everybody loves a parade Our house is a jumble of boxes, papers are everywhere, artwork has come down and rests against walls, laundry is piled high. The fridge and pantry are empty mainly, and shall stay that way at this point. I've spent hours on the phone and online doing the things one does, cancelling … Continue reading This Is How a New Chapter Begins
Beauty
Sunday Almanac: We March Inevitably Towards Winter
It is always a little sad to me when the snowplow rig assemblies start showing up on pickup trucks around town; it’s inevitable, but cold weather comes a little too soon on the heels of summer (to say nothing of ephemeral fall) in these parts, and wears out its welcome along about April, when everybody … Continue reading Sunday Almanac: We March Inevitably Towards Winter
Frozen Moments: A Memory
Impressionist-like landscape Leaving work last Friday afternoon, and even a couple of moments earlier in the week, I paused to drink in the landscape around our office campus, so eerily quiet just now. It always possesses a bucolic beauty, even on the bleakest winter days. But at some point when I was too preoccupied with … Continue reading Frozen Moments: A Memory
Sunday Photo Essay: Spring Is Open for Business
However haltingly commerce goes on during a pandemic, the changing of seasons waits for nothing and no one. We ventured outside for a brief walk in the moderate temperatures and glorious sunshine yesterday, The Chef and I and one Goldapeake Retriever called Scout. I've always thought of our little hamlet in the Southwest corner of … Continue reading Sunday Photo Essay: Spring Is Open for Business
Journal Entry: Desperate Measures
I don’t want to write about it. How can I not? A little earlier I was outside visiting The Chef, who’s been doing yard work on this exquisite early spring day, raking leaves in the garden where we tried to grow veggies with mixed success last summer, but this summer will convert to a cutting … Continue reading Journal Entry: Desperate Measures
Photo Essay: Saturday Afternoon at MASS MoCA
We're lucky to live close to several cultural treasures, including The Clark Art Institute just down the road from us in Williamstown, Massachusetts, and if you hang a left just before you get there, a few miles on you'll arrive at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art—MASS MoCA—in North Adams. Yesterday was one of the … Continue reading Photo Essay: Saturday Afternoon at MASS MoCA
Journal Entry: When Change Is Good
In a recent video chat with my irreverent twenty-something, I mentioned I’d heard a song on the radio that really resonated with me (it was a Blues Traveler song, in case you’re wondering), and after several days with that earworm, decided I must have this music, in spite of the negative review one critic gave … Continue reading Journal Entry: When Change Is Good
Sunday Photo Essay: Human Nature
Listening to one of my favorite radio shows not long ago I was gobsmacked by this notion: we often think of nature as separate from us, a thing we must protect, else destroy. But the truth is, we humans are also part of nature, and not separate from it. I latched onto that notion right away, because … Continue reading Sunday Photo Essay: Human Nature
Unpacking Hope: A Sunday Wish
So, so many material belongings that came with me to Vermont all the way from Tennessee have waited patiently in storage for the last three years: things David and I considered nonessential when we combined two households three years ago, the year I started writing and editing professionally full time for a marketing agency. But … Continue reading Unpacking Hope: A Sunday Wish
Photo Essay: Scout Between Storms
Niko left us with about eight inches of snow on Thursday, Orson's knocking at the door right now: we expect him to gift us with ten to twelve or so inches. Yesterday Scout—with shiny, new off-leash privileges—took advantage of the calm between the storms.
Sycamore Stories 