-n-roll played over a more recent portable stereo. I heard rumor that the chef's table was going to host a little martini party for those who stuck around. Not me. I was off to see the local high school's production of Rent. Our daughter was the lead in the musical the year before, so it was great to go back and see the kids from that show progress and move into new roles. I was blown away.


Now Sunday is upon us. The hike is a given. We are more loyal to our Sunday hikes than perhaps any other activity in the history of our weekends. This time we are going to a nature preserve near Media, PA. It is part of a quest to hike all the local preserves and get the prize--a fleece vest. We may or may not stop at Pinocchio's for beer and pizza. Actually, this is probably a given, but we are going to pretend we can take or leave it.  I have a Michael's run in my future to buy picture frames for our newly painted wall. Have to strike before the coupon expires. We were invited to go to a concert in Philly, but we are opting instead for a quiet dinner and movie with friends. I can imagine we will finish the weekend the way we started it--tired from our exertions.

And herein lies the biggest question. The one we pose every weekend. Will we get our nap?

Buying a House in Arden and Other Irrational Behavior, Part II

photo by Joe del Tufo

Probably the best way to tell you about our experience seeing our house in Arden that we bought sight unseen is to post an email that I sent out to a friend the day after we came down see it.  We had to wait 2 days after getting the house to see it. As you might imagine we were going crazy.

Dear M--
We were coming down to go to a dinner gild at Arden at 6. Originally Cynthia was going to take us around to look at houses starting at 1. But since we bought a house, she asked us to come 4 or 4:30. We said 4; we couldn't wait any longer. We were a bundle of nerves Thursday night into Sat. We finally left the house with Maren. Jonah didn't want to come. But it was funny weather [freak instance of sleet and freezing rain]. There were 5 accidents on the turnpike. It took us an hour longer to get down there, and we only reached Cynthia's house at 5. Joe and Keri weren't at "our" house when we arrived. We would have time to look at it without them about. First impressions. We had seen the outside before. The side of the house faces the road. You turn left into a circular driveway with a carport (More like a party pavilion) on one side and the house on the other. The house faces the woods, sunset, and the carport. It has a huge slate patio and ground cover (no front lawn). Enter through the side front door. Joe and Keri don't use the formal front door because it creates an alcove that is better used as a seating area.

I cannot tell you how perfect this house is for us. The first thing I saw was a chalkboard hung just outside the front door of the house as you enter and another hanging just inside the house. I lamented that the realtors made me paint over my chalkboard [menu board in dining room] to sell our house. It was like I had to cover up my personality. But what greets me first thing in the new house? Not one, but two chalkboards. There is a window seat by the door which overlooks a hammock outside. The kitchen is amazing. Amazing. Amazing. I can't even describe the ways I love it. Maren loved the huge warm chocolate chip cookies, Keri set out for us. The back yard has been fenced in for pugs. It is small and requires only a rotary push mower. Slate patio out back. Totally enclosed. So many little seating areas. Very little upkeep to be done. [Ha ha, I say now.] Who needs a yard when you have a whole forest?

Back inside: Bookshelves. Two fireplaces. Security system. Great closets. Bathroom to die for. Beautiful colors. We won't have to change a one. Side screened in porch. Basement storage and workroom which hardly any houses in Arden have. Maren loves her room.

Being late, we had to hustle off to dinner which was being put on my the Ardensingers Gild who were doing a preview of the musical Yeoman of the Guard that they are putting on next month. English themed dinner: Cottage pie, brussels sprouts in mustard sauce, pea/radish salad in light dill dressing and chocolate bread pudding. It was BYOB. We got a table in the front room and who joined our table but the mayor of Arden [Sorry, Arden, I didn't know the correct terminology then], the woman who sewed all the costumes for the Shakespeare plays, and the welcome committee chair? Cynthia said she could not have planned better.

After dinner we went back to Joe and Keri's to have champagne with them and Cynthia and David. We stayed for 2 hours talking. We are similar in so many ways. We feel like we already have friends in Arden. Joe and Keri are Unitarians, as are we. Their daughter Alex is 6 weeks younger than Maren (both born at a birthing center) and is ready to introduce M to all the kids in the neighborhood. Alex spatter painted her closet door and had all her friends sign it but had to cover it up to sell the house. Maren is going to invite her back to do it again. Keri wants to help me bring a labyrinth to Arden. Joe is going to leave one of his framed prints with the house. Mark and Joe discussed microbrews and sound systems. There were many freaky moments of serendipity. Alex and Maren kept shaking their heads at how similar we all were. Cynthia was very happy she could make this work. She got some flak for selling the house without letting it go on the market, but she did everything above board. There are some people who are angry they didn't get a shot at the house. And we are on our way to becoming famous because Joe and Keri are telling everyone how we bought the house sight unseen.  There isn't any traffic on our street, but Cynthia said there are going to be people taking a walk in the woods who never took walks in the woods before.

Here ends the email. I am so happy to have this record. What else do I remember about that day? The soundtrack of the evening was Kate Miller-Heidke. Joe and Keri apologized for some of the language in her songs (an apology which seems funny now). I remember the bedroom was smaller than we thought it would be, but still plenty big, and that the back room was bigger than we thought. We were thrilled at the walk-in closet in the Master bedroom, which hadn't shown up in any of Joe's photos. We didn't quite have the layout correct when we looked at the pictures. It was great to see how the puzzle of rooms fit together. After leaving the house, we were so excited, and the late June settlement date seemed so far away. We knew we would be back in a few days for home inspection. That's when the true test of courage would be called into play. But after seeing the house, we knew that we had made the right move by putting in our bid like we did. I am pretty sure the house itself, in addition to the community of Arden, was calling to us to it.

Arden Dinner Gild

A few quick notes on the Gild system in Arden. A gild is a club. Like guild, except that in the early 1900's  when Arden was in its infancy, the Georgists who ran the show were part of a movement to spell words the way they were pronounced. They dropped the "u" in gild and have been explaining the letter deficiency ever since. According to the Arden Club web site: The Arden Club, Inc. is the cultural umbrella group for many Gilds in the three Ardens: The Village of Arden, Ardentown, and Ardencroft. Most activities take place in Gild Hall, which dates back to the 1850 when it was used as a barn for the Grubb farm. It was substantially renovated in 1910 as the Gild Hall and can be rented for special affairs. The grassy amphitheater of the Moonlight Theater sits to one side of Gild Hall, and the Swim Gild’s swimming pool sits behind Gild Hall.  At this point in Arden Club history we have the following gilds: Ardensingers, Concert, Dinner, Folk Dancing, Gardeners, Georgist (this gild is in limbo at this writing), Library, Poetry, Scholars, Shakespeare, Swim, and the newest gild--The Bridge Gild. Gilds have a couple of responsibilities throughout the year. They must participate in the Arden Fair to perform a needed service or to do something, like manning the baked goods table or overseeing the book sale, that raises money for the Club. Each gild must also provide a dinner for the Dinner Gild.

Last month, I attended a talk at the Scholar's Gild given by Henry Voight, a man who collects historical menus. As a foodie and an American history buff, I was intrigued on several levels by his presetation. Mr. Voight gave the history of our country told through food, and yet the talk was not quite about food. Did you know that restaurants as we know them only started in the 1840's in this country? He showed menus from restaurants, club dinners, Civil War reunion dinners, and in one case, he showed a menu from some sort of town gathering. June, one of the oldest residents in town and an active member of the Arden Craft Shop Historical Museum, asked Mr. Voight if he would be interested in seeing the menus that they had for The Dinner Gild. Mr. Voight brushed her off--not understanding the gold she was offering. He neglected to see the historical value, which is a shame. We in the Ardens know. We were treated to a museum exhibit that centered on The Dinner Gild, its history, menus, and recipes.

The Dinner Gild has been in existence for decades. My memory is telling me somewhere in the 1940's or 50's, but June could tell you for sure. At age 91, her memory is sharp as a tack. Mark and I met June when we drove down to Dinner Gild in those hazy months before we actually moved to Arden. We tried to reintroduce ourselves to her when we actually did move to Arden, but she didn't need a refresher; she knew who we were.

Imagine this. The Dinner Gild oversees weekly dinners for 100-140 people from October through the middle of May with a week off for Thanksgiving and another week or two off at Christmas. At the very least, they probably implement 30 dinners in a season. I continually remind my friends from outside The Ardens that we have perhaps a pool of 600 adults in the three communities. The amount of volunteerism needed to run our organizations  and events is staggering. It probably takes at the very least, ten volunteers to pull off any one dinner. Often it is more. These dinners are nothing short of incredible. The kick-off dinner is typically beef tenderloin and crab cake (though this year, they went without the crab cake). With all the creativity in the Ardens, the menus are a thing of art. Literally. David, a local artist, gardener, handyman extraordinaire creates chalkboard art to accompany each and every menu.

Chalkboard Art by David Yoder

So let's talk menus. This weekend's feature was Chicken Mole which has become an annual tradition. I'm not going to run down all the food we have eaten at Dinner Gild but here are some of offerings which stand out in my mind: Peanut Chicken with Sesame Noodles, Rochester Garbage Plate, Day of the Dead taco dinner, Eggplant Parmesan, Chicken Marsala, Pork Tenderloin, Cincinnati Chili, Beer-sauced short ribs, German sausage and kraut, Mardi Gras gumbo, and a 420 dinner which featured foods you might find in the parking lot of a Grateful Dead concert. We were pressed into dinner gild service one evening while sitting around a fire making S'mores in October just after we had moved in in late June. We agreed to lead a Pennsylvania Dutch dinner of Chicken Bott Boi, brown butter carrots, salad with sweet and sour dressing, and rolls with apple butter. It was a success, and we repeated the dinner again this year.

You will find salads with such ingredients as pears and hazelnuts, and homemade breads with compound butters. The desserts can be anything from Mississippi Mud Pie to coconut rice pudding. Chocolate caramel bread pudding to homemade pumpkin ice-cream with a ginger snap. The desserts for our Pennsylvania Dutch dinner in January included red velvet whoopie pies and shoo-fly cupcakes. Where else can you get a dinner of this caliber for $11 a head? ($13 for non-Arden club members.)

This Saturday, Mark and I walked from our house carrying our bottle of wine. Those en route to the dinner in cars, rolled down their windows and promised not to run us over. The wine bottle was a dead giveaway as to where we were headed. We got to the lower Gild Hall right at six and found ourselves at the end of a long line. The Gild Hall had a little snafu with its floors. Seems the folks who built the barn put the floor right on top of dirt with nothing to support it in one section. This was preliminary action of a $300,000 kitchen renovation coming this summer. Part of the lower hall was cordoned off with dividers and plastic because of the work being done. No worries, the Chicken Mole crew decorated over the plastic, but the new arrangement cost the dinner three tables of ten. With such a popular dinner and the loss of seating, you could see latecomers mentally calculate the remaining available seating. Musical chairs--for real. The tables were festooned in brilliant colors with confetti in the shape of little cacti and set with baskets of chips and homemade mango salsa next to baskets of warm tortillas and honey butter.  Mark and I did a "no-no" and put our coats and wine bottle at a table in the back room to reserve two seats next to a former town chair and his wife who works in R&D at Dupont. Yes, we were cheating at musical chairs.

Chef's table at dinner gild

This leads me to the very essence of Dinner Gild, and it is none of the things I have mentioned so far. Though there are those who sit with the same people each week, we do not. We squeeze in where we can. In this way, we have managed to meet so many of our neighbors. I really think this has made all the difference in the way we were able to assimilate into Arden village life. The conversations we have are fresh and fascinating. One week we are talking beekeeping with Ron, and the next week we are talking about a trip to China with...well.. a different Ron. Sometimes we eat with our most immediate neighbors, and we keep abreast of what is going on with them. How often do you live beside someone and know nothing about them? Too many times to count, in our lives. We have sat beside June and let her recount the history of all the people who have lived in our house during her lifetime. June is a treasure, and any time the seat next to her is open, you should take it. We have also sat next to June's son Allan and his wife Sharon. One such interaction led to an impromptu game night at their house. Game night is always a possibility except when, on a night like last night, there was a concert offering going on upstairs.

Also, on dinner nights, the library is open upstairs. You can check out the latest book by Anne Patchett (which I have done) or listen in on children's story time around the fireplace. I do want to volunteer to do story time at some point. I really miss reading to my kids. Last night, Mark and I were too tired to attend the concert or go to the library. With the threat of daylight savings time change looming over us, we walked home to watch a movie. On the whole walk home, we were groaning that we ate too much. Smart people bring containers to Dinner Gild, because most times, you can very easily package half your dinner and have something to eat the next day.

Mr. Voight did not know what he was turning away when he dismissed the invitation to peer into the history of Arden's food service. Oh, the stories he could have uncovered.