If you get your mail in Temple or if you’re a Temple property owner who gets mail somewhere else, you have recently received a copy of the “Survey About the Town of Temple”.

The survey is an important part of developing a Comprehensive Plan for Temple, a document that in its completed form will include Temple’s history, current state, and future vision. Input from residents and property owners will form this third part of the plan. What do you see for Temple’s future? What will make Temple as good a place for your grandchildren to live as it is for you? Or a better place?

The survey is the means to find out what our residents and property owners want for our town in the future. Its an easy way for you to put in your two cents worth. The survey really only takes 15 or 20 minutes to complete. Fill it out & get it back to the Town Office sometime soon. It will be time well spent.

I had the pleasure of helping to stuff and address envelopes for the survey mailing. As commonly happens, I became curious about the demographics and by the time we finished sorting the mailing by zip code, well, we had a lot of numbers.

There are approximately 620 separate pieces of property in Temple, most of them taxed. Only a church, a couple non-profits and the town’s several pieces of property pay no tax. There are two hundred seventy-five recipients of mail delivered through the Temple post office; residents, households, businesses and what not. Two hundred twelve owners of Temple property receive their mail elsewhere. Many folks own more than one piece, though I don’t know the percentage.

Some Temple residents find it more convenient to use another post office, and some, those from “West Temple” in the vicinity of the White Schoolhouse Road, simply are not served by the Temple post office. All together there are about 14 of these folks.

The rest of it breaks down like this: A little more than half of the non-Temple mailing went to other towns in Maine. Ten pieces went to southern states including Texas, and three went to the west coast. Nearly all the rest live in northeastern states. Only one Temple property owner lives on another continent, in this case Europe.

All this just gives us another view of our town, another way of experiencing it. There are more pieces of property in Temple than there are residents, and every acre of the landscape is accounted for.

It has struck me that Richard Pierce’s History of Temple, Maine; Its Rise and Decline was a sort of early Comprehensive Plan for the town. It certainly captured our history and it presented a detailed accounting of its present state in the mid-1940s. The future vision, as Pierce interpreted it, was that Temple would soon cease to be an independent town, that unable to conduct its own business because of a shrinking population it would become a mere plantation. I can’t help but wonder if the two hundred fifty or so residents at the time would have agreed with him.

A memorial gathering was held last weekend for Libby Darlington, a long-time resident of Temple, who had been living for the past several years with her daughter in British Columbia. Many in attendance were Libby’s fellow members of the Farmington Quaker Meeting of Friends, and it was the Quaker outlook on life that shaped her political and social activities. Libby was always concerned about the welfare of others and worked to find ways for the community to collaborate in solving problems. To this end, she was a founding member to the Farmington Ecumenical Council.b

Libby was remembered as energetic, loving, generous, passionate about her political beliefs, and always non-judgmental. Having never gone to college, late in life Libby took up reading all of the books she had missed in her younger years. Her desire to understand the world endured in life, and her kindness endures still.

Jo Josephson had a wonderful visit recently with three very good friends from her Peace Corps days. As part of the second group of volunteers the Corp ever sent abroad, they served together in Africa in the mid-1960s. Now living in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Michigan, they are able to get together only infrequently, but they always have much to talk about. By day, Jo took them on tours of northern Franklin County; by night they stayed up late, drinking wine, remembering, laughing, and occasionally crying. Old friends are the best friends, especially when you have shared amazing adventures.

The first of the Friday evening Temple Live! events at the Upside Bakery was held on October 2nd. The small crowd was thoroughly entertained by a program of music and skits that drew on local talent. Aulie and Maurice Romanyshyn and their good friend, Max Olmstead of New Sharon were the principle actors in a musical skit about Sheriff Joe Arpaio from Arizona.

Mixed in with the music and humor was much political and social commentary as is generally the case with Temple Stream Theater sponsored events. The entertainment cloaks both information and message. One comes away with a broader understanding of current issues.

One of the highlights for me came early in the program as Joe Hodgkins played a set of original music. An instrumental piece titled Temple Stream was fast paced, bubbly and sweetly evoked water falling over rocks. It was delightful. Thank you, Joe.

The second Temple Live! is on Friday, October 9. Pizza is served starting at 6:00 and the program begins at 7:00. Vanessa Renwick, a filmmaker from Portland, Oregon, will present a collection of short films. Her film company’s website describes Vanessa as “a true barefoot, cinematic rabblerouser, of grand physique, calm pulse and a magnetism that demands the most profound attention.” It should be fun!

Temple residents, please feel free to call me at 778-3856 with news or announcements, or if you see your neighbors filling out the survey.