For those of you who have not driven out Stillwater Avenue past the mall recently, let me give you an update. HQ, the huge national hardware warehouse chain which has consumed a few local hardware stores in the last few years, has given birth to Home Depot, right across the street. That’s right, all that separates these two giants is Mall Boulevard. Now, I like HQ, and have been there many times. A friend of mine referred to a trip to HQ as “the most fun a married middle-age man can legally have on a rainy weekend.” However, do we need another one, right across the street? Actually, Stillwater Avenue near the mall is a bizarre and semi-frightening collection of pairs of related businesses, sort of like a consumer’s Noah’s Ark. (And the Lord said, “Take two of every business”…) There are two Chinese restaurants within 100 yards. There are two auto parts stores, two car washes, two crafts stores, two travel agencies, two video stores, two discount wallpaper outlets, two sporting goods, two “Inns” that begin with the letter C, two places to “quickly” change your car’s oil, and of course, two convenience stores with multiple self-service gas pumps.

Does anybody have any control over this? Where is intrusive, Big Government when you really need it? Bob Osborne, who works in Planning over in City Hall, told me there is no office to determine the appropriateness of the type of business concern. “We have no role in deciding whether there is economic opportunity in auto parts or sewing material.” So we rely on bare-knuckles capitalism, survival of the fittest among those store-owners who pay a serious chunk of change to lease or rent their space. The consumer, by spending dollars over time, determines who lives and who must get out, a kind of economic democracy.

When we moved out this way eight years ago, most of this area was fields and woods. There was no traffic light at Hogan Road and Stillwater, because there was very little traffic. But the mall has drawn the customers and their infernal machines, and Franchise, USA has noticed. It is a business district that exists primarily to serve people in their cars, and contrary to downtown, walking is not encouraged. There are no sidewalks. Crossing the road on foot is hazardous duty, attempted only rarely by lathered-up shoppers who arrive in buses. Even driving along Stillwater can be adventure, with plenty of drivers doing in excess of the speed limit. It’s enough to make even the Mall look comfortable and user-friendly.

Downtown Bangor has the potential, but not enough people live there. A downtown without a strong residential base relies on 9 to 5 workers and closes up after dark or withers. Bringing in University College is a fabulous idea being floated about recently. If students move in, the downtown will revitalize in a hurry. Then we can leave the mall area to the cars and buses.

I received numerous letters and phone calls as a result of my column on fathers and divorce. Most were from divorced fathers who felt skewered by vengeful ex-wives and a legal system that they believe to be badly tilted against them. One wrote “If I miss a child support payment, I’m a `deadbeat dad’ and can be threatened with the garnishment of wages, seizure of assets, revocation of my driver’s license and even incarceration… But my ex-wife can cancel visitation with my children anytime she wants to, and if I get into court six months later, the judge will do nothing.”

Having done marital therapy and “best-interest evaluations” of divorcing families, as part of my psychological practice, I am familiar with the multiple injuries that occur and recur in some divorces. In the least painful divorces, the couple is able to put recriminations aside and do what is best for the children. In the most painful, the Mom and Dad fight a war of attrition, and the children are both victims and weapons. The divorced couple is still intimately engaged, but love has been replaced with vendetta.

Searching the Internet, I found a variety of sites that provide legal, financial, and psychological information for fathers trying to remain in contact with their children. Some of the best are:

United Fathers of America (www.ufa.org)

National Center for Fathering (www.fathers.com)

Father’s Rights and Equality Exchange (info-sys.home.vix.com/free/free/)

These sites also provide links to other sites that might be of use to you as well. Feel free to e-mail me at: jakeefe@aol.com

Jack Keefe, a Veazie resident, is a clinical psychologist whose column appears every Wednesday.