Home A Cape Codder



 

Q. What is a Cape Codder? 

A. These days they are harder to find, but they do still exist in various locations around the Cape.  There are certain traits that set them apart from others who live here.  but it seems the longer one lives here, the more one picks up the characteristics and attitudes that make one become an old salt.  There is a long standing unconfirmed suspicion that there is something in the sand... or the air.

 

You're a Cape Codder if:
 
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You can remember doing all your Christmas shopping on Main Street. [pick a town]
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You went ice skating on a frozen pond where the Cape Cod Mall is now.
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You once thought you knew everyone in your town.
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You know what part of Hyannis was called Fish Hills.
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Hurricanes. 
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You remember the trains.
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You remember the first motels on Rt. 132 
[Extra points for remembering Storyland]
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You saw a circus parade in Hyannis
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There was two way traffic on Main St. and South St. in Hyannis
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Sandwich High School had a graduating class of 16.
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...And, the town had only one traffic light.
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You were able to remember there being a shoreline in Hyannis Harbor.
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You skated at the Kennedy Rink when it had no roof.
well... now , soon, it will be: when there was a Kennedy Rink.
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A real Cape Codder will tell you that only those who can claim at least three generations of family on Cape Cod are the only true ones.
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Except for the Native American population who could take issue with that assumption.
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Those who happened to be born here are called locals. 
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If you moved here from elsewhere, you are a:

Wash-a-shore.
Or "from the city."
Or "not from 'round here."
Or "from over the bridge."

Which today is nearly everybody.
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The odd thing about those who move here, is they have tended to bring with them what they often moved here to get away from.
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Thankfully, there are those who have moved here and brought skills and the understanding that help preserve what quaintness there is left, while the Cape continues the inevitable change and growth that ... well, just happens. 
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And then... there are those come here and who stick their feet in the sand and just know that here is where those feet should take root, and they become, a Cape Codder.

Could be the air.