If you want to meet an Angel in the flesh and also soak up some pure unadulterated community, go visit Jean’s Place in Hoosick Falls, N.Y.

Community is a strange thing.

We all want it, few of us have it or know how to find it.

Sociologists believe community is perishing all over America, thanks to corporations,  box, stores and franchises, and the gutting of rural America by politicians and economists.

Most cities don’t even pretend to be about community any longer,  they are so expensive and transient.

They are now officially about money and development, by any means, at all costs.

Farms have always been about community, really, and farm communities have sometimes hung onto a sense of connection and values even after most of the stores and farms and jobs have gone, providing they can keep Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks and mega-stores out.

“A community,” writes the author and farmer Wendell  Berry, ” is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared and that the people who share the place define and limit the possibilities of each other’s lives. It is the knowledge that people have of each other, their concern for each other, their trust in each other, the freedom with which they come and go among themselves.”

Hoosick Falls, a town struggling with the demise of Main Street and the collapse of family farms, has no trouble keeping the big chains out, they have no interest in going there. But if Berry were talking about Jean’s place, it would closely fit his notion of community.

The loss of small businesses and jobs is a tough thing for these towns like Hoosick Falls to endure but in some ways a Godsend.  Most politicians didn’t notice, some did.

Jean’s would not likely survive near a suburban mall or a gentrifying downtown.

Jean’s Place is a genuine, quite wonderful, almost miraculous throwback to another America. It’s almost shocking to eat such good food for so little money and be treated so warmly and quickly. By the second visit, they know your names and what you like to eat.

So when Maria and I  stumbled across this gem and homage to the community a few months ago, we were and are delighted, even grateful. I drove by it 1,000 times without notice, she suggested we stop and eat there.

I feel good just walking in the door with my big camera, and am welcomed by Kelly, daughter of Jean, or Robin, herself an angel and much loved by everyone who knows her, according to my e-mail. All of her neighbors have gone to the trouble of letting me know just how kind and loving she is.

I imagine I am different from most of the customers, but I have felt nothing but welcome since the minute I walked in the door. That is not always true of my experience in the country.

The first thing I see is the 40’s and 50’s architecture, I don’t think one thing has changed or been renovated since the restaurant opened.  Jean’s reeks of authenticity, it is not evoking the good old days, it is the good old days.

Across the street, there is an auto repair and car sales lot with a big “Jesus” sign out front. I’ve never seen a car dealer advertise that way. There are reminders on the windows that bad credit is not necessarily an issue.

The funky, often homemade paintings and drawings on the walls of Jean’s are a revealing and comforting thing to see, there is real local and American character displaced all over the walls. The wall was not designed or polished, it is a mirror of the community. It tells its own stories.

There is also, in the signage and posters, a deep and sincere tribute to veterans, to the soldiers who fought and fight in wars. “Honor Our Troops” is the banner you see when you enter. It is not a request.

Like much of the country, Jean’s is not a diverse place, there is, in fact, hardly anyone but white people for miles around.

When I lived in New Jersey, everyone hated wars but I never met anyone whose sons and daughters were fighting in one. In the restaurant, the spirits of veterans of past and current wars are always present, you can see the insignia’s in the caps and the tributes on the walls.

When they think of wars here,  they think of all the local boys who died in them over the years. Everyone knew someone who did. War and loss are not remote things here, they are woven into the fabric of the place.

Hoosick Falls is a place where the Army is either a career opportunity or an honorable tradition in the family. Veterans are a very personal and intimate thing, not a reflexive and empty posture. Everybody I meet had or has someone in one service or another.

Traditional values of family and country are deep and open in Jean’s. And there is no tradition more sacred in rural America than hospitality and community.

I have no doubt that every person in the restaurant voted for Donald Trump and is eager to do it again. I am sometimes puzzled by why a man with so admittedly few values is loved so much by people who care so deeply about values and have so many.  Sociologists and journalists have great trouble figuring out values.

It’s the conundrum of politics right now, and living where I live, I may just get to figure it out.

Today, we talked with Robin about family, grandkids, discipline, her sick husband, her sister’s wedding (three blog readers were there, “you’re famous,” she said to me, “you just don’t know it.”) She made it a point to say everyone who spoke with her loved Maria. I beamed, that was thoughtful and true.

Some blog readers have popped into the restaurant while on vacation to say hello and check out the place.

I know what all of those people meant when they first e-mailed me about Robin. I feel as if I have known her for years. I hope one-day people will say the things they say about Robin about me. But that is not likely.

I am not an angel, but I believe in them. According to the people who e-mail me about here, Robin is one. She is the sort of person who never makes the news but does more good than a dozen politicians.

We’ve made plans for Robin to come to the farm when her daughter and grandchildren come to town.  She is thinking of joining Maria’s belly dancing class.

They are military kids, she said proudly, very polite and well behaved.

Angels are good for the community, they listen to people, feed them, take care of them and make them feel good about themselves. They make people feel as if the belong. That is no small thing in our country these days.

I was feeling down this morning, Jean’s perked me right up. My recipe is:

Jean’s, Oat Bran pancakes, fresh coffee, three dry and crisp slices of bacon, a small glass of orange juice, and Robin, the Angel of Jean’s Place.