Happy October:
It’s been a great couple of weeks in the green mountains. The leaves are popping, days in the 70s, nights in the 40s and the Vermonters are rightly bragging about this being the best place to be in this season. The pictures show the leaves, the guests, and the adventures we are having in the north woods. So…a few thematic highlights:
Flying in Vermont: this is not an easy task, often requiring a two hour drive to Albany and then multiple flights. So- I finally made the plunge to take the commuter flight on Cape Air to Boston out of the Rutland airport five minutes from our house. So Jenn drives me in her bathrobe and curlers and drops me off an hour ahead of time. The building is the size of our living room and no one is there yet since it is apparently WAY to early too early. They have to call in the TSA who are home eating maple syrup. I check in and they say they have to weigh my bag since they have to decide where it goes on the plane due to weight restrictions..THEN they weigh me! I’m thinking at this point that a Xanex and several bourbons are in order, and THEN they pull up the plane and it is several sizes smaller than the FedEx plane and holds eight people if they are not too big. We get in and the ground guy winds up the propellers (Really!) and the co-pilot turns around to shout out the safety instructions over the drone of the propellers, and then we take off for twenty minutes of death rattle shaking. I turn Catholic and recite fifty three Hail Marys and Our Fathers..but once we get up in the air it is magnificent; flying at 7000 feet over the mountains and foliage, until we get to Boston and then they go out over the ocean and we commence to shake and rattle until we land at Logan…and this is how we fly in Vermont.
Visitors: we have become popular in the last month (or maybe it is the leaves?) and had a variety of visitors stay with us. We get to show them the Vermont highlights, which has included seven trips to the Vermont Country Store in Weston; a place we would never set foot in on our own…bit it is VERY Vermont -so we go. They all wonder if we have heat and what the peculiar sound is when Larry sings glory, glory at sunset…and they all have to be retsrained from jumping in the pond with the kitchen strainer….We took Jenn’s son Ryan and fiancé Lauren to our favorite hike on the property of the old fella who built these magnificent trails for people to enjoy. His name is Carson Davidson (Kit) and it turns out he is a pretty famous short documentary filmmaker from NYC who retired to the woods and is now 89 (you can see his photo if you pay attention). The Japanese Gardens there are not to be missed and the hike up to Moot Point is to die for, so when you come we can go see him and see if he is wearing his Speedo and hanging upside down.
Living in an Electricians’ former house: Our benefactor Karin’s husband Walter was an electrician and the house has all the wonderful touches of someone who knows electricity and knows everyone else does not. Walter was really good in his installations but they are inscrutable to the average Midwestern dunce. So we spend a lot of time trying to figure out what light switches control what lights (still searching for 5 or 6 after three months) we have a number of timed lights which come on and go off as they (or Walter) desired…but which we are humbled by…and then there are the circuit breakers. Walter installed four breaker boxes at two ends of the house, and we are certain he knew why and what they controlled. But every time a light goes off we go down to the basement, try to avoid whacking our head going through the secret tunnel that connects the two sides, and then start throwing breakers. We usually hit something that works by the 25th or 30th breaker (there are around 45)…and then we just wait for the next one to not work. Karin and her daughter Christine send us periodic e-mail pep talks from Las Vegas (where they apparently have neither timers nor basements)about the wiring and then we just figure everyone is Vermont has light trauma.
Sunsets in Vermont and elsewhere: It is safe to say we are becoming connoisseurs of the magic of sunsets. We find them everywhere we go and have watched the beauties in the last month in the Adirondacks and Green mountains, over the Pacific and the San Bernardino mountains in CA, at our little house up on the hill and this week on Lake Champlain. I have taken 1900 sunset photos in the last month, but only share a select few so my son Max does not take my camera away from me. Like men hanging naked upside down, some people think they all look alike- but we think each one is a Michelangelo painting.. While chasing various sunsets, I like to take a plunge in a nearby body of water, even if no bathing suit is handy. In the last week, I have jumped into the pond, Lake Bomoseen and Lake Champlain…needless to say there is lot of shriveling that go with this in the autumn in Vt.…but It’s quite invigorating and creates fond memories once defrosted.
Music in Vermont- today we went to a little store down the road called “Junque”..which is applicable. We ran into an old Vermont woman who plays fiddle all over the place and she has invited me to come and pick with her and her friends. While I am working up the nerve to do that (what if they turn to me and nod??? What would they mean?), I have been playing on Monday nights at our local folk club and this week we had our annual performance in the town library basement. The club members have embraced my arrival with open arms- except for one woman (who may have issues)who once a night says she hates me. There were around 15 of us and twenty of them (fans with lighters) and we went through a good set of songs that each person had brought to the table. I drank a bunch of bourbon from a honey bottle (the squeeze kind) and had a really good time. One woman sang “That’ll be the Day” in honor of Linda Ronstadt (they both have Parkinson’s) and a little man from across the border (NY that is) sang Rick Danko’s “The Shape I’m In” which made me wet my pants . Music is quirky in Vermont- but very lovable.
Chasing Leaves: Just because we have moved to Vermont, we have not given up our fascination with finding peak fall color- so we drive around and take walks every day in search of the perfect red maple. We were up at the Lake Champlain islands for two nights this week- but it is still fairly green up three though the orchards and wineries were popping. Last week we saw magnificence at the Brandon Pass and in the Adirondacks on our trip there for a few days. Our drive into the town on Belmont is particularly scenic, though every five minutes that I stop to take a photo, Jenn reminds me that my version of rose colored glasses may make it seem a little better than it is (talk about bubble bursting). I’ve included a few leaf shots in the attached montage- though Max will take my camera again if I start really posting these . Next week we are heading up to see our friends in quaint Brookfield and then to a remote fishing camp on the Canuck border ( we may even fish…)It’s a good way to while away an afternoon and my Subaru has mysteriously increased its mileage from around 24 mpg to over 30 mpg as we drive up and down mountains….go figure. In other fall happenings- we decided that our little front door autumn display really lacked some corn stalks- so you can see the pix of Jenn stealing them from a remote cornfield and the resulting splendor at our front door.
Has anyone been watching the new series “Orange is the New Black” on Netflix or “Masters of Sex” on ShowTime…..Hmmm…..
Miss you all,
Stu
