CSH Rotary’s April 8 meeting opened on a reflective note with a Kierkegaard quote about understanding life backwards while living it forwards — an apt frame for a morning devoted less to a guest speaker than to the club’s own future. Patty Harbinger joined the gathering as a guest as members settled in for breakfast and announcements.
Several upcoming dates were highlighted. Volunteers are still needed for the Shelburne Road Race on Sunday, May 3, where the assignment is mercifully simple: point runners in the right direction and keep things moving. The club’s 55th anniversary celebration is set for Friday, May 8 at Fiddlehead starting at 4:30 p.m., and the annual Changing of the Guard will take place on Thursday, June 25 at Jessica Brumsted’s house. Members also heard that Champlain Valley Fair volunteer sign-ups will be coming soon, with grilling help likely to be the hardest slot to fill.
A few other club matters made the rounds. Matt Lawless’s membership application remains open for comment through the membership committee. Harriet continues to collect books for Amanda Vincent’s baby basket, with members encouraged to add a note inside if they like. Dennis reminded the room that the program committee will meet on April 22 immediately after Rotary and is eager for speaker suggestions. On the service front, the food shelf collection is now above $260, with a goal of reaching $300 so the funds can be split evenly among four local food shelves.
Happy Fines offered the usual mix of humor and humanity. Susan Grimes shared that her photographs are hanging all month at Kevin’s Village Wine & Coffee Shop. Harriet brought in an old moon globe from her son Justin’s room, prompting plenty of curiosity and commentary. Richard Fox reported an Easter egg hunt that turned into a full sibling skirmish between his 18-year-old and 13-year-old, while Dan York described catching a livestream of astronauts circling the moon. Phil Denu marked 33 years with the club and reflected on how far it has come, including its transition from an all-male club to one that is now evenly split between men and women. Linda Barker rounded things out with a photo from a library project in Honduras.
The centerpiece of the morning was a structured club visioning exercise designed to generate ideas for the club’s next chapter. Members began by answering a deceptively simple question: why do we keep showing up? The answers were revealing. People spoke about the quality of the speakers, the sense of connection to local life, the volunteer opportunities, and the simple pleasure of the room itself. One comment captured the mood especially well: there is “no other place” where people get to enjoy banter like this in such a warm, lighthearted setting.
From there, the conversation turned to what the club should start, stop, or improve. Several themes kept resurfacing: hold occasional evening meetings to make Rotary more accessible for working professionals, rotate meeting locations among Charlotte, Shelburne, and Hinesburg, organize a walking group, strengthen committee structure, and improve the club’s Zoom setup so remote participation is more reliable. Members also warmed to the idea of better preserving the club’s institutional history, whether through scrapbooks, archives, or talks from long-time members that could help orient newer Rotarians.
The bold-ideas round brought out some especially lively proposals. John Hammer again pitched his long-running dream of a Vermont Teddy Bear picnic, part county fair and part summer family event. Others floated a Christmas in July food drive, an after-hours grocery competition among local business teams, and more systematic annual fundraising rhythms that businesses could plan around. Brandon Tieso suggested there may even be ways to monetize the Rotary Halloween parade’s remarkably large audience while preserving the event’s community character.
No single idea carried the day, but that was never really the point. The meeting worked because it surfaced the values behind the club’s energy: fellowship, useful work, civic connection, and a willingness to laugh while doing serious thinking. It was a good morning’s reminder that for CSH Rotary, the strongest planning sessions are often the ones that sound most like ordinary conversation.