This beautiful block on Main Street is the heart of our town, which has less than 2,000 people in it, a rich mix of farmers, working people, nurses, artists, writers and laborers.  There are two restaurants on this block, the Cambridge Diner on the left, the Round House Cafe in the old bank on the far right. In between is the Battenkill Books Store, the Over The Moon Bead Shop, a real estate office, the Hubbard Hall Opera House and Arts And Education Center, an artisans shop, The Hubbard Hall gift store, an antique dealer.

Community lives on this block, it is a beautiful and defiant block, it has seen awful times and good times, it has been preserved, restored, argued over, re-imagined. Rural communities have been abandoned all over America by greedy and soulless corporations, arrogant bureaucrats, feckless politicians and economists who have forgotten what people are for.

This block is a triumph of community and of the human spirit, it perseveres, it does better than that. It was exhilarating to stand there with my camera and look at it. We have lost a pharmacy, I thought, but look what we have gained.