Big Doins in Meadville!

In the past five years and five months I have lived in Orlando, greater Boston and Albuquerque before moving to Meadville. What I've noticed about Meadville is that things that would attract very small crowds in very big cities are per capita very big draws here. The first example is one we haven't seen yet, but we are assured that we must: there is a dam hereabouts where people feed the carp bread, and they have grown so big and so numerous that ducks walk across their backs. That's entertainment.

There are three theatrical entities in the city plus a few out in the hinterlands - we have been to shows put on by two of them already.

Thunder In the City, a motorcycle and classic car festival, was in the city the second weekend in August. The UU church put on a pancake breakfast that Saturday morning and nearly broke even.

The County Fair was last month, and every place we went people asked us if we had gone to the fair yet. (Don't tell anybody - we never did go.)

This week The Tall Ships are in Erie, and the chatter is all stories about times folks have gone up there to see them in years past, and/or plans to go see them this time.

This past Wednesday we were invited by a church member to the Crawford County Historical Society's presentation by a man who has done a lot of research into the history of the Medal of Honor with an emphasis on the two Meadville residents who were awarded the medal for their valor at Gettysburg in 1863. There were about seventy people there.

And today was my second session serving the homeless at The Soup Kitchen over at the Methodist Church across the street from the UU church. There were five of us from the UU church (the second Friday of each month is our day) four non-UU volunteers and after a while we were joined by about ten members of the Allegheny College Gators football team.

What I'm saying, I guess, is that in those places I used to live, this sort of thing is overshadowed by the sheer mass of events and activities available on a daily basis. Here in small town Pennsylvania, this is what there is to do, so many people do it. It's kind of refreshing, really.

I like it!