Wired in Houlton

If you ever get to Houlton, you must come 9:00 on a Friday so you can stop in at Wired Cafe on Market Square, Main St. Jim, a tall, very pale and welcoming white man has owned this cafe for only a year and is well on the way to making it a community treasure.

There's not only space for eating, drinking coffee (altho don't expect plain, hardy black coffee, it might even be flavored...yuck!) and connecting to the "best wifi" probably in a 100 mile radius, but he also has two other small rooms he makes available for meetings and conferences or conference calls!

And he would have hosted one of my readings had I gotten it together to let him know.

I park my truck in the middle of the square so I can keep an eye on it and attempt to engage with folks I see stopping to read. Several times, people flee into the opposite direction as they see me approach and even before I can reach them.

The couple people - most everyone seems to be white in this town - who do approach me are 'newbies' even though one man said he's lived here 37 years. And even better, are on my team, as my grandchild would say.

So come support Jim.

Plus there's a co-op in the next block in a beautiful old building with a variety of farmers offering their product as well as health-related items from small businesses, and even a few antiques and reproductions of farm merchandise.