Tag: Labrador Retriever
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After Rowing, Retrieving
After rowing, retrieving. A perfect pairing in the eyes of Carley, our Labrador retriever. Fall is upon us, but that’s no disincentive to man and beast from enjoying the still warmish waters of Lake Champlain. I find it challenging to capture in prose or images, but this autumn atmosphere and rhythm lend themselves to the…
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Sun Puddling
Our Labrador retriever loves sun puddles. Ever since Carley was a pup, she has sought out the sunniest spots for her siestas. Sun puddling, we call it. She’ll reposition herself around the house, the icehouse, the yard throughout the day to ensure that she is snoozing in the most optimal sun puddle possible. Bliss, shear…
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Sunday Morning with Carley
Man. Dog. Sunday morning. After a week of early starts, this morning Carley and I slept until 7:00, and then we lingered lazily for an hour and a half. Tea. Reading. Slow breakfast. MUD\WTR. Sun soaking. Cricket listening. Lots of snuggles, belly and ear scratching, even a treat or three. Sunday morning with Carley is…
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Hammocking with Carley in 2020
Take me back to the spring a summer of 2020. Height of ‘rona. And hammocking with Carley! When memories drift back to that peculiar spring and summer of the Covid-29 pandemic, fear and paranoia come to mind. Manic masking, toilet paper shortages, spraying toxic clouds of disinfectant onto our groceries, and horrifying statistics mounting nationwide…
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Opossum O’Clock
You’ve heard of happy hour. And maybe even beer blogging. But opossum o’clock? Earlier this evening (or late this afternoon, if you’re still jet lagging from the standard time to daylight savings time adjustment,) Carley burst into a barking frenzy. Bark, bark, bark,… Not an excited “My momma’s home!” bark. Nor an “I need to…
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Tuesday Snooze-day
I’ve succumbed to the rhythm and rhyme of Tuesday snooze-day, not because this is an especially unusual site, Carley enjoying a postprandial siesta (after all, the same could be said of Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.) But coupling the second day of the work week with the hole-up-and-play-hooky siren call of a mid…
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Winter Solstice: Longer Days Ahead
Welcome to day one of the Adirondack Coast‘s coldest season. Today is the winter solstice, the first official day of winter, and — more importantly for the likes of my mother and others who favor longer days and shorter nights — the threshold between the briefest day and the most prolonged night and imperceptibly-but-steadily lengthening…
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Is Home a Place, a Feeling, or a Relationship?
In the days since publishing “What Makes a House a Home?” I’ve been fortunate to enjoy follow up exchanges with many of you. It seems that we all have some compelling notions of homeness! Thank you for reaching out and sharing your often personal stories. I’ve mentioned to several of you that I’d like to…
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Pandemic Puppy: Carley Corona
We lost our last Labrador Retriever, Griffin, in the months preceding the pandemic. Only a few months later we lost Susan’s mother, the best mother-in-law I could have conjured from the depths of my imagination. And then we plunged into the pandemic. In those early weeks that bled into a month, then two months, we…
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2007 Thanksgiving Remembered
Nine years ago I sat in Rosslyn’s front parlor on Thanksgiving morning and started drafting a blog post. I’m sitting in the front parlor (aka the “green room”), drinking coffee, scratching Griffin behind the ears, and allowing my mind drift to back to that first Thanksgiving we celebrated at Rosslyn. It was actually one day…
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Seasonality
Seasonality might strike you as a strange menu for organizing a blog (and an even stranger way to navigate a narrative.) But in many respects it may well be the *only* useful way to structure a circular story that’s slim on plot, chronically a-chronological, and deeply immersed in the poetics of place. Summer’s End Haiku As if…
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Morning Light, Front Hallway
Ah, that morning light… Long before we purchased Rosslyn, before we’d even had any realistic discussions about purchasing Rosslyn, and before I personally had wrapped my mind around the possibility of Rosslyn becoming our future home, before all of this, I began experiencing a recurring daydream. If you imagine a daydream to be a bit like…