The darkness would have compelled any visitor to stand quietly for a moment and adjust to it before finally getting his bearings, after crossing the threshold of this cottage, if it were only just: More precisely, this was but a room of four rough-hewn paneled walls, unfinished, with a shed-style roof fashioned of standing-seam metal, … Continue reading Evening Miniature 11.22.20
Afternoon Miniature 11.8.20
Lucy tugged at her skirt, which had ridden up over her bent knees in a funny way, and now its satiny lining had shifted, allowing the wool fibers to rub her skin uncomfortably. Her head swam with obtuse and acute angles, theorems and axioms. She glanced down at her open notebook and saw where her … Continue reading Afternoon Miniature 11.8.20
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
Afternoon Miniature 10.25.20
The ancient truck’s open hood concealed her from the waist up as she bent over its engine; she rose a little onto her toes to get a better look at something shadowy and undefined. Try again now, she hollered to nobody in the cab, but all that happened was nothing, only the obstinate click-click-click of … Continue reading Afternoon Miniature 10.25.20
Coping With COVID: A Lifetime of Stories in Teacups and Coffee Mugs
Mad Hatter: What’s the matter my dear, don’t you care for tea? Alice: Why, yes. I’m very fond of tea. March Hare: If you don’t care for tea, you could at least make polite conversation! —Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland cup and saucer I found a few years ago at the Adelphi Hotel estate sale, … Continue reading Coping With COVID: A Lifetime of Stories in Teacups and Coffee Mugs
Sunday Almanac: It’s Fall Foliage Time in Vermont
Kinda. Here in town, some leaves seem reluctant to let go of the summer, as am I. But the ‘peepers’ have been here in droves like they are every year, not dissuaded by The Plague, nor pestilence, famine, nor floods, it would seem. This year they’ve descended upon us not so much in tour buses, … Continue reading Sunday Almanac: It’s Fall Foliage Time in Vermont
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes: How This Pandemic Is Forcing the Evolution of Our Species
It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change. ―Charles Darwin from the New York Public Library Digital Collections Downtown Bennington is small, like Bennington itself, with a ‘four corners’-style crossroads at its heart, North and South … Continue reading Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes: How This Pandemic Is Forcing the Evolution of Our Species
Mid-Week Almanac, 9.23.20
It’s somehow Wednesday already, a vacation day for me because I have a little bidness to take care of later on this afternoon, and maybe I simply needed a day for myself. There’s nothing left for me to say about missing our annual travel down South that I haven’t already said, so I’ll leave it … Continue reading Mid-Week Almanac, 9.23.20
Talent—or Time? Searching for the Special Sauce
I keep on plugging away at classical guitar, resurrecting this discipline I haven’t studied in so many long years. I’ve more or less worked my way through the book that was my introduction to playing, compiled and composed by one Christopher Parkening, and have moved on to some slightly more intermediate-level exercises and pieces. This … Continue reading Talent—or Time? Searching for the Special Sauce
Afternoon Miniature 9.7.20
Cecily could still hear the little fan whirring, a sound that somehow underscored the silence that morning, if she thought long and hard enough about it. For all but the coldest months in the last year, Claudia had kept it going on a small fern stand next to her reading chair, more or less in … Continue reading Afternoon Miniature 9.7.20
Sycamore Stories 