Good Sunday to the world at large and to all our friends and family:
“Your sacred space is where you can find yourself over and over again” Joseph Campbell
“Da Doo Run Run Run……Da Doo Run Run” Leonard Cohen
Well, the Garden Tour extravaganza came and went. In the process, we dug up most of the yard, moved three 100 pound or more boulders out of the ground, threw out both our backs and generally entered into a state of show-off frenzy. The signage to our house was not very good- so we had a disappointing 15 or 20 cars come by. Jenn was a delightful host and tour guide…Lucy and I escaped to Rutland and the air conditioned comfort of Wal-Mart.
Aside from the generally disturbing thought of a Trump presidency (this is dark humor, right?)…we were very disappointed this past week by the passage of the Congress’ watered down GMO law, which now usurps the exponentially more stringent law Vermont passed two years ago. In case you missed it, our congress had decide that citizen’s right and need to know will be served by putting bar codes on food products that you can potentially scan and read with your smart phone while shopping down the aisle. And, they gave the food giants 2-3 years to comply with this burdensome requirement. Go Kraft and Monsanto; get lost you peons…
I have been thinking lately (DUH!) that sometimes life in the mountains has it’s CHALLENGES; may of which we have been experiencing:
Phones……..don’t’ ask. booster goes down, no service. Take the 20 minute ride to find a piece of ground that might get an intermittent cell signal, and hope it does not rain
Power– we had our first power outage this week- for over 12 hours, which of course, also means no phones, no way to call power company or see if anyone else is out. This is when the whole town goes to Java Babba to drink coffee, eat cake, and find cell and laptop service…you have to beat down the masses for a table
UPS/FedEx– sometimes they find us, sometimes they don’t…then the packages make the tour of local post offices until we find out it has gone back to the distribution center and we get them to bring it back…makes Amazon Prime two day rather ineffective
Mail– well…it is the Postal Service…so we quit getting any forwarded mail about ten days ago, which may be at post office in Delaware, at our home mailbox or in Oshkosh, by gosh…is all this communication stuff really all that important anyway?
Bedding– in the mountains one needs quite a bit more bedding than a flatlander would…and with a multitude of beds at the Inn at Scum Pond…well, it takes lot of staying on top of…and a lot of UPS deliveries drifting around the back roads of central Vermont
In addition, I might add: the garden weeds are overwhelming in the rock filled, post-apocalyptic, volcanic yard; it is really hard to get Chinese food late at night, it’s a long way to find an adult film (no, not that kind) and flying…….. well flying just takes awhile
And, on top of all that…THE POND…has reached an all-time high scum quotient, which neither the pump solution nor the kitchen strainer approach is having any effect on….where is the Pond guy?
So, what is the payoff, you might legitimately ask (remember, there is no late night Chinese!). Well, I went to a Governor’s Council all day retreat this week up in lovely Barnard, at Silver Lake State Park. My commute was an hour drive down dirt roads (circumventing Woodstock) with sweeping vistas in every direction, stone walls abound, grazing buffalo, and dappled sunlight through the forest.
Leaving the driveway, you see mountains in every direction, heading for the charming small towns that surround us, music is in the air at every turn, there is almost no summer humidity and it takes 20 minutes or less to get to a dozen fine hikes and a dozen mountain lakes to kayak in. And the farm to table restaurants and the farmer’s markets everywhere. Pond-schmond…. we love Vermont.
We had Iranian guests this weekend, to add to our recent ethnic mix of Chinese and Bostonians…it takes all kinds…..
Gotta go see how much scum was born in the pond overnight, see if we can figure out how to put the pulleys on the exercise machine extravaganza and maybe find a swimming hole. Off to NOLA for the week tomorrow, and then readying for our summer sojourn back to the Midwest homeland.
Enjoy the day. Seize the moment. Eat a peach.
Stu-Man
