Self-Guided Tour
I stop by to pay a visit to the Thomas Cole National Historic Site. I’m early. Visiting hours don’t begin for another half hour. I sit on the porch and look at the view....
Category: The Word from Pandora’s Tavern
Looking for Robert M. Coates
The collie and I were on the trail of some literary ghosts. We were following directions provided in a letter written sixty-five years ago by Robert Coates to Malcolm Cowley. Along the way we...
The Town Tomb
It’s a beauteous Dour Hour, calm and free, down at Pandora’s Tavern. The early June sun is sinking low in its tranquility. The windows of the tavern are thrown open wide. I sit near...
Called Back
Around back of Emily Dickinson’s Homestead. Lots of visitors but they are very quiet. All of them are on the phone, just listening. Apparently there’s a number you dial for an official recorded guided...
Visitation
Here is where Herman Melville wrote Moby Dick. And Pierre. And Israel Potter. And The Confidence Man. And Billy Budd. The docent at this historic home in the Berkshires is a college student. This...
Seeking Roots
An email in my box from one of those genealogy sites, with this subject heading: “John P., experience a whole new Ancestry”. Okay. I take the bait and open the message. It’s blank. Nada....
Local History
The Old Burying Ground in an Upstate, almost-Vermont, New York village dates from 1769. Nearby is an idle fairgrounds. Official historical signage indicates: “More Revolutionary soldiers are buried here than any other cemetery in...
Tangled Weeds
Garlic mustard, I am led to believe, is an invasive weed. So each spring I walk around Paradise Hill and wherever I see it I yank it from the ground. One weed after another....
Real Estate Listing
A stately old home in a prime location. Formerly used as a funeral parlor. Ready for easy conversion back. Into a single or multi-family home. Smoke detector system. Dry sprinkler system. Both fully installed....
A Grave Error
My old flip phone. Old? Maybe eight years. I went back to it last summer, after going through two or three generations of “smart” phones. I thought I was being smart by reverting to...