This has been a busy week… though I
actually took time to take a mini vacation mixed with work… the first in 6
years. Only 48 hours or so long,
it managed to do something special to me, something I will always remember.
The trip was business in a
way…and payment to a volunteer helper Barbara Keough… who had become enamored
by the Shakers after viewing a video I owned by Ken Burns.
Ironically, the story of this
year’s speaking engagement was on William Pryor Letchworth and the Shakers
played an important role in his work, so I had planned to do this year’s lectures
on the Shakers.
To prepare for the trip I had
bought Barb a wonderful (used) book by June Sprigg called “Simple Gifts”. It was a charming look at her college summer
job for three years as a tour guide at Canterbury Village in New Hampshire.
The summer was magical for
her as she became an adopted “granddaughter” in a way, of the old Shaker woman
who were left and who had opened the village officially to tours as a way to
educated and to preserve the rich cultural heritage of those that toiled before
them in the religious sect known as The United Believers in Christ’s Second
Coming…better known as “Shakers”. The
women lived in a belief that June not only came to understand, but also came to accept
in an enlightened way…though not becoming a Shaker.
As she described her arrival
at Canterbury Village and her view of the dusty road that led to a place that
had once been a vibrant community of “Believers”…working, living, and dying in
their beliefs you fell in love with Canterbury yourself. That summer she came to understand herself and what she longed
for…her “Spiritual Awakening” you might say.
As a novice guide she worked
with a young man of only 13 who was the tour guide the previous year. His father worked as a caretaker for the community
and lived with his two boys in the village… it is his father before him who took people through and
explained the Shakers as well as Canterbury’s history to visitors for many years…The
young man's name was Darryl…someone she had become fast friends with even though he
was younger. It seems anything she
wanted to know about the Shakers he shared with her, knowledge he had gained as
having lived there at Canterbury for much of his young life.
The day we arrived, we were a bit hot
and tired since we had gotten lost and were running behind schedule. But as we
approach the village... June’s words seemed to come to life…there before us was
the dusty road with a clearing at the top of the hill… lined with white and
colored clapboard built structures dating from almost 200 years ago!
We bought our tickets and just
caught a tour that had started a few minutes earlier. We walked to a grove of trees where the guide
gave us the story of their plantings… it seems each tree was planted by a child
who lived in the village and it was their responsibility to water and nurture it… the
one we stood before he said was his.
At
that moment… like in the movie Field of Dreams…” all the cosmic tumblers fell
into place”…Darryl of the book was our tour guide…but 30 years older. As he spoke with so much love and knowledge
of the women who in the book he called his “grandmother’s”, he made you part of that love
and of their story. His history
knowledge of the Shakers was enormous and he was a fascinating speaker and
guide.
As
he closed the tour and left us to wander and explore on our own… he stepped out
the building’s side door. I followed him and
called him by name asking him about June Sprigg who he said was now a librarian at Berkshire College. He said she was a wonderful writer…I said, “I
know”. We spoke for a while of the two new Shaker converts at Sabbath Lake
Maine.
As
we ended our conversation, I thanked him and said that I was so glad he was
our tour guide. He smiled and put out his
large warm and firm hand for me to shake.
With his touch I felt I had been transported back through the years and knew all the people who had come before… I
was now part of them and the pages of their dusty and once glorious past.
Now
as I write this I have a feeling that perhaps I left a piece of me there at Canterbury Village… in the past…now a part of it... I
wonder?
***Barb
and I have visited a number of Shaker Villages that are now being restored and
the Hancock Shaker Village, which is in my opinion too commercial. So I recommend if you want a trip into
understanding and wish to see a Shaker Village, visit Canterbury. It looks and feels as if the Shakers just had
just left it there for us to find and become part of.
To
make the trip complete… read the book “Simple Gifts” by June Sprigg… perhaps
Daryl will step out of the pages of it to take you on a trip back to a much more simple time….
Here is a quick video I did of our trip... enjoy!
