Happy Stick Season from the Green Mountains:
“ Zen IS your life, Appreciate YOUR Life”- Taizan Maezumi
So- now it’s time to say goodbye to all our family (MIC-KEY………..). A magnificent autumn has turned into the grey of stick season here in the mountains as we prepare to head back to Ohio in a week…a very bittersweet time of year for us. We have decided not to come back this winter with the ongoing drama and burden of the house of horrors in Groton, which we will be maintaining (and praying for no disasters) this winter…as I’ve said , we have TOO many houses. So, away we go…should be an interesting trip home-packed to the gills with two cats and Lucy aboard.
But today, we are still here…light snow is falling along with the last of the leaves and pine trimmings. We are in the 20s at night and looking at low 40s high this week. We had our first snow on Halloween and many dustings since then, with the mountain peaks covered and the snow machines working at night at Okemo and Killington.
Jenn is in Cleveland for Ry and Lauren’s wedding shower and sent me an emergency e-mail this morning to make sure to water the Wheat Grass- a process that involves bending each plant aside to gently spray each root (no shit!). Wheat grass is one of the staples of our life in Vermont. We start every morning with a shot glass of the sickly sweet nectar to correct whatever we have eaten in the previous 24 hours and make us whole. Jen is heavily engaged in learning the art of growing and studies at the foot of our local master, Peter, who is a Communist who claims to be hiding from the state department and is the bearer of all things wheat grass. We broke into his house one night while he was gone to retrieve an unclaimed container of peek ready wheat grass that would have apparently gone to waste had we not rescued it. Such is life in the organic , no “GMO” state.
We have spent a lot of time in Groton lately; overseeing the preparations for winter- including the erection of a new room; a 6×10 shanty to cover and insulate the basement water pump that provides water for the apartment- so that after we drain the house system and shut it down there will still be water for the apartment in winter…please make it stop! So now we can list the house on MLS as 24 rooms instead of 23- which should really jack up our showings.
One benefit of stick season is that all the algae in THE POND is now dead , and it looks great…reborn in fact. I’m thinking we just need a refrigeration unit out there all summer and it will be crystal clear…really, see the pictures.
We got up to the Northeast Kingdom the week before last for our final leaves trek of the year. It was grey and wet but we saw 3 or 4 trees with nice leaves on them. Lucy got to stay in her first Country Inn and made lots of new friends everywhere she went. We went to some of our favorite Vermont remote classics- like Brownington and Craftsbury Common to play in the fallen leaves and we found a diner in Coventry that a Boston paper said has the best southern fried chicken north of the Mason-Dixon line (well, not really, but good anyway). We kept seeing sunshine in the distance- so our trip was based on trying to catch up with it-we caught it several times- for about 5 minutes. All in all, we had a great leaf chasing Fall-the locals say it was the best foliage in 20 years, and I think we caught almost every tree in the state(and some in NY and NH)- before they shed. But now….gone….and…STICKS!!!
Out trips also led us to a bunch of wildlife sightings including mountain rams, lots of wild turkeys and chickens, exotic birds heading south (like us, but further) and maybe even a Beefalo, though it may have been a developmentally disabled cow.
We have continued to walk up our two road hills to catch the diminishing view- which Lucy really likes and she and I did a bit on the Appalachian Trail yesterday; I suppose stick season has its own kind of beauty…but not all that much.
So, I’m sad to say, this will be my last missive until the Spring. Some of you have asked me to continue when back in the flatland, but who wants to know about life in the Midwest, anyway? But, I’m glad to have shared with you every few weeks and hope you continue to find this amusing.
If you did not hear the Car Talk tribute to brother Tom (by brother Ray), who died this week- it is one for the ages. I laughed and cried for an hour. I’m including a link you can access it with.
http://www.cartalk.com/content/1445-tommy-riposa-pace
Be well, do good work and stay in touch.
Love, STU
