March is indeed stomping in like a lion this year. But two weeks ago, for two consecutive days, it was warm enough for shirt sleeves. We broke records. Same thing last week, though not quite as warm. Out came the running shoes, and the long leash, and the water bowl for the car. About this … Continue reading In Like a Lion: Vermontish Running Habits
Dogs
Vermont Vortex: When Parts Fail
What is that thing, you ask? Why, it’s a completely broken alternator plucked from an ’07 Subaru Outback. (What—you don’t have random car parts on the floor in your mudroom? You should; all the popular people are doing it.) I snapped that photo in the early morning hours on Friday, when one impatient David-the-Chef stood … Continue reading Vermont Vortex: When Parts Fail
Why Do You Run?
Why do you run? The gentle, soft spoken man balances a clipboard on one knee, pen poised in hand, listening carefully while I explain my habits before going on to tell him the history of a badly compromised heel. He starts scribbling while I talk. It gets me outside, I said. With my dog. It … Continue reading Why Do You Run?
Vermontish Doppelgängers and Other Christmas Week Reflections
This one thing still happens to me every week, if not every day: I see somebody and I think I know who it is for an instant, and then remember there is no way I could possibly know them. I am new here still, and mainly disconnected, still. Back ‘home’ in Knoxville I could scarcely … Continue reading Vermontish Doppelgängers and Other Christmas Week Reflections
Heavenly Noise: Holiday Sunday Photo Essay
Suffice it to say we have been busy. (Note to self: never again move to a new house just before Christmas.) A little peek at what some of us have been up to these last couple of weeks. Heavenly Peace on this Christmas Eve, from my family to yours.
Shape Shifting Words and Other Moving Truths
Have you ever fixated on a simple word until it’s no longer recognizable? The word desk, for example, is a four-letter word that means “a table, frame, or case with a sloping or horizontal surface especially for WRITING and reading and often with drawers, compartments, and pigeonholes,” so says Merriam Webster. Roll around the word … Continue reading Shape Shifting Words and Other Moving Truths
One Picture, A Few Words: B & W Photo Challenge Day 6
We are tired. All of us. Yesterday Scout and I ran five miles, the longest run we've undertaken together. We reached a familiar milestone on the Battenkill I once met with Clarence-the-Canine, and then turned and headed back to the car. We did not run as fast as Clarence and I ran, but we stopped … Continue reading One Picture, A Few Words: B & W Photo Challenge Day 6
Scout’s Big Epiphany
Whatever life experiences shaped Scout-the-Lab before he came to us last December, there is this one truth about him, and about all dogs says the vet: they forget nothing. Scout’s skittishness is authentic, part and parcel of who he is. I may have envisioned a goofy, tail-wagging demeanor in my early quest for this dog, … Continue reading Scout’s Big Epiphany
Dogged Adventures: Asheville Is Noisy
The metal carabiner-like clip that fastens to the harness part of Scout-the-Lab’s seatbelt is maddening, like that childhood game Barrel Full of Monkeys: just when you think you’re about to get it clipped—or unclipped as the case may be—an irksome little hook (think crochet needle) gets hung up and refuses to slip through the metal … Continue reading Dogged Adventures: Asheville Is Noisy
Dogged Adventures: No Complaints About Rainy Days
When it’s cold-ish, rainy, and a bit blustery on vacation, you spend a fair amount of time in your cheap hotel room doing mainly nothing. Or riding shotgun around town with your twenty-something while he shows you new stuff and changed stuff and plain missing stuff. Five years is long enough for the landscape to … Continue reading Dogged Adventures: No Complaints About Rainy Days
Sycamore Stories 