It isn’t that we don’t have restaurants, dells or pizza joints. We do, along with a 7-Eleven for microwave burritos and a grocery store with a deli. There is a drive-in called Rotten Ralph’s, which serves fish and chips and locally made mountain-blackberry ice cream. Townsfolk brag that Ralph’s cones are the largest in the state. There’s also The Blue Bird Care, which specializes in Swiss steak and mashed potatoes. These businesses don’t have a huge advertising budget. They hire locals, offer decent food and expect adults as well as children to clean their plates.
But the modem world is starting to push in at us now. We’ve got malls and housing developments. We’ve got Costco and Eagle and clothing outlets within a half hour’s drive. When Arlington’s only clothing store went out of business last month, after more than 40 years, I started thinking about what it means to live in a small town. Sometimes, I feel there’s an entire economy dedicated to wiping out my town.
I grew up in a hamlet of 250 in eastern Washington. I knew everyone and they knew me.! actually lived in that mythical village it takes to raise a child. There weren’t many jobs, so when the siren song of a more exciting future beckoned, I left for college, marriage and employment in what could be called a real city. But when I had my first child, it became clear to me that I didn’t want to raise a family in a place where I’d have to entrust my kids to strangers.
That’s when my husband and I set out to find a new home. On an afternoon’s drive, I saw a white house with a garden and fruit trees, an elementary school just a block away, and I knew I was there. Arlington is a town where the mill owner’s children go to school with the logger’s kids. Everyone has an opinion, and a letter to the editor of the local paper has real consequences.
We settled in a place where young and old live on the same street and have to make some kind of peace with that. We have an informal block watch because it isn’t just some woman getting beat up by her boyfriend–it’s the grocery-store checker’s daughter. The one who graduated with your son. Neighbors look out for each other and when renters at the end of the block turned out to be drag dealers, the landlord heard about it. From us.
In Arlington, we go to soccer matches, baseball and fast-pitch games, dance recitals and concerts because we know the kids who are involved. They go to our church and buy stuff from our stores. The youngsters may be classmates of our grandkids or best friends or worst enemies with the neighbor’s kid.
This is a town that smells like cow manure when the wind blows the wrong way. But that happens only a couple of days a month. It’s balanced by the fact that I can walk one block to the Stillaguamish River and pick blackberries along its banks. I can wade in it. I can catch fish in it. On a hot day–or a cold one–I can listen to its rushing water, raise my eyes to the mountains and be drop-to-my-knees grateful I live here.
I can walk the five-block stretch that is Main Street and know the blessings and tragedies of each shopkeeper. I know more about my city-council members than they might like. I talk easily to the emergency-room physician because his daughter and mine played in the same piano recital. I’m part of a community.
I’ve always been more distrustful of big business than of government-maybe that comes from growing up in the ’60s–and I guess that’s how you separate the conservatives from the liberals. It’s no secret that I’m the latter. Lately I’ve been thinking that we need to worry less about saving our nation and the world and worry more about saving our cities and our towns. That’s where people congregate in sickness and in health and where children learn about life and death. It’s where kids learn about fair play, trade-offs and tolerance–and where the buck really stops.
That’s why I want my town to survive. It bothers me when the citizens of Arlington go elsewhere to shop. They say there’s a wider selection in the big stores. That may be true for some things but certainly not for all. Not even, to be truthful, for most things. I’ve heard that it’s more expensive to buy in town, but our hardware store has sales that can match most warehouse prices from paint to flashlights. Doesn’t spending $4 on gas, $3 on beverages and $10 on lunch cancel out much of what is “saved” driving to the mall? Is it all that economical living in a community that’s had its heart torn out bemuse citizens don’t support local businesses, activities and schools? It isn’t just loyalty we’re talking here. It’s property values and hard-nosed common sense.
These so-called bargain hunters forget that the city budget relies on local taxes. They don’t buy ears at the car dealership or lumber at the lumber store and then wonder why local government is having budget problems. They complain that the streets aren’t clean and the police aren’t plentiful. They forget the basic math that says nothing is free. If you want something you have to pay for it. With votes. With energy and time. With money.
Maybe this new McDonald’s is going to help people stick around with their money. Perhaps it will put new life back into the empty storefronts I see up and down Main Street. If folks start staying in town to eat, perhaps they’ll also stay in town to shop. For lumber and sporting goods. For sewing needles and tires, tables and shoes, stationery and books, bicycles and gardening supplies, haircuts and bouquets and watches and linoleum. Maybe this fast-food restaurant is the start of something good.
