Gathering summer

I remember one spring day in Guilford, or maybe two. Then it rained again. Soon it was summer. In between there was a visit to Boston for the Early Music Festival, and we went with Harry to tour Frederick Law Olmsted's offices at his home in Brookline. There was a trolley program we put on for the GPA, and a quick visit to New York to see Jerry and Geri Fleming. Went with the Flemings to the Neue Galerie, a precious gallery on the upper East side. And Bill and I visited the Archives at Yale to read some of the 70,000 letters of William Graham Sumner stored there. We also discovered Chatfield Hollow, not so far from our house, a new place to hike and swim.

We reported dutifully to Gilmanton for the Fourth of July. Got to see Sarah and Jody's twins, Willa and Josie. And other little ones. Soon we were off to Canada, Quebec, Montreal, Kingston, and Toronto. A lovely two-week trip bracketed with overnights in Vermont, one of our favorite states. We arrived back in Gilmanton at the end of July, and Jenny and Phil and the kids blew in a few hours later with a tent, a new van, and various bicycles tied on to the back. Soon there were more, Lorie and Thomas and their kids, lucky a lot of them actually liked sleeping in the tent. We celebrated the union of Abby and Wes, and their new daughter Talia, and commemorated the lives of Joe Urner and Jimmy Johnson at beloved Loon Pond. The Rock Party was the fitting conclusion, Roger and Liz walking down in front of us under the full August moon.

Now I am in Chester, Connecticut, with a few friends from last year's workshop at the Frost Place. We are going at it full bore. I have revised two poems already. Grateful for all comments.

Waking Up the Blog

a foot and a half more or less

You never know who might show up here, expecting to find an up-to-date blog. The last post was oh-so-last year. Would you like to go forwards or backwards? I prefer going forwards, on the Metro at least. We'll have to pick up just after Christmas (white) when Karen and Fede and the girls arrived to help us celebrate the new year. No champagne (we all went to bed early...) but lots of cookies. The heaviest snow came a few weeks later, one day it was a foot and a half. As February rolled in, we rolled down to D.C. to attend AWP, sold quite a few Sixteen Rivers books at our table, some great readings (one at Busboys and Poets was especially good). Bill and I also went on a tour of the Library of Congress, which took us to the top of the building where the Poet Laureate's office is...he wasn't in. For Presidents Day we had a visit from the grandchildren, walking the Stony Creek Trolley trail was a particularly nice excursion.

Bill and I left suddenly for California that week, as my sister's husband, Len, had passed away. Many tears, but a lot of pride watching my nieces and nephews, and my two very grownup great nephews, speak about their Nonno at the service in my childhood church, filled with hundreds of mourners. We had fun staying in the last part of my sister's bed and breakfast she hadn't yet sold, the cottage in the rear. And we had a nice dinner with Mimi, too. Not the California visit we had planned, but it turned out to be a meaningful visit with family and friends.

Cottage of Janet's Bnb

The Brigantine, Atlantic
City in the distance

In March we went down to NY to hear Bob Hass, Adam Zagajewski and Claire Cavanagh read and talk about their connections with Czeslaw Milosz. A bonus was getting together for breakfast with Gwen and Norm at the M. Wells Diner, and seeing their apartment in Long Island City. At the end of the month we took our (now) annual trip to New Jersey. We met our friend Carolyn down in the Pine Barrens, where she took us on a tour of the Brigantine, a wildlife preserve in vast stretches of marshland, and a view far off of..Atlantic City. The next day Bill and I drove to Batsto, a former iron manufacturing company town--we thought we'd spend about an hour, but it was really fascinating, so of course we were there much longer! We drove up through the pine forests to Princeton, and the next day I joined my fellow U.S. 1 Poets in a reading at the Princeton Library from the new anthology. We also ate for the first time at the Blue Point Grill, had to eat at the counter, but it was really great! Dropped William at the Princeton Junction station the next morning (he was off to play bridge with Harry in NY), drove home in a little rain, stopping for lunch at the Runcible Spoon in Nyack. I think we're pretty up-to-date now. Time for Easter brunch in Gilmanton!

November eases into December

Hudson, NY

After driving the nifty Volvo station wagon rental car in the Land of Altena (our Netherlands part of the trip), I didn't wait a week before I visited the New London Volvo dealer. It helped that The Broken Yolk breakfast place was nearby. I'm now learning to pronounce the new car I own. I guess it's Vahl-voh not Vohl-vo, I keep trying to turn it into an Italian car. So we set off in the new vahl-voh, driving west for Thanksgiving. First stop was Hudson where we discovered a great coffee place, The Swallow. Then we stayed in Cooperstown at the August Lodge. The next morning we had breakfast in town, and visited the Fenimore Museum, which was a delight.

Fenimore Museum

Then on to Buffalo to see Jenny and Phil and the kids. Their cousins were visiting as well, so everyone had someone to play with. Thanksgiving dinner was yummy, each family's contribution a little different, the Croatian goodies, my sweet potatoes roasted with pecans and currants, and succulent turkey roasted by Phil's parents. Snow fell while we were there so we had a nice outing in a recreation area south of the city. On the way home we stopped in Skaneateles, then stayed in Cooperstown again.