EAST MONTPELIER – There are certain phenomena you can count on here in northern New England. Most are pleasant, migrating birds, the first snow, the aroma of boiling maple sap. Some are not. I’ve kept track of my first black fly each spring: average date, May 5, and it’s downhill[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – A couple of days ago I had to make an afternoon run a few miles east to the health center to pick up a fresh supply of one of my life-extending pills. Driving home, a few minutes after four, I watched the sun disappear into a cloudy[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – Traveling from Nahant, Mass., to Montpelier, as I often do, requires working my way west through the stoplighted streets of Lynn, passing Hispanic churches, tire warehouses, convenience stores, discount gas stations, liquor stores, and at least one urgent care center to get to a rotary (which Bridget,[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – The other evening I pulled into the carport at the back of my house and before I turned off the ignition and opened the driver’s side door, I checked the outside temperature on the thermometer on the dashboard. Twenty-three degrees; cool enough. I double-checked it with my[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – Well up on a heavily wooded mountainside in the eastern Adirondack high peaks, in a lonely, sloping seep between two rocky ridges that likely sees no human beings for years at a time, there lies an anomalous cast-iron cauldron, almost hidden by years of dead leaves, that[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – If you happen to live long enough, there comes a time in life that, facing an uncertain, but certainly fairly short, future, you may find yourself wondering what you’ve been waiting for. There are still mountains you haven’t climbed, and now you’re no longer able to climb[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – Whenever I take the ferry to the New York shore from Charlotte, I try to sit on the forward-facing bench on the upper level of the boat. Ahead of us rise the Adirondacks, one of the oldest ranges in North America. Most of the highest peaks are[Read More…]

EAST HARDWICK – On the penultimate weekend before the election, Bea showed up in the yard right around dark, having started from Nahant after her last Friday meeting. We were both ready for supper; so I fed Kiki, and we went out for Mexican and a beer. It was to[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – Sometimes, when the stars align fortuitously, everything turns out fine: your car stops burning oil, your wife’s Raynaud’s quits bothering her, and your kid moves his drum set to the garage. Other times, when the alignment is bad, everything goes to smash. That was the case with[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – During the high summer the sun swings far enough north to flood the back porch with heat and light, especially in the afternoon at the hour for preprandials. But around Labor Day it retreats behind the northwest corner of the house, and it’s possible to sit out[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – It doesn’t seem possible it was that long ago, but it was. Seventy-four years now; my first autumn in New England. When you’re new to a place, you register everything completely, and with fresh eyes and ears. I had the incredibly good fortune to have been sent[Read More…]

EAST MONTPELIER – Of all the cultural commentary that floods in here daily on the internet, this little story is one of my favorites. A man standing in a checkout line in a supermarket is talking in a foreign language with someone on his cell phone. The woman standing behind[Read More…]