Pandemic-fueled buying frenzyhas pushed prices up, selling time down

By Lynn R. Parks  
Photographs by Scott Nathan
From the October 2021 issue

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Coastal Sussex has long been a mecca for retirees. “They’ve been coming here for years,” says real estate agent Judy Rhodes, manager of the Century 21 Home Team Realty office near Rehoboth Beach. This year, though, the COVID-19 pandemic has pushed more people to act on their plans than usual, Rhodes says. Retirees who had been saving for a home at the beach decided that now was the time to take the leap. Others who were still working turned in their notices and embarked on early retirement. 

And then there were younger people who are still raising families but who realized, while kept out of their offices under COVID restrictions, that they could do their jobs from anywhere. “If work could be done remotely and you no longer needed to live near your work location, then work could be done from a much better place than you currently had,” Rhodes says.

 

We might take for granted the preservation of historic homes, the creation of an impressive public park, and the safeguarding of a clean enviroment, but those achievements did not happen by luck in the First State's First Town. Citizen activists made them happen.

By Chris Beakey 
Photographs by Carolyn Watson
From the September 2021 issue

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Whether you’ve just escaped from Route 1 traffic or taken a detour on your way home from a day at Cape Henlopen State Park, you’re apt to feel a special kind of peace as you encounter historic Lewes’s most picture-perfect places. The bustling marina alongside the Savannah Road bridgeCanalfront Park, with its performance spaces and public boat launch. The quaint downtown surrounded by beautifully preserved Colonial, Victorian and craftsman homes. 

But what if it wasn’t there, as you see it now? 

That’s a question some longtime local residents contemplate every time they look back on three pivotal events that almost turned Lewes into a very different place: a town challenged by chronic pollution, reduced access to its picturesque canal, and the loss of prized historic buildings. 

Getting together with friends ain't like it used to be

By Fay Jacobs 
Illustration by Rob Waters
From the August 2021 issue

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It’s August already and I’m aging more gracelessly than usual. But at least I’m vaccinated, out and about, trying to remember what life used to be like. The fact that I lost more than a year of touring with my one woman show, “Aging Gracelessly: 50 Shades of Fay,” is significant.

I mean hell, I broke into show business at an age I’d more likely break a hip, so a lost year is big. How big? This morning on Facebook somebody posted “Life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer you get to the end, the faster it goes.”

Tell me about it. We’re deteriorating at a rapid rate. My wife recently had a knee replacement made necessary by an injury she got putting out the garbage. And I suffered a torn rotator cuff in my shoulder tripping over that same garbage before it went out. We’ve both spent the past few months at physical therapy.