Give Us Your Best Shot! (Week of August 23, 2018)

To submit a photo for The Town Line’s “Give Us Your Best Shot!” section, please visit our contact page or email us at townline@fairpoint.net!

EARLY HALLOWEEN: Steve Nichols, of South China, found what could be early Halloween masks when he sliced open this green pepper.

CLOSE UP: Emma Salisbury, 16, photographed this grasshopper at the Benton Falls.

OOPS: The photographer of this White Admiral butterfly, Kaleb Brown, 12, of Palermo, was misidentified last week.

New Dimensions FCU 5th annual “Cruisin’ For A Cure Car Show” raises money for cancer program

From right to left, Ryan Poulin, CEO, Sharon Storti, executive administrative assistant, Lori Schmitz, director of HR, and Tanya Verzoni, director of financial education. (Contrubited photo)

On Saturday, June 2, 134 participants showed up at Faith Evangelical Free Church, on Kennedy Memorial Drive, and entered their showcase cars into one of 23 offered classes. The live remote drew in many spectators, the food table sported lengthy lines all day, and the trophies were accepted with giant smiles and pride one by one. The weather was amazing all day and the surveys sent out later told us just how  much the community enjoyed their day.

As much fun as the directors, management, and staff of NDFCU had while hosting this well-attended event, their focus goes well beyond beautiful cars and trophies. In fact, the real driving force is the impact that is made on every child in Maine who has developed cancer and/or a blood disorder. The Maine Children’s Cancer Program (MCCP), an affiliate of The Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital at Maine Medical Center, located in Scarborough, is the benefactor of all proceeds raised. Their mission is to treat and heal children with cancer while supporting the entire family through the difficult journey of living with this terrible disease.

Recently New Dimensions presented a check for $9,110.22 for the program and when Marketing Director Tammy Poissonnier inquired about the impact the money raised had made, Tara Studley, Philanthropy Manager, informed her that components of MCCP, such as Psychosocial Support Services, Social Work Spotlight, and Childhood Cancer Research, were all made possible by the community support, like NDFCU’s Cruisin’ For a Cure Car Show!

MCCP’s support and research initiatives serve the entire family in their time of need while focusing on the patient experience and by documenting their journey in a meaningful way. Ongoing research initiatives are part of continued collaboration through a consortium of major academic pediatric cancer centers from around the world, with more than 2,000 physician-members.

Community comes together to surpass fundraising goal

These Lawrence High School students, in Fairfield, were helpers during the fundraiser road race, with proceeds going to law enforcement scholarships. (Photos by Mark Huard, Central Maine Photography)

by Mark Huard

On August 19, more than 1,000 runners and walkers came together for a half marathon and a 5K in honor of Corporal Eugene Cole. Just four months ago Cpl. Cole was slain in his line of duty as a Somerset County Sheriff’s Deputy. Following a four-day massive manhunt, his alleged killer was located, thanks to the efforts of the entire state and even some out of state law enforcement officers. In a situation that could tax an agency, and even a profession, to its limits, the community came together and said “We will.” There was an energy and cohesiveness in the community that hasn’t been felt by the masses in a long time. The family and the community sent the message that for Cpl. Cole, “we will rise up and show our strength.”

Race organizer Jessica Gleason, left, with Somerset County Sheriff Dale Lancaster.

Just weeks after the corporal was murdered, six community members began organizing this 5K to raise money in Eugene Cole’s name. Over 1,000 people attended for what was regarded as a worthy cause. Jessica Gleason was one of the main organizers of the event, and she reports that enough money was raised to put several recruits through the academy as well as start a scholarship fund that will sustain itself. Those involved attribute the upwards of $45,000 earnings to the fact that this tragedy touched everyone in all economic statuses, all professions and all circumstances.

The runners consisted of law enforcement agencies, local businesses, professionals and community members that were all sending a consistent message once again, which was we will rise up in the face of this tragedy and do what is right and necessary. The community was greeted at the starting line by Cpl. Cole’s wife, Sheryl Cole, and their efforts were duly noted and recognized by her. This community has really set an example for the nation with their efforts to band together in the face of tragedy for Cpl. Cole and the thin blue line to proudly announce “we will.”

Roland’s Trivia Question for Week of August 16, 2018

Mookie Betts recently hit for the cycle in a game; Brock Holt did it in 2015. Who was the last Red Sox player to do it before?

Answer:

John Valentin, June 7, 1996

Give Us Your Best Shot! Week of August 16, 2018

To submit a photo for The Town Line’s “Give Us Your Best Shot!” section, please visit our contact page or email us at townline@fairpoint.net!

SALUTE THE ADMIRAL: Kaleb Brown, 12, of Palermo, snapped this White Admiral butterfly resting on a leaf.

LOON FAMILY: Karen Spehler submitted this photo of a family of loons enjoying a swim together on July 29.

REFRESHING: Lindsey Varney caught her dog, Toro, enjoying a swim in China Lake at sunset.

FOR YOUR HEALTH: Struggling With Addiction? Tips On Finding Quality Treatment

(NAPSI)—It can be overwhelming and confusing to know where to start if you need to find treatment for an alcohol or drug addiction. Addiction touches nearly everyone in some way, yet there is no one-size-fits all approach to effective treatment. With many addiction treatment options, finding a program that will provide the quality care you or your loved one needs to address their specific addiction issues can be challenging. These steps will help you know what to look for to find a treatment program that is high quality and tailored to your needs.

How Do You Find A Treatment Provider?

If you have insurance, a good first step is to contact your insurer. Ask about your coverage and whether they have a network of preferred providers. If you don’t have insurance, you still have access to quality care. Each state has funding to provide treatment for people without insurance coverage. Find out where to call for information about payment for services at: https://www.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/ssa-directory.pdf.

What Should You Look For In A Program Or Provider?

Quality treatment programs offer a full range of services accepted as effective in treatment and recovery from addiction. Keep these points in mind when weighing your options.

  1. Accreditation: Make sure the treatment program is licensed or certified by the state. This ensures the provider meets basic quality and safety requirements. You should also check that the program is accredited, which means it meets standards of care set by a national, compliance organization. Be sure to ask the program to show you how people using their services have rated them.
  2. Evidence-Based Treatment: Check to determine if the program offers effective and proven substance use disorder treatments, such as medication management, cognitive behavioral therapy, drug and alcohol counseling, education about the risks of drug and alcohol use, and peer support. Quality treatment providers or programs offer more than one form of effective treatment. Effective programs will also be mindful of or address mental health and physical disorders that will affect substance use treatment.
  3. Medication: Confirm whether the program offers FDA approved medication for recovery from alcohol and opioid use disorders. However, keep in mind that currently, there are no FDA approved medications to help prevent relapse from other problem substances.
  4. Families: Family members have an important role in understanding the impact of addiction on families and providing support. Make sure the treatment program includes family members in the treatment process.
  5. Continuing Care: For many people addiction requires ongoing medication and supports. Quality programs provide treatment for the long term, which may include ongoing counseling or recovery coaching and support, and helps in meeting other basic needs like sober housing, employment supports, and continued family involvement.

Once you’ve identified a treatment program that meets the criteria above, call for an appointment. Many programs provide walk-in services. If they can’t see you or a family member within 48 hours, find another provider. (It is important that the provider or program connect you to care quickly).

You can find more information about finding addiction treatment by visiting: https://findtreatment.samhsa.gov/ or calling the National Helpline at (800) 662-HELP (4357).

13th Annual Football Camp

13th Annual Football Camp (photo by Central Maine Photography)

Senior Logan Fortin, PAL Director John Stewart, and senior Kyle Carpenter working on blocking techniques during the Central Maine Football Camp. (Photo by Central Maine Photography staff)

SCORES & OUTDOORS: The poor, misunderstood, unappreciated brown bat

 

brown bat

Roland D. Halleeby Roland D. Hallee

While sitting around a campfire with family last weekend, the conversation, for some insane reason, resorted to bats, and the many myths and misbeliefs attached to them.

Bats have long been maligned by humans, a taboo, a creature to be shunned. These little furry animals that fly seemed to be half bird, half mammal, and looked ugly – which they are.

But today, they are being given their proper recognition as valuable to mankind in the ecological system. Many plants, such as bananas, are dependent on bats for pollination because they bloom at night. Bats are responsible for 95 percent of the reforestation of the tropical rain forest through their dispersal of seeds.

Their immediate appeal to most people is their enormous capacity for consuming insects. A nocturnal animal, bats eat when the insects are out, as opposed to birds, which eat during the day. Some bat species consume half their weight in a night – as many as 600 or more gnat-sized insects an hour.

A single little brown bat, Myotis lucifugas or a big brown bat, Eptesicus fuscus, some of the most abundant and widespread bats in North America, can eat 3,000 to 7,000 mosquitoes each night, and a bat can live to be 20 years old. That’s a pretty effective insecticide, especially when you consider that it doesn’t poison other creatures or make holes in the ozone layer.

Bats are also misunderstood creatures that are generally quite harmless to people. They do not become entangled in your hair, nor do they attack humans. Contrary to misconceptions, disease transmission from bats to people is easily avoided. Never handle bats, and the odds of being harmed will be extremely remote.

Over the last 40 years, public health records show that only 16 people in the United States and Canada have died of bat-borne diseases. That means the odds of anyone dying from a bat bite are pretty slim.

In the Orient these gentle animals are symbols of good luck, long life and happiness. They are meticulous in their grooming, spending a fair part of the day and night combing and grooming their fur.

When bats fly, they navigate by means of a sophisticated echo location system. The bats send out signals of sound energy, which are reflected back, giving it the location of an object as well as its texture and other characteristics. They can avoid a single human hair with extreme accuracy, even in total darkness, contrary to the myth that bats are blind.

Macrobats like the large fruit bats love to eat ripe fruits. As the seeds pass through them, they spread them all over the forest. A fruit bat can disperse thousands of seeds to help replant the forests they live in. Unfortunately, with the loss of rain forests, these bats are endangered because of loss of habitat.

Bats also help farmers. Microbats eat mosquitoes, moths, locust and grasshoppers. Such bugs can destroy crops and spread disease. The American farmer’s biggest pest is the corn earworm moth. One bat can eat 20 female moths a night, reducing the number of crop eating caterpillars.

And, forget everything you’ve ever heard about vampire bats. Vincent Price and Boris Karloff, in their vampire movies, did a lot to give the bats a bad reputation.

There are lots of stories about vampire bats that drink blood. Vampire bats do exist, but are three species out of about 1,000 from the bat family. They mostly live in South America – not Transylvania – and feed on the blood of farm animals. A vampire bat does not suck blood. They usually walk up to the animal while they are asleep, and use their sharp teeth to puncture the skin and lick the blood. Their saliva has a blood thinning chemical that scientists are studying.

So, you see, all the bad rap is unfair. The bat is actually a friend, not a foe.

Roland’s trivia question of the week:

Mookie Betts recently hit for the cycle in a game; Brock Holt did it in 2015. Who was the last Red Sox player to do it before?

Answer can be found here.

SOLON & BEYOND: Rogers-Safford families renew tradition of reunions

Marilyn Rogers-Bull & Percyby Marilyn Rogers-Bull & Percy
grams29@tds.net
Solon, Maine 04979

Good morning, dear friends. Don’t worry, be happy!

On August 4 one of those special family reunions was held at the home of Arthur Rogers, in Solon. When I went down to see him yesterday to find out more information, he said that his daughter, Shawna Albert, did most of the planning and getting in touch with family members, etc..

It was a Rogers-Safford reunion and it had been several years since one had been held. But as Arthur said, “It was a good turnout.”

If you remember, the Sunday it was held was one of those really rainy days we’ve had lately. Arthur had arranged several tarps over a large area on his lawn and everyone was having lots of fun visiting with each other. As Arthur said, “Rain didn’t dampen their spirits,” and that was so true! A potluck luncheon was being enjoyed by all and the children were having lots of fun, outside the protection of the tarps, running in the rain. Arthur said there hadn’t been any complaints about the awful weather.

Everyone was having such a wonderful time, including me, it was great to see all these people that I hadn’t seen in years. Some of them I didn’t even recognize and had to ask. It is very special to get together for a family reunion, thanks for having that one Arthur.

The Solon Pine Tree 4-H Club took part in the 4-H Day parade at the Skowhegan State Fair this week. Leader, Eleanor Pooler took 84 exhibits done by the members of this club to be exhibited at the fair. The next meeting will be on August 20.

Received an e-mail about upcoming events at the Embden Community Center: On August 18, Steve and the Good Old Boys band will be there from 7 – 11 p.m., and on August 26, Country Sunday/Open Mic from 1 – 4p.m./second and fourth Sunday.

That is all the real news I could gather this week. It has been one of those busy weeks when everything happens at once….and as always, I welcome any news you might want to share.

I came across this little bit of what I consider good advice in this troubled world, entitled: “Treat others with kindness”. Unexpected but sinple acts of kindness surprise and uplift us. We’re stuck in traffic, sure that we’ll never make that left turn, when suddenly a stranger waves us on and lets us go ahead of him. Little gestures like these can make our day.

Practicing kindness means taking one extra second (really) to think about what we’re doing. Instead of ridiculing a friend, we can hold our tongues and avoid unnecessary embarrassment and hurt. Rather than repeating a rumor about a colleague, we can give praise instead.

It is important to treat ourselves kindly also. We do so by not criticizing or demeaning ourselves, in word or deed, and by refusing to accept abuse from others. Preventing hurt feelings and bruised egos (including our own) is what kindness is all about. Simply put, kindness improves the quality of all our lives.

Now for Percy’s memoir: “One kind word can warm three winter months.” (Japanese proverb.)

Now we are off to the fair!!!

Hope to have more news for you next week.

I’M JUST CURIOUS: Grieving

by Debbie Walker

I remember thinking when we got out of school in June: “Wow, I’ll have more time for my projects!” I had been collecting the necessary items to be able to complete those projects. Well, that creates a mess of sorts because the house is not huge. So I also figured I would be making the house look less cluttered, too. I wasn’t expecting:

Mom just up and died! I think the train came along and said, “All aboard!” and Mom always has enjoyed a train ride, so off she went. She had just gotten her new driver’s license two weeks earlier. That’s how we know she didn’t know about the train ride coming so soon. If she had known she wouldn’t have bothered with taking that driver’s test for just two weeks of driving!

I am hoping you all have an effective way of dealing with grief and I know some folks rely on time lessening their pain. Grieve as you need to, acknowledge and accept the feelings you have a right to have and don’t beat yourself up if someone foolishly tells you, “It’s been long enough.” But please do try to fit in some of those special memories that are yours and make you smile. I suppose the time thing is part of ours, too. But in the meantime:

When Uncle Allen died in a white water canoeing accident the adult nephews who had been with him put things in his coffin they felt he needed to have: Twinkies and a can of Coke like they had shared that day. They all emptied their pockets of change and put that in because, “Unc didn’t go anywhere without money.” They also included a mini motorcycle (he was an avid rider).

When Grammie Bailey died my cousin Dennis and I got Gram’s last pack of Winstons [cigarettes] and put them in with her as she once requested. She told us she wouldn’t need a lighter! My Mom put in a crochet hook and a little yarn, she was a little shy about doing this (the process was new to her) until she stood by the casket and saw the big skein of red yarn and knitting needles, Mom let out a chuckle. My cousin Christy went up and told Mom that Grammie had promised her a pair of red mittens that winter and Christy was holding her to it!

We’re not really being disrespectful of the person who passed or anyone’s personal beliefs. Fortunately, some parts of this process are a bit less solemn with Celebration of Life gatherings. We had a DJ at Mom’s. It was our DJ’s way of expressing his love for Mom.

I pretty much lost the whole month of July and the first half of August has been given to a close friend’s wedding. Life does go on.

I am NOT just curious about what is next! Thank you for reading. Contact me at dwdaffy@yahoo.com with questions or comments.