You Can Do a Lot with 12-foot Ceilings

Progress, progress, the cafe is moving ahead and we can't wait to show it all off on Tuesday. Last night I joined about 70 of my neighbors at a fundraiser on Crestview Drive. This is a wide street with underground utility wires (the mark of a high rent district) located behind my house. Each of these demi-mansions sits on a huge lot and most have at least four or five baths and tremendously large garages.

But the house where the party was was even more special...it was a converted tobacco processing plant, a huge wooden structure that Vern Harrington has turned into a cozy and spacious home. Entering the space, it is almost like a big ship, the living room is just huge, and the ceilings are 12 feet high. Vern used all of the wood from the old factory to make beautiful ceilings and gorgeous cabinets. In the kitchen one cabinet turns out to be a hidden doorway into the bath. Each of the kid's rooms has a loft bed, you can do this with 12-foot high ceilings.

It was a rare outing in South Deerfield--and many of my cafe customers and other neighbors were there to chat up. I enjoyed catching up with Laura, who runs a daycare on Sugarloaf St., and two postmasters who live together in Montague. The benefit was for some local kids who are going to Guatemala to build houses for Habitat. Nice kids too, they even wore ties and got in front of the mike to thank all of us oldsters for coming out.