VERMONT

Vermont has a large number of homes and commercial structures that were built in the early 1800s-to-early-1900s and, over the years, Vermont's frugal citizens have maintained, repaired, restored and reallocated these buildings.

In 1791, Vermont became the Union's 14th state. Oklahoma, my home state, was admitted to the Union as the 46th state in 1907. With over a century head-start, Vermont's moneyed families employed skilled, immigrant workers to erect magnificent edifices, while Oklahomans were still living in tents, sod-houses or ram-shackled, wood-frame dwellings.

Vermont's early buildings were built to last. They were set upon deep foundations of granite, which enabled their roof lines to remain straight and their brick and stone walls to be without cracks.

In the ultimate form of recycling, many of Vermont's elegant, 19th-century mansions now house health clinics, senior citizen centers, libraries, state agencies and offices for attorneys and insurance agents.

Other brightly-bedazzled, Victorian homes are no longer occupied by single families, but have opened their doors for many guests to sleep beneath their roofs. In Burlington, the windows of these homes frame many families in their daily routines and countless students at their studies.

In addition, Vermont's abandoned factory buildings, often previous fabric mills, have transformed into apartment buildings, restaurants and shops.

Built in the early 1800s, many of Vermont's massive, stone churches continue to hold Sunday services. Likewise, many banks of similar vintage, with their original vaults, continue to transact business.

Unlike Vermont's architectural heritage, Oklahoma's aged buildings are too often demolished, with the remains deposited in a land fill, while new structures, of dubious quality and scant beauty, take their place, to repeat the cycle anew in 30-to-40 years.

Oklahomans, too often follow society's illusions and build their dream McMansions, which keep the builders and bankers in money, but leave the new homeowner with a large mortgage and a lifetime of work.

On the flip side, Vermont, as does Oklahoma, has it's trailer-house blight, with no aesthetics and a short life expectancy but, gratefully, trailer homes do not have a significant presence in most of Vermont's towns and villages.

Because Vermont's residents often live in smaller, more centralized communities they frequently walk or ride bicycles to shop, visit friends or go to school, work or church. Vermont also sports numerous fit mothers pushing baby carriages, with their elder children in tow.

Frequently, Vermont's children can be found playing outside. Its high school students can be seen walking home after school. These same students are frequently without cell phones or DVD players plugged into their ears, and they actually laugh with and talk to each other.

In contrast, after the last school bell rings, Oklahoma's mothers are usually lined up, with engines running, in their over-sized vehicles, waiting to pick up their darlings, the latter of which, upon arriving, promptly put on a head set or start pushing buttons on their electronic gizmos.

Overall, Vermonters are much slimmer than Oklahomans. Our state ranks dead last on the health polls and at the top of the obesity charts.

Besides recycling, repairing, maintaining and reusing their buildings, Vermonter's environmental consciousness was also evident by their volume of pedestrian traffic, clothes billowing dry on clotheslines and well-placed, recycling containers.

I love Oklahoma and its people, but it is time for Oklahomans to wake up and get with the program, and Vermonters have much to teach us.

DINERS

Diners are without pretense, phony sophistication or inflated prices. Therein, conversations are relevant and to the point. As in all eating establishments, diners sport menu items that are not so kind to the waistline. However, diners also serve nutritious foods.

Jim is the manager and chef in Burlington, Vermont's Henry's Diner. Jim is in his mid-thirties, of stocky build, with reddish hair and a face to match. Watching Jim handle a number of orders at once is like watching a ballet, graceful and perfectly timed.

After a few rushed minutes, Jim stepped from the kitchen, walked to the counter and introduced himself. He said that he was of Heinz 57 lineage, but I suspect there was a heavy dose of Scott and Irish in that batch.

Jim said that he had worked in a kitchen his "entire life" and explained that he grew up in his grandfather's bakery, Dough Boy's Bakery, which had been located around the corner from Henry's.

With kind eyes, Jim smiled and revealed teeth in need of a hefty dental bill, but Jim had his priorities straight and spoke of his plans to buy his own diner.

Jim also bakes the Henry's pies, and we discussed the virtues of a good piece of pie. Jim fondly spoke of his wife and three children and of the two apple pies he'd baked for them the previous evening.

With orders stacking up, Jim hot-footed-it back to the kitchen and resumed his rhythmic dance.

Besides the good food and homey atmosphere, I especially like diners because of people like Jim, good, down-to-earth souls, who enjoy the quintessential hearth, the kitchen.


Addendum: If anyone wants to share an experience, offer a comment or ask a question, I'd welcome the dialogue.

ADMIR

Admir waits tables at Henry's Diner, located near Burlington, Vermont's town square. At 22, Admir is tall, has handsome features and is clean-cut, well-spoken and nicely mannered. In 1999, he, his parents and his now 20-year-old brother, Nerman, emigrated from Bosnia. Following the Bosnian war, the country's economy was depressed and many workers lost their jobs, including Admir's father, a police officer, and his mother, a nurse.

I asked Admir about his life in America.

"We like it here," he said. "People have jobs and can even work more than one job. People can go to school. In Bosnia, only rich people can go to school."

Admir, Nerman and their parents all work two jobs. By day, their mother works for a dry cleaner and their father works at the Burton Chocolate Factory. During the night, all four of them clean office buildings for the Burton Cleaning Company.

About the Burton's, Admir appreciatively said, "They are good people."

In addition to Admir's jobs, he is also working on a degree in business management from the University of Vermon, located in Burlington.

America is a nation of immigrants, be they from Europe, Africa, Asia, Mexico, South America or elsewhere. Admir's work ethic and enterprising spirit are an inspiration. In this nation of plenty, many of us have grown soft, lazy and entitled.
America's "unemployed" must get off their royal duffs and, with the humility and determination of their immigrant forebears, go back to work, even if they think that work is "beneath" them.

ITALIAN IMMIGRANTS

Barre, Vermont, granite country, was settled by a potpourri of immigrants, especially Italian stone workers, the descendants of Renaissance masters.

From the earth, these men wrestled enormous blocks of granite. Then, they cut, carved, sculpted and polished the Stone and, often, they died young from accidents, back-breaking labor or lungs filled with silica dust.

From the quarried granite, these immigrants, their children and their children's children anchored and adorned buildings and populated graveyards of the wealthy with exquisitely finished, carved and lettered monuments.

Barre's "Hope Cemetery" is the resting place for many of these immigrants and their families. Though their incomes were meager, their headstones mirror those with greater means and are a testimony to their artistry. Many of the monuments bear birth dates of the mid-1980s and surnames such as:

Abbiati, Andreoletti, Amici, Barberi, Benvenuti, Bianchi Bielli, Bogni, Bottaro, Bottiggi, Broggini, Brunella, Brusa, Buzzi, Calcagni, Calderara, Cardi, Cassani, Casellini, Catto, Coletti, Colombo, Corti, Cozzi, Croce, Domenichelli, Fasola, Fumagalli, Furloni, Giannarelli, Gilli, Guidici, Guidugli,Lamperti, Lanfronconi, Lotti, Malnati, Marchesi, Masi, Mazorati, Mochetti, Moruzzi, Movalli, Orlandi, Parnigoni, Pasetto, Peduzzi, Pellegrini, Pilini, Piretti, Pironi, Puricelli, Rizzi, Roncoroni, Rossi, Rusconi, Sassorossi, Simonetta, Sironi, Stefanazzi, Tamborini, Tarelli, Tosi, Valli, Vanetti, Vasoli, Veronesi, Zanleoni.

Residing in central Barre's Dente Park is a large statue dedicated to Carlo Abate, an artist, who was born in Milan, Italy in 1860 and died in Barre, Vermont in 1943. The sculpture is also a tribute to all Italian-immigrant stone cutters and their progeny.

The heroic, squarely-built, standing figure has muscular, heavily-veined arms. His large hands hold the tools of his trade, a hammer and a hand point. He wears a cap and a sturdy apron. His furrowed brow, piercing gaze and firmly set jaw definitively establish his determination and will to not only survive, but to prevail.

Now, with paltry results, in the name of speed, money and progress, machines and less-dedicated, less-inspired men, unaccustomed to hard work, attempt to imitate quickly the grace and artistry of those dedicated and gifted craftsmen. Like all of today's society, this generation of workmen must slow down, take pride in their work, study the techniques of the master stone cutters and learn to listen to and communicate with the stone. For, the masters were one with their tools and the stone.