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THE OTHER SIDE OF THE VALLEY
by Jim Kenyon
Chapters:
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Photographic version
Keeping the Faith In a Season of Hope
Barry Seaver must make a decision on going ahead with the Habitat for Humanity house. As a working, single mother, Ginny Macomber finds herself in the minority in Norwich. After two months of living at the Fireside Inn, Kate Wood's family looks for a way out.
Chapter Five
The knock on the door comes late on a cold, cloudless Wednesday night in December.
"Hold on, I'll be right there," shouts Barry Seaver from the kitchen of his Lebanon apartment, where he is washing a day's worth of dishes.
Dean Kellogg, Habitat for Humanity's foreman, waits on the other side of the door.
"Hey man, what brings you here?" says Barry, already knowing the answer.
"I haven't seen you at the house in a couple of weeks," says Dean. "I was on my way home and I thought I'd stop by to see what's going on."
"Come on in."
As foreman, Dean is Habitat's only paid worker at the house the nonprofit group is building for Barry and his three kids in West Lebanon.
Affordable housing for working-class families is one of the Upper Valley's most pressing social problems, particularly in the core communities of Hanover, Lebanon and White River Junction. Dozens of families inquire about each modest home, but Habitat only has the resources to build one or two a year.
After reviewing the applications and interviewing finalists, Habitat's board of directors must choose one family. "Playing God, that's what it is," says a board member. "You get a house. You don't."
Dean is at the construction site on Route 10 every Wednesday night and Saturday, organizing the volunteer work crews and overseeing the project. He knows first-hand how tough it is to make a livable family wage in the Upper Valley -- working for Habitat is his second job.
Dean, who lives in West Canaan, has a full-time construction job in Hanover. He is in his mid-40s, with muscular arms and rough, callused hands. Bits of sawdust fleck his graying hair as he arrives at Barry's apartment.
Barry motions Dean through the narrow hallway leading to the kitchen. They sit at the kitchen table, which doubles as a stand for a miniature Christmas tree and small television set.
In the two-bedroom apartment, upstairs from the nonprofit mental health organization where Barry works as a peer counselor, the kitchen is the only space for guests to sit. The living room has been turned into a bedroom for Barry's two teenage sons, Lucas and Ben. Barry's 11-year-old daughter, Jessica, who spends half of her time at her mother's house, has a bedroom off the kitchen.
"I'm sorry I haven't been at the house for a while," says Barry.
"No problem," replies Dean.
"I guess I've lost some of my drive."
"Fine. Just don't give up."
From previous conversations, Dean knows that Barry is worried about water leaking into the new house's basement, which has happened several times during the construction.
Dean can't blame him. He knows Barry wants to finish off the basement eventually, turning it into a room for his oldest son and a music studio for himself. If flooding is a constant threat, those plans could go down the drain.
Working together for three months has also taught Dean that Barry is a perfectionist. A couple of weeks ago, Barry was agonizing over the size of the closet in his bedroom. It was too big. On a night when nobody else was working, Barry came in and ripped out all of the studs, making the closet smaller.
Sitting in the kitchen, Dean figures the best way to help Barry is to just let him talk through it.
"Every place I've ever lived it seems has had water in the cellar," says Barry. "It's the worst thing in the world."
Dean just nods.
"You know what the problem is don't you?" says Barry. "The house was built too low."
"We'll work it out," says Dean. "It's still going to be a good home for your family."
"What other options do I have?" Barry asks.
Habitat was planning to start building its next house in the spring. Habitat officials might let him wait and take that one, Dean says.
Barry looks around the apartment – at his sons' two beds and pile of dirty laundry in the living room. From the kitchen, he can look down the hallway to the small bathroom, its walls streaked by brown nicotine stains left by previous tenants who smoked.
THREE DAYS LATER, on Saturday morning, Dean is the first to arrive at the construction site. A few minutes later, shortly after 8, Barry walks through the kitchen door and heads across the living room's plywood floor to where his tool belt dangles from a saw horse.
For the first time in two weeks, Barry hooks the belt around his waist.
At the Fireside Inn, Kate Wood is lounging on one of the double beds, flipping through a Pottery Barn Christmas catalog. She loses interest after a few minutes, tossing the upscale home furnishings catalog on the pillow beside her. Even if she could afford a $200 lamp, she still would need a credit card, which she doesn't have, to order it.
She glances at the digital clock on the night stand. The clock reads 1:45 p.m. Her McDonald's shift starts at 4 p.m.
"Mom, can you wake me up at 3?"
"Sure, hon," says Robin without looking up from her computer set up on the room's desk. After moving out of the Hartford campground in October, Robin was able to re-start her Web page design business out of the hotel room.
Kate's family has called room 260 of West Lebanon's Fireside Inn their home for the last seven weeks. Kate shares the room with her 3-year-old daughter, Olivia, her mother and her 20-year-old sister.
After spending the summer and much of the fall at the campground, they were hoping their hotel stay would be short. Kate recently looked at a $750-a-month apartment in Lebanon, but could not come up with the $2,000 needed for the first month's rent, security and utility deposits.
With Christmas approaching, Kate is dreading the idea of spending another holiday surrounded by these four walls. She does not want to repeat the $46.99 Thanksgiving dinner in a box from the P&C supermarket.
In her head, Kate has already planned the first meal she will cook when they finally get an apartment: baked chicken, yellow rice and for dessert, cheesecake.
A LOTTERY TICKET lies crumpled on the carpet next to the bed. It will take a miracle -- like winning the lottery -- for Kate and her family not to be spending Christmas in room 260.
The $3,000 child support check from her daughter Olivia's father is gone. When the Greenfield, Mass., family court judge ordered the money to be paid last month, it was supposed to be Kate's ticket out of the Fireside Inn.
But it has not worked out that way.
She sent some to Jim Smith, the Springfield, Mass., lawyer who represents her in the child support case. A bigger chunk was used to pay down her student loans from 1 1/2 years at Smith College in Northampton, Mass.
The rest is piled on the floor in the corner of the hotel room. Kate spent $900 on Christmas presents, most of them for Olivia. Then there was $84 she used to buy her daughter a velvet holiday dress and for numerous trips to the children's section of the Dartmouth Bookstore. A child, says Kate, can never have enough books.
Besides, she adds, "I figured it was her money any way."
Kate's mother has a good idea why her daughter went overboard on the Christmas gifts. Kate can't forget Olivia's first Christmas. With the family broke, the only way Kate could be sure that Olivia would have Christmas gifts was to put her daughter's name on a list of needy children.
Never again, Kate promised, would her daughter have to depend on the generosity of a stranger.
A WEEK BEFORE CHRISTMAS, Kate still has one more gift to buy.
Holding her daughter's hand, she walks through the glass doors of the Ames department store in West Lebanon.
"We would like to contribute to your Angel Tree," Kate tells a store clerk. The Angel Tree is the name of the store's program that provides Christmas gifts to needy children.
"We want to buy something for a little girl about my daughter's age," says Kate, pointing to Olivia, who is about to turn 4.
Together, Kate and Olivia head for the children's clothing area. Olivia quickly points to a Winnie the Pooh fleece jacket.
"I like this," she says to her mother.
"I do too," replies Kate. "I think any little girl would like this."
"Let's get it, mom."
This Christmas, they will be someone else's angel.
AT LOU'S, A TALL, WHITE-HAIRED MAN sits on a stool near the end of the lunch counter. He eats alone, his long, frail fingers trembling slightly as he brings the cup of coffee to his mouth. He sets the cup down on the counter, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand before taking a bite of a large blueberry muffin.
"He comes here every day," says Ginny Macomber. "It's part of his routine."
Philip is 81. A retired carpenter, he walks a mile to Lou's every morning from his house off Route 10.
If a seat is available, he walks down to the end of the lunch counter, where the waitresses congregate between the breakfast and lunch rushes.
Leaning over, Ginny asks Philip, "How ya doing today?"
He looks up, smiling at the blond waitress. He nods without speaking. Philip suffers from dementia, says his wife. The daily walk to Lou's, which he has been making since retiring 18 years ago, is good exercise for him, she says.
Finished with his coffee and muffin, Philip pulls on his winter coat and hat. He waves to the waitresses on his way out the door without bothering to stop at the cash register.
"We don't charge him," says Ginny.
A few minutes later, he returns.
"What you need, Philip?" asks Ginny.
"He's lost a glove," says another waitress.
"Give me a second, and we'll take a look around," volunteers Ginny.
She looks under the counter and behind the coat rack. "Are you sure you had your gloves when you came in?" she asks.
Philip shrugs.
Ginny reaches into the pockets of Philip's winter coat.
"Sorry, it doesn't seem to be here."
She pulls his wool hat tightly around his ears. The old man turns and walks out the door.
Watching him leave, Ginny thinks of her own father. Richard Macomber is only 58, but years of smoking have taken their toll on the man known to friends as "Trader Dick." Ginny's father was once an auctioneer; before getting sick he loved to stop at yard sales in search of trinkets.
But these days, with his lungs racked by emphysema, he seldom leaves his one-bedroom apartment in Woodsville, the blue collar town where Ginny grew up. The apartment is filled with nautical items – a lobster trap, fishermen's nets and pictures of the ocean – that he has collected over the years.
"How's your dad doing?" another waitress asks.
"Not good," says Ginny. "I don't know how much longer he'll be able to live on his own. But he's stubborn; he doesn't want to give up his place."
AS TWO COLLEGE STUDENTS head toward the door, Ginny starts clearing their table. She picks up crumpled napkins, half-filled coffee cups and ketchup-stained plates. With one hand, she sweeps several $1 bills and loose change into her apron. Like many waitresses, Ginny never stops to count her tips, preferring to wait until her shift is over.
Earlier she did take notice when one of Lou's regular customers and his middle-aged daughter left a $20 bill on the table. Money in hand, she approached them at the cash register.
"I think you made a mistake," said Ginny, figuring they confused the $20 bill for a $5 bill.
"No we didn't," the man's daughter said. "Merry Christmas."
GINNY GLANCES AT THE CLOCK. Almost 1:30 p.m. Across the river in Norwich, her 8-year-old daughter's school holiday pageant is already under way.
Ginny wants to be there. Unfortunately, Norwich's public elementary school stages its pageant on a weekday afternoon -- a time when most working-class folks are still on the clock and unable to slip away for a while.
The early afternoon starting time is not a problem for many in a community where $800,000 homes are bought with cash and many people pay more each month in property taxes than Ginny spends on rent.
Most of Norwich's children have parents with white-collar jobs and flexible schedules that allow them to leave work in the middle of the day. Others have at least one parent who does not work outside the home.
Norwich also has a sizable number of "trust funders," residents with independent incomes and no jobs at all. As a columnist for the community's newspaper once wrote, "They don't have to work because their grandfathers did."
For Ginny, taking a day off, or even leaving for a couple of hours, would mean trying to find another waitress to take her spot. It would also mean she did not get paid.
After totaling up the bill for another table, Ginny looks at the wall clock again. A few minutes after 2. Briana's school pageant will be ending soon.
Ginny tries to remember the last time she checked the parking meter. She must go back again soon if she wants to avoid another $10 parking ticket, or an "improper parking notice" as the town of Hanover prefers to call it.
Parking for Hanover's sales clerks, waitresses and bank tellers is a constant hassle. Their best option is a shuttle bus from the Thompson Arena parking lot across town, but it does not run on weekends.
On weekdays, Ginny doesn't have time to wait for the shuttle because Lou's has already been open for two hours before she gets there. She considers herself fortunate that Lou's management allows her to come in late -- shortly after 8 a.m. -- so she can first drop her daughter off at school.
Ginny scans her tables; everyone looks content. She pulls on her jacket and hurries out the door.
"I'll be right back," she tells another waitress. "I've got to feed the meter."
IN HER ROOM at the Fireside Inn, Kate sits on the bed with her legs crossed and a ballpoint pen in her hand. In her lap is an application from Upper Valley Habitat for Humanity.
The group that is building Barry Seaver's house in West Lebanon is now accepting applications for its next single-family home. Habitat has been building houses for working-class families in the Upper Valley since 1988.
The houses are not free. If Kate, who works at McDonald's in West Lebanon, is chosen she will have to repay a 20-year, interest-free loan.
Kate first heard of Habitat last summer from a family staying at the same campground while they waited for their Habitat house to be finished.
They urged Kate to apply. Now, with the January deadline looming, Kate still must complete the application.
"Olivia, please stop jumping on the bed," she snaps, without looking up at her daughter.
Kate starts with the application's financial questions.
Hourly pay: $8.45
Weekly earnings: $338.
She scribbles a note on the application: I make an extra $75 a week in overtime.
"How much do I make a year?" she asks her mother.
Robin is sitting at the room's desk, working on her computer. She switches on the computer's calculator.
"That's $17,576. The overtime brings it up to $21,500."
Kate reads the cover letter attached to the application for a second time just to be sure. A family of two must earn between $16,850 and $26,950 annually to be eligible for the Habitat program.
"Whew, I qualify."
She moves on to the section of the application that wants to know about her debts. She owes a credit agency $3,600 and has $4,500 remaining in college loans.
Next, Habitat wants to know why Kate needs this house. Kate bears down on the pen. The words flow easily.
"We live in a single hotel room. We can't cook and don't really have the space to store food. We live on canned soup and snack foods. And my sister has to stay with us so we can afford it. It's horrible."
Kate places the completed application on the desk. It's time for lunch.
She walks over to the room's coat rack, which doubles as the family's food pantry. From a grocery bag, Kate pulls out one large potato. She slices the potato down the middle with a plastic knife and places it in the microwave next to the room's television.
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About This Series About a year ago, the Valley News began taking a look at life for ordinary working families in the Upper Valley. Initial interviews with more than a half-dozen social service agencies made one thing clear: The Upper Valley is not an easy place to live if you don't have a lot of money. The region's most pressing problem, these agencies agreed, is a lack of affordable housing. With this information as background, staff writer Jim Kenyon began visiting neighborhoods, motels and campgrounds in search of families with a story to tell. The focus narrowed to single-parent families, because they seemed to have the most to juggle: work schedules and demands at home. In the end, four families stood out. For 10 months, Kenyon and three Valley News photographers chronicled the lives of these four Upper Valley families. They went to work and school with them; they spent holidays with them, and for dozens of hours, they interviewed them. All of this was done with their permission. Many quotes are taken from the reporter's notes. When the reporter was not present, conversations were reconstructed with the help of one or more of the people involved. The Valley News thanks the families and others who appear in this eight-part series for their cooperation.
Who's Who in This Story
Barry Seaver
Ginny Macomber
Kate Wood Also in this series:
Kerrie Ramsey
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