(Host) Vermont is not our only beautiful state, but commentator Martha Molnar notes that it’s one where the beauty
is equitably distributed.
(Molnar) As the light, the air, the
blaze of October fade, my walks become a search for color and novelty. My focus
shifts from the near and small to the distant and large. And I start noticing
the houses, imagining a day in the lives lived in each.
As I pass
a little old farmhouse, my eyes shift from the house to the mountains, to the
slivers of lakes and the far fields visible in every direction. I crest a
hilltop with million-dollar views, but no million-dollar homes. Instead, there
are some nondescript old houses, an expanded trailer home, a camp, a smallish
log house, and a couple of new, higher-end houses. The value of the houses is
not generally related to how much of the unspoiled world above and below they
command.
I am
struck by how fairly Vermont’s beauty is distributed, with
all of us sharing our chief natural resource. Not just in the splendor
evident on a drive on almost any road, even the Interstate; but also in the
beauty surrounding virtually every home, from the antique mansion on Main
Street to the modest ranch on the upland pasture.
In other places where I have lived, the views belong to
the wealthy. The high-rent buildings on New York City’s Riverside Drive
open to the Hudson River and neighboring New Jersey. In Westchester
County
north of New York City, the most expensive houses occupy the woodsy,
unspoiled
areas. Even in relatively lowly Queens, the leafiest streets showcase
the most
impressive homes. And any promising location that happens to be less
than
elegant, is sooner or later gentrified, exiling those who can’t afford
the new
order.
Vermont is a place apart. While it has its wealthy ski
towns, they are by no means the most scenic or unspoiled. Western Rutland
County, where we live, is arguably one of the loveliest areas in the state, a
patchwork of wide valleys, forests, streams and lakes, with both the Greens and
Adirondacks visible from many vantage points. And all are enjoyed equally by
all of us.
We owe this fortunate state of affairs to the original
settlement patterns and to intelligent planning. The landscape was preserved in
the farms and pastures stretching across every valley. When development
pressures mounted, the state and towns enacted thoughtful land-use regulations
– from stopping a proposed highway atop the Green Mountains to outlawing
billboards along our roads.
Still, challenges abound.
As we list the things we each feel grateful for at our Thanksgiving
feast this year, I will offer my thanks for the privilege of living every day
amidst this loveliness. And I will say a silent prayer that Vermont continues
to ensure that the beauty remains available to all… on our walks
and drives, and from the windows of our homes.