My friend, Jennifer, and her husband have three children. She is a hair stylist and has her own shop. You can imagine her shock and horror when she received a work text saying, “… I hope you don’t recover from that surgery and it fucking kills you you fat fucking gay white bitch.”
Continue reading “Haters”
Each October at Rohan Farm, we have a sign of cold weather’s impending arrival – the day Cathy plays god with the outdoor plants. Which ones come in the house, which are on life support in the barn tack room, which are left dormant in the garage, and which ones die on the patio with the the first frost.
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And just like that, a decade has passed. I started this blog ten years ago, on October 19th, 2015. I was 60 then. I’m 70 now. The blog started because of a death*, and a West Point classmate’s admonishment to “Live Life Exuberantly.” I have tried to do so, although not always successfully.
Continue reading “Ten Years”
This is a good month to be a squirrel at the farm. Acorns are falling like rain and the ground is covered. You hear them hit our metal roof day and night. It is so loud, it sounds as if the trees threw the acorns at the roof. Old wive’s tales say all these acorns are a prediction of a bad winter to come.
Continue reading “Falling Acorns”
I opened the door to the room and the five of them were there. My brother-in-laws, Jack and Don, old friend Tim, Dad, and Cathy’s Dad, Max. All looked robust and in their 50s, except for Max who died at 41 and remained forever young. Tim looked up from the bar. “French 75 Maxie?” I nodded yes.
Continue reading “The Dinner Party”
The election for Governor and other positions here in Virginia is November 4th, but early voting started last week on Friday, September 20th. At 9:45 that morning, I was voter number 54. We are blessed and cursed here in Virginia, with elections Every. Single. Year. This year, the stakes are high.
Continue reading “Voting in Virginia”
My eyes were drawn to the stone immediately. We were at our campsite in Wyoming when I noticed it. A small smooth stone by itself on top of a tree stump. It had no business being there, unless placed by someone. I walked over and picked it up. It was warm in my hand.
Continue reading “Pocket Stone”
September 11th is our National Day of Remembrance. I think back to that horrific day, and also recall the unity that came to America afterwards, for a while at least. I now also have something else to think about. I recently learned my dad enlisted in the Army 85 years ago, on SEPTEMBER 11th, 1940. He was all of sixteen.
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In 1986, Life Magazine called Route 50 through Nevada the loneliest highway in America. They actually issued warnings for parts of the drive. Cathy says lonely does not begin to describe it. Forlorn, desolate, rough, isolated, remote, vast, haunting, and yes, hauntingly beautiful.
Continue reading “The Loneliest Road”
OK. Cath and I did a thing. We are in California and bought a camper van. It has been a lifelong dream, and we just pulled the trigger. Over the next couple of weeks, we will drive it 3,000 miles back to Virginia, hopefully the first of many adventures with it.
Continue reading “We Did a Thing”
