EAST MONTPELIER – Every once in a while, amid the cacophonic news that pours in through the various speakers here and there in the house, I detect a bit of the America I used to know. It’s not necessarily an explicit image, but more of a remembered aroma; as Eliot[Read More…]
East Montpelier
We New Yorkers couldn’t get any respect
EAST MONTPELIER – On warm summer days it all comes back to me, much like a dream. When I was young in my early twenties, I was often embarrassed to say that I was from New York. Almost no one not from New York really knew what it was like,[Read More…]
Perfect chance to experience America at its essential roots
EAST MONTPELIER – There’s a reason politicians so often show up at barbecues, ice cream socials and block parties. It’s where the people are at their most relaxed and most sociable. It’s a lot easier to chat with voters at a pig roast than at a so-called town hall meeting,[Read More…]
I watch her watching
EAST MONTPELIER – The apocalyptic traffic predicted for the last day of the Memorial Day weekend hadn’t become evident before Kiki and I covered the three hours and change from the North Shore back to Montpelier. As usual, I emptied everything temporary out of the car, put the leftovers from[Read More…]
I’ve run out of elders
EAST MONTPELIER – Most of us have always been told, and believe it, too, that for wisdom we should look to our elders. At my age, however, I’ve about run out of elders, and I don’t feel particularly wise, myself. But I’ve discovered something that’s changing my attitude: my kids[Read More…]
Nowadays it’s most likely a Sharpie
EAST MONTPELIER – Charles Dickens, as most of us have read, went to work in a boot-black factory at the age of twelve to help with his family’s expenses after his father, John Dickens, had been sentenced to debtor’s prison. The factory, not surprisingly, was in a sagging, tumbledown old[Read More…]
Walking on water
EAST MONTPELIER – A couple of weeks ago I mentioned the luxurious digs I called home during one summer of the 1950s, and suggested that there was another story involved. There certainly was. Old George Lamb, who cooked for our work party up at the Ausable Lakes, heard that I[Read More…]
Terry J. Allen
EAST MONTPELIER – Terry J. Allen, an artist, photographer, journalist and activist, died at her home in East Montpelier, April 10, of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare and rapidly-progressing prion brain disorder. She was 78. Allen was born November 24, 1947, in Fall River, Mass. Brave and independent, headstrong and altruistic,[Read More…]
Joining the human race
EAST MONTPELIER – Summer, 1958. I was in temporary remission from higher education and looking for work. I possessed a copy of “On the Road” that I read rather as a bible. I still have it; it’s about eight feet behind me on the bookshelf. I was driving a 1946 Plymouth sedan[Read More…]
Bored with the details
EAST MONTPELIER – Whatever happened to the idyllic idea of living in our houses by the side of the road and being a friend to people? Whatever happened to listening to Walter Cronkite talk about the main story of the day? Ending with “And that’s the way it is.” Poor[Read More…]
Here’s where my amazement began
EAST MONTPELIER – As I age, I’m more and more frequently amazed at the complexity of various systems and the genius it must have taken to design and build them. The loop-the-loop highways of Montreal, Boston and Los Angeles are one example. Though much cursed, reviled and lampooned, it’s hard[Read More…]
Alaska can’t hold a candle . . .
EAST MONTPELIER – December 13, 1989 – Dear Sir – You are cordially invited to participate in the NINETEENTH ANNUAL INTERSTATE GERIATRIC SKI TOUR and GRAND SUB-ARCTIC BUSHWHACK to be held at the Hell Gate cabins in the Dartmouth College Grant from Friday, February 16, to Sunday, February 18, 1990.[Read More…]
