Category: Archeology of Home
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Oh, Possum, Opossum
One year ago an opossum sighting, an opossum photo, and an opossum poem. A familiar chain reaction fueling a familiar runaway post. The photo never made it into the post, and the poem — albeit a preliminary push, unready for prime-time — was buried in a morass of words more focused on Carley, our Labrador…
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Placid Lake Day
Ah, moments like this. A placid lake day inspiring a seasonality sing song. Lake Champlain’s surface silky smooth, disrupted only by the wakes of paddling Canada Geese. Temperatures warm enough to tempt daydreams of spring despite dipping temps (and possibility of precipitation) next week. Bluebird dome above — with just the faintest whisper of cloud…
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Sugaring Season
I’m remembering the year my brother and gathered sap and boiled it down over an open fire to maple syrup more than a decade ago. Hour after hour, day after day, emptying buckets, hauling buckets, stoking the fire pit with logs to keep the syrup boiling, but not boiling over. Though more than once we…
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Coyote Pup
On May 7, 2022 at 11:43 AM friend and wildlife steward John Davis made this video of a coyote pup playing in a brush pile in Rosslyn’s wildlife sanctuary. One of several he witnessed denning near Library Brook, I resisted the temptation to post this at the time in order to protect the location of…
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Hung Tree Unhung
An arboreal alert from Glen, a prompt and well managed resolution by Tony, and a faltering first foray into a poem by me. Glen: When I went to measure the gate I noticed a tree had broken off and hung up on other tree just above wire fence by the compost bin. Tony made short…
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Hostess with the Mostest
Yesterday a friend expressed confidence that his dog would notify him if an intruder entered his home. Our labrador retriever lets us know if someone arrives at our house, I explained, but whether family, friend, or intruder? It’s anybody’s guess. Carley welcomes one and all with enthusiasm. I laughed and suggested that an intruder brandishing…
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Mute Muse: Swan Song
Two years ago today the mute swan returned to Rosslyn’s reopened “duck pond” and — for an all too brief interlude — we celebrated. Many of us indulged a moment of optimism that the solitary bird, ill equipped for our harsh winter conditions, might manage to make it to spring. Let’s rewind just a little…
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Poetics of Firewood
Hats off to Steve Cooley who’s responsible for bucking, splitting, and stacking a whole lot of firewood. It’s a good feeling to be laying up firewood for *next* winter when we’re not even through this winter. And that curiously contented feeling prompts me to consider the poetics of firewood. What I was in my last…
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Sunrise Today (Minus Ten Years)
What a difference one decade makes! This photo of sunrise over Lake Champlain at 5:55 AM on February 24, 2014 captures a typical midwinter perspective from Rosslyn once upon a time. Snow. Ice. I think the last time that the broad lake froze was 2019. And at this advanced date, it looks increasingly unlikely that…
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Hand-me-down Haiku
As the oldest of three children, I recognize that my association with hand-me-downs is far from universal. Perhaps my brother and sister would offer a different perspective, recollecting with less enthusiasm having been the beneficiaries of my outgrown clothing and playthings during the 1970s and 1980s. And yet I remember my excitement when a box…
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Daddy’s Girl
One of the very best ways to begin and end the day is a Carley cuddle. Our unabashed daddy’s girl is always up for a snuggle, a massage, spooning, hammocking,… As an early bird — I’m usually up by 5 or 6 o’clock in the morning — breakfast duty falls to me. Since the outset…
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Stump-to-Table: Ron’s Bistro Table
At long last — albeit ten months to the day after it was completed and delivered — I share with you the looong promised “concept-through-construction of a mixed species (ash and elm) ‘bistro table’ built by Ron Bauer…” mentioned in “Tung Oiling Ash & Elm Table” and elsewhere. I started to compose this reflection on…