Stepford

I wrote this piece earlier this year, and its definitely a work in progress. It does need some serious help, including the name of a particular road that I just sorta left out, and an ending. It just sorta stops.

Someday I’ll remember that I was twenty years old the day I realized that I lived in Stepford. Small, sleepy little Millbrook was Stepford in the flesh. Millbrook was a perfect little town, manicured lawns, no trash cans anywhere, a Sotheby’s in the center of town right across from the local deli which had been family owned forever. Millbrook was a place where people lived on roads like Elm Drive and Weatherford Lane or Ciferri Drive (named after our mayor, who had been mayor for as long as I can remember), and it had its own castle, Wing’s Castle, somewhat of a legend in its own right. That day, as I drove around waiting for the blue jeep to leave the cemetery where my father would be for the rest of time, I looked around at our little town. We refused to let McDonalds invade us because we felt that it would ruin the effect of our little town; that it would look tacky. We got a Stewarts instead.

I drove past the cemetery and turned right onto the road that goes past the golf course. On the right, a woman dressed in all white stood teeing off with an instructor standing between her and the golf cart. I had had a few friends in high school who had worked there, at the Millbrook golf and tennis club. They had been

babysitters and bartenders, entering the world of the rich, the pristine, the all-white-wearing, suburban-driving population of Millbrook. On the left was a beautiful old handmade stone wall encasing a large field. I drove past the rotary that has always confused new drivers; it had some historical commemoration significance, I was pretty sure, but I didn’t know what. I had always tried to drive past it as fast as I could without hitting the brakes at all. I guess they finally caught on, because there were yield signs in place that had not been there before. Right past the rotary was the nursery school that my brothers and I and many of our school friends attended. My mother worked there for a few years after my younger brother was born. It was a really good school; it drew interest from people like Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson. Further on and set back from the road, but still within easy viewing, was Bennett College; a haunted house if I have ever seen one. It hadn’t been used in years, and had fallen into disrepair, but it was still one of the most beautiful buildings I had ever seen. Some years back, there was interest in fixing it up, making it a historical landmark or restoring its college status. The project was dropped because the cost was too high, so Bennett College continues to sit on top of the hill, decaying.

I made a right at the light, drove past the farm on the left, the massage therapy place on the right. One of the three Millbrook cops is generally sitting on the side of the road on that stretch, so I made sure I was within the speed limit. I was officially in the village when I reached the town square of sorts, where people came to play Frisbee with their dogs. There was one out there, a little one, white and brown, on a leash. On the left was the Tribute Gardens, also known as the park. It had been pretty shitty when I went there as a child; you always got stains on your pants when you went down the curly slide, the small pool under the bridge was always either covered in algae or completely drained with leaves mucking up the corners. There was a black metal bar that ran the length of the pool; it was a challenge to climb hand over hand across the bar without falling in, but I never did fall. I guess the incentive of not falling into the green goop that generally covered the water was enough to keep me firmly attached to the bar. If you jumped on the bridge over the pool with someone else, you could feel it shake, despite it being a concrete bridge. It still shakes, but they cleaned up the little pool—it never has algae or leaves anymore, and there’s even a little stream that feeds into the pool now. A few years ago they also replaced all of the old playground equipment at the top of the park, they put sand down, and sidewalks in between.

I made a left on Main Street, past the large brick “friendly hometown bank” where I had both a checking and a savings account, and the post office, zip code 12545. I turned right at the newspaper offices for the Millbrook Round Table. It was a large two story building that clearly used to be a house, but had been converted years ago. There were tall bushes, eight feet or so, lining the sidewalk by the offices. I drove past the ever-inefficient DMV, and made a quick left onto Elm Drive. There are a few houses on the left before the elementary school looms out on the right. It holds kindergarteners through second graders, and is named after the road its on, thus creating Elm Drive Elementary School. The houses past the school are beautiful two story houses with mowed front lawns and trees in bloom: green leaves, purple, pink and white flowers; bushes lined the edges of yards, swings hung from trees. I drove around the school, to the back, where the playground, baseball diamond and basketball court are. The little kids never use the basketball court for basketball, or the baseball diamond for baseball. The town baseball league uses the diamond in the spring, but otherwise it’s a kickball field for gym class on nice days. Past the school are the town tennis courts, and a gazebo. There was a couple playing tennis, a blonde woman and a shirtless man, both in their early thirties. They probably have an honor roll high school student babysitting their first child. A few years ago I could have been that student. Soon I could be half of that couple.

I turned left onto .Houses lined the street, even bigger two story houses than on Elm Drive. I made another left onto Haight Drive, where an older lady was taking a walk. There was a family named Haight that I remember from my childhood, I wonder if it was named after them. I turned right onto Weatherford Lane, but had to do a three point turn before I reached the cul-de-sac where a couple of kids were skateboarding and riding a bike. I went back, past Haight Drive, to Ciferri Drive, which I took back into the heart of the village, away from the residential Stepfordness of that section of town.