What We Do with Winter

I know. According to the groundhog, spring is supposed to be right around the corner. Personally, much as I like the whole legend, I don’t put a lot of stock in a woodchuck predicting the weather. When you consider the number of intelligent men and women who have devoted years of their lives to studying meteorology, and they have a hard time getting it right, how can you put your trust in Phil?
This winter has been strange, too, in that it’s not much like winter. Not many bitter cold days. Very little snow, but just enough like winter to keep you from doing what you might be doing any other time of the year.
If you have kids, their cabin fever is probably even worse than yours, because they haven’t even had some snow days to cheer them up.
Here at the Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts & Humanities (MAC) in Cape May, winter is a time to refresh mind and body. A break from the daily tours and daily chores that threaten to overwhelm us at times, like during the holiday season, so we’re sort of glad when these weeks of winter roll in to give us a breather.
It also gives us a chance to look at what we’re doing and decide what we need to do more of, less of, do better or do differently. Let’s face it; everyone likes to have something new once in a while. When you consider that many of the visitors who come to Cape May have been doing so for generations, you can get an idea of the challenges we face in terms of coming up with new tours and events every year.
Much of what both visitors and local residents enjoy about Cape May is its rich history, its delightful Victorian architecture and the abundance of things to see and do. Well, we know we can’t change history and, thanks to strict preservation oversight and guidelines, there’s not much that can be done that impacts those architectural treasures, but creative minds at MAC have certainly found new ways to tell Cape May’s stories.
One of last year’s new trolley tours is a good example of that. Our Cape Mayhem Trolley Tour, the brainchild of tour guide Janet Coupland, delves into some of the odd customs of the Victorian era, like headless photography. Long before Photoshop was around, the Victorians came up with some pretty creepy family photos. And that’s just one of the oddities you’ll hear about.
Every year, the Physick house museum has a new theme for its tours. This past year, it was “At Home with Nature.” The Victorians were so enthralled with Nature that they took every opportunity to display it in their homes.
I guess they overlooked the irony of having to pluck it or stuff it to do that, of course. This year’s theme, beginning during Spring Festival at the end of April, will be “What the Heck is That Thing?” and tourgoers will be introduced to a variety of gadgets that were essential parts of the Victorian household, even if most of us would be hard put to figure out what they are.
So, it won’t be long before everything is up and running full time again. The trolleys will be out and about, the Physick House will welcome visitors, the Lighthouse and the World War II Lookout Tower will be ready for climbers.
In the meantime, we’ll be recharging our creative batteries for the year ahead, knowing that Cape May still has plenty of stories to tell and we’ll find them for you. 
Barraclough is director of publications and website at MAC.