Small Summer

Brunswick, Maine, with a population of about 22,000, is the state's largest town. But if that sounds like there are a lot of people, so many that one could live anonymously, forget it. A trip to the grocery store takes anywhere from fifteen minutes to half an hour longer than it would just getting food because you *will* meet at least some people you know, and some of them might be people you need to Catch Up With, which can take a while.
Maine Street, which is Brunswick's main street, is not long. It would be easy to walk the length of the downtown and back, stopping to gawp at the eleaborate window displays at the furniture store and the Salvation Army and the art galleries, in under half an hour. But it is nonetheless impossible to turn onto Maine Street and drive down for a minute or two without spotting someone you know, either in a car or a truck, or maybe walking along.
Of course, if there is a Big Event-- say the parade at Halloween, or Memorial Day-- then one simply loses count of the people met. This reinforces the dictum that one should Be Nice to people, because one *will* encounter them again...
Of course this meeting of people one knows happens less in the winter, when everyone hunkers down more. You can't really see out of your car very well in winter--the windows are fogged up, there's only sunlight for six hours a day, it snows, the roads are icy so you have to look at where you're going instead of off around. But in the summer time, it's light past 8:00 at night, people Take Walks, linger by the town gazebo, stand around the baseball fields... It's incredibly social, and it's marvelously pleasant to pass the time with people one knows but doesn't see often-- to talk about the weather, the tomatoes, the last parade, the next town meeting, the new sidewalk construction, the children, the new cats, and the hope for Morning Glories creeping up the side of the house...