What Happens in WinVegas (and may not for much longer)

(Apologies. Venting)

A story of mine, which has been politely rejected on some of the finest letterhead in the literary publishing universe, features a scene in which a husband and wife argue about living in a small town. The husband loves the peace and serenity of the small town while the wife--having spent some time living in London--feels smothered in what she sees as a backwater village. Friends reading this might think it recounts a debate between Andrea and me; in fact, it is a debate that I've had with myself many times over since we moved from Lexington eight years ago.

We came to Winchester because it was a map dot geographically centered between Lexington (where I worked at the time) and Stanton (where my wife had just been hired as a Public Defender). A few months before the move, I decided to drive around and get a feel for where we would want to rent a house. We weren't sure about leaving Lexington, so we planned to rent and see how Winchester worked out. I drove out Winchester Road and came upon the intersection of US60 and the Bypass in Winchester, a cluttered, electric line crisscrossed vista of fast food signs and dingy looking businesses.

I managed to overcome my impulse to immediately turn around.

But over the course of several trips, I found that it is always unfair to judge a town by the road designed to bypass it, and discovered a lot of really beautiful and charming neighborhoods in town. We also met many wonderful, creative, interesting people here and after several months, we went ahead and bought our first house. Even after Andrea changed jobs and both of us were working in Lexington, we decided to stay here because we've come to know and love so many friends here in WinVegas. (or Funchester. Or Gun City. Take your pick).

However, people who live in small towns by choice often face weekends like this one, which are exciting and frustrating in equal measure.

With a lot of our friends, we are dedicated to support local events and businesses. We have been to planning and zoning meetings to support the Winchester Travelling Trail and Rails to Trails. We aggressively evangelize locally owned restaurants and art venues. If a national speaker is invited to the Leeds Theater or a local church, we go. We could easily bolt out the 15 minutes to Lexington, but we think Winchester is a beautiful place and it deserves a more vibrant cultural life.

This vision isn't just the pipe dream of a few crackpot, artsy types. Complaining about a lack of restaurants and "things to do" is quite a popular pastime here in town, so highlighting these local activities and eateries is a response to an existing community desire.

So this weekend should have been a chance for Winchester to shine.

Stinky & Coco's--a fantastic and new diner with a very odd name, an owner who's operated restaurants in Chicago, and a very interesting breakfast and lunch menu, was open for dinner. Lexington-based artist Helene Steene had an opening at the Winchester Opera House gallery with music, a wine tasting, and fantastic food. National artist Antsy McClain & The Trailer Park Troubadours was performing at the Leeds and putting on their unique fusion of country, rockabilly and Garrison Keillor-style folksy storytelling. All of that entertainment would put a couple back less than $50.

The result?

Admittedly, we were only there for about 30 minutes, but only a few other people came into the restaurant, missing out on a Triple Berry pie (raspberry, blackberry, strawberry) that was, as the kids say nowadays, redonkulous. The gallery opening was reasonably well attended, but I'm curious how many of the people came from Lexington, because I didn't recognize very many of the other attendees (Winchester is small, people). But then the Leeds show, at $15 a ticket for 3 hours of great music and humor, drew (in my rough estimation) about 60-70 people.

My wife and I and our guest had a fantastic time. But seeing the poor attendance left me crestfallen.

I don't expect us to bring in the Royal Shakespeare Company. I don't expect the Marina Abramovic exhibit to swing into town after it leaves New York. I do, however, still want to expect something. Something beyond regularly taking my money fifteen minutes down the road to Lexington and watching our local arts venues and restaurants slowly falter and lock up their doors.

Some of the problems are failures of marketing. I will certainly be contacting several of these venues to show them how to more effectively use their healthy Facebook groups to drive attendance. But it also depends on the citizens of Winchester. If we want "something to do" then we must demonstrate that booking an event in Winchester means a full crowd and a reasonable profit. We must make supporting these opportunities a matter of principle.

If we don't want to just be a bedroom community for Lexington, we must do better.

Photo above (C) 2010 Jason McKinley Williams