Dear Editor:

I sold bottle propane to Jan Beaver for 30 years. I think that nearly every one of those 30 years, she ran out of gas either on Thanksgiving or Christmas, despite my efforts to remind her to check her propane because the holidays were coming.

One year (1999), my telephone rang on Thanksgiving Day. “This is Jan Beaver. I am out of gas and I have a turkey in the oven that is half cooked.” I said, “OK, Jan. I’ll be right over.”

After connecting the new propane cylinders, I went inside to light the standing pilots on the range top and oven. The pilots sometimes were difficult to get going at Jan’s (she often boiled things over). After everything was going, I noticed all of this food in the kitchen. Several pies — apple, squash, mince, etc. — were set on the table and in the oven was the biggest turkey I think I have ever seen.

I asked Jan, “Are you having a lot of people over for Thanksgiving?”

“No,” said said, “just me.”

I stayed and had Thanksgiving dinner with her that year. It was a wonderful meal. She told me that all the food that she had cooked was going to be taken to the elderly and shut ins around the region.

I will miss seeing Jan Beaver on Wednesday afternoons in her colorful printed dresses and silly floppy hats as she stops me to her her weekly copy of the Boothbay Register — a practice she had done for years.

Arthur Carter

Boothbay Harbor