In our towns, Christmas means community
From the Desk of the Editor, Sarah Craighead Dedmon
My tall and skinny husband played the Machias town Santa Claus for two years, which is one way I know the amount of effort that goes into the Machias Community Christmas celebration. And I’m not even counting the work it took to make him look fat.
But this town makes its celebrations look easy, and last weekend I could not count all of the resulting smiles — not on the faces of families waiting for a free horse-drawn carriage ride, not at the Wesley Tree Festival where hopeful children weighed which trees they wanted most, and not in Station 1898 where some children weighed the invitation to sit on Santa’s lap carefully, too, and where every child enjoyed a wrapped gift from the North Pole.
Since I don’t expect many tots to be reading this column, I feel safe telling you that Santa’s presents, almost 300 of them, were each hand-selected by town manager Bill Kitchen during a long afternoon at Walmart, that they were entirely paid for by AT&T FirstNet, and that they were organized and wrapped by town office personnel including town clerk Sandra Clifton, finance director Meghan Dennison, and deputy clerk Jane Foss.
It took four hours just to wrap them all.
Last year, when COVID-19 canceled an in-person celebration, the Wesley Foundation stepped up with a drive-by parade and gifts for children, too. The resulting traffic made Route 1 look like Los Angeles at rush hour. That's a slight exaggeration, but only slight.
It’s a longstanding local tradition to give gifts to all of the children who attend these events, something that took us by surprise when we moved here 9 years ago. My children were small and looked at me questioningly after they walked away from Santa — can we really just take one? In those days, the toys were handcrafted by the inmates of Downeast Correctional Facility, and we still cherish our collection of painted airplanes, trucks, and old-fashioned cars. But more than that, I cherish the quiet sense of belonging my children found in receiving those gifts, just because they were there.
It takes a lot of effort to make all of this happen. And I’m sure I don’t have to say it, but it takes a lot of heart, too.
I haven’t even touched on the work that went into one of the best Machias Parade of Lights I’ve ever seen, or the fun taking place across town as shoppers participated in a small business scavenger hunt that took them through most of our adorable shops, or the generosity and celebration on display at the final event of 2021 for the Jonesboro Grange, Cookies and Cocoa with Santa.
Years ago we excitedly invited friends to visit us here. They pulled into our driveway and the first thing they said was not, as I expected, about the gorgeous scenery, but, “Wow, you’re really far away here, aren’t you?”
Far away from what, I asked?
Here in Washington County, we have unspoiled land, public suppers, working waterfronts, country churches, homemade wreaths, wild blueberries, vibrant schools, our own orchestra for Pete’s sake, and celebrations where half the town pitches in.
What else could you be looking for?