Many years ago I knew a guy named Alan. We were both regulars at the Nelson Coffeehouse, where he would often play the banjo. In spite of that we become friends. For his day job, Alan was a minister in one of those pristine white churches that characterize our small New England villages. He seemed to enjoy his work, and I suspect he did okay at it. At the time he was also going to graduate school, to become qualified as a therapist, and his rationale was thus: he was on the threshold of being forty, and he was predicting that some time in the next decade he was going go have a mid-life crises which would, among other things, create a desire for a career change. He wanted to have alternative credentials in the bag so that when that happened, he could just turnkey into his new line of work.

It was the quintessential Peterborough experience: dinner at Harlow’s, a walk up Vale Street and around several little side streets, through a wooded path alongside the Nubanusit and emerging back into town via Putnam Grove. Then up to the Peterborough Players to see Our Town.

One of the many chinks in John McCain’s armor appears to be his reputation – so far unchallenged – as a supporter of veterans, a market, the Palm Beach Post points out, that McCain’s militaristic stance should have cornered. Veterans however, beg to differ. Checking the Web site for The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, I was stunned to discover that Senator Warrior rates no more than a “D”  for his anti-veteran voting record. What’s more, Barack Obama rates a “B plus.”  In fact, several liberal congressmen rank well above their flag-waving conservative colleagues in the eyes of the veterans group. The Disabled American Veterans give McCain 20% and Obama 80%!