EAST MONTPELIER – This is written in the last days of April. From my office window, the yard and the field and the woods beyond seem to be catching their breath before tackling what’s always come next. Out back, the air on this sunny day is alive with birdsong. So[Read More…]
Willem Lange
It Wanders Today, as Often it does Lately
EAST MONTPELIER – The dying day breeze stirs only the treetops, and an evening stillness descends upon the woods. I sit on a bench in the park, as quiet myself as our surroundings. Kiki, restless as ever, alternates between the bench and my lap and short sniffing forays into the[Read More…]
What Will Karma Have in Store?
EAST MONTPELIER – Many of us are familiar with archy and mehitabel (more of us ought to be), a collection of essays, stories, and poetry written by archy, a cockroach with literary instincts and talents who’s been condemned to a life as a cockroach for the crime of having been[Read More…]
It’s a Fairly Pleasant Arrangement
by Willem Lange EAST MONTPELIER – Living three and a half hours apart, as we do, my dear friend Bea and I get to see each other about every two weeks or so, on average. This is almost without doubt an ideal arrangement, as our life styles are quite different, and[Read More…]
If it Gets You, You Won’t Hear it
EAST MONTPELIER – The sky has always been a source of wonder for us earthbound folks. For some of us who are – shall we say – more earthbound, it’s a source of portents, omens, and myths. What we call thunderstorms and explain as electrically charged clouds used to be[Read More…]
We Saw Things We’d Never Seen Before
EAST MONTPELIER – “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” — Samuel Clemens If anyone[Read More…]
Aha! A cane-user
EAST MONTPELIER – Our cab arrived at 4:40 a.m. on the dot and deposited us at the entrance to United Airlines about 5:30. Check-in was amazingly easy, and the trek to our gate likewise. We took off from Logan also on the dot – it seems to be true that[Read More…]
It Sucks You in and Spits You Out
EAST MONTPELIER – This coming Saturday morning, a Boeing 737 Max 8 bound for Denver will be taking off (or at least is scheduled to be taking off) from Logan Airport at 7:19 a.m. This means that my intrepid traveling companion, Bea, and I need to be at the United[Read More…]
I Do Object to Ageism
EAST MONTPELIER – It’s likely the unavoidable fate of both teenagers and golden-agers that most news reporters and writers are aspiring twenty-somethings eager to make splashes. Thus, if a young person with a newly minted driver’s license loses control of their vehicle on a slippery night, the headline will include[Read More…]
I Needn‘t Have Worried so Much
EAST MONTPELIER – Owing to the recent development of a relationship with a much younger lady (of only 76), I’ve been traveling every so often to Nahant, Mass., a few miles north of Boston, for visits. Being a bit of a country rube, I’ve been quite aware of the increasing[Read More…]
To me, it was the Mother Lode
EAST MONTPELIER – If you gad about enough and try to do at least one new thing a week, you’re bound to encounter interesting people, educational experiences, and exciting situations. A perfect proof of that came up for me last summer, when I trundled across New England to join my[Read More…]
Many a Toast Over the Years
EAST MONTPELIER – This past week, during the excitement of Valentine’s Day and the nocturnal activities of the characters who covered the windows of downtown Montpelier with hundreds of red hearts, a significant birthday passed almost unnoticed. While here in the north country of New England a mediocre winter defies[Read More…]
