Thank you, Lee Tree

Photo by Kate Rasche

They have been doing it for 12 years now. Starting early on the Friday after Thanksgiving - while the rest of the world is off recovering or shopping - and working all day long through Saturday, on into Sunday, and some years into the following week. There is always a whole gang of them, assorted members of the Lee family and their employees, all putting in this work for free just because it seems to them like the right thing to do. As for the rest of us, we all get to look at their work and have all those beautiful lights in the Village that put a holiday smile on our faces every time we drive by. In other words, a gift to all of us from all of them. From here then, thanks and Happy Holidays to you, Lee Tree.

 

Honest work

Photo by Steve Rasche

In this issue you'll find a story by Virginia Woodwell on the hardships facing fishermen in Maine and here in York as they struggle to retain access to working waterfronts. This story is worth an honest read, and worth some honest thought.

It is our perceived connection to the sea that makes our coastal towns so special to most of us. But our connection these days is less and less a thing of reality, and more and more simply a thing of perception, a view from a picture window. Still, as we drive over the Route 103 Bridge, or down over Sewall's Bridge, or up by Perkins Cove, we see them. Real fishing and lobster boats, worked by real people who endure real hardships, real dangers. Their continued, stubborn existence is somehow a reassuring reminder to the rest of us, a show of courage and continuity for work that remains hard, elemental. Were they to be gone someday, we would surely all be the lesser for it, and inside we know it.

To the credit of York, there have been real and successful homegrown efforts to help preserve access to the working waterfront for our local fishermen. In some cases, the efforts made here locally have provided examples that are being looked to nationwide. These efforts provide some hope for the future of our local fisherman, but the precarious nature of their existence can't and shouldn't be dismissed because the livelihoods of these men and their families is, in many ways, our canary in the coalmine. How we help support them as a viable working part of our community over the coming years will say much about us and what kind of a coastal town we want to have, or deserve to be.