Finding the best view of Lake Champlain

This weekend, Rick and I visited our dear friends Wayne and Susan in Richmond, Vermont and as part of the festivities, we climbed a mountain I had never heard of before, Mount Philo (pronounced FIE-lo, not like the Greek pastry sheet).
     Because we’re training for a hut climb in the White Mountains in June, Rick and I wore backpacks for the roughly one-mile, fairly vertical hike.
     As hikes go, it was pretty easy – a paved road, with lots of day hikers and LOTS of dogs.
     But there was also trillium, those delicate three-leaved flowers that appear only in spring. And wild columbine growing along the path. And birds singing their spring songs. And at the top, stop-in-your-tracks views of Lake Champlain, with a foreground of plowed farm fields and shiny-roofed barns, and glimpses of the Adirondacks in the distance.
     Mount Philo may not have the best views of Lake Champlain of any place around but if it doesn’t, I’d love to see the place that does.
     Just to keep us humble, I guess, it snowed on the drive up to Vermont. Made those signs of spring on the mountain even sweeter.

Going (more) organic

For the first time in my life, I bought some organic seedlings yesterday.
     Rick and I try to buy organic produce whenever possible, to avoid all the pesticides, insecticides and possibly carcinogenic whatevers in the food we ingest, so it made sense to go organic with the plants we are going to put in the ground, as well.
     I have bought organic SEEDS before as, apparently, many others have. I was surprised and pleased to see that WalMart now carries a whole display of organic seeds, under the name brand Seeds of Change, next to its regular Burpee and other seed containers.
     And there are some things that should only go in the ground as seeds – mesclun lettuce mixes and arugulas, or peas, for example – but I have had rotten luck growing some things from seed indoors. My tomatoes, for one, get all leggy and frail-looking and are never as robust as they should be by the time I plant them.
     So, organic seedlings seemed the way to go. I only bought some cold-weather seedlings – leaf lettuces, mainly – but I like the place where I got them, Tulip Tree Farm in Hampstead, N.H. It’s run by a young mother with long shiny hair who has a whole greenhouse full of tender seedlings she seems to treat as part of her extended family. Heirloom tomato seedlings are among them.
     I told her I’d be back sometime in May, to get tomatoes and other warm-weather plants.
     In the meantime, anybody need any rhubarb? I’ve got tons.

Grief and guilt

One of the things I know about grief is that guilt often accompanies and complicates it. And I had been carrying both since Cissy died.
     There’s the “what if” variety of guilt – what if I had gotten there earlier,  what if I had called her on Easter as I had been planning to, what if, what if…
     And there’s the deeper, heavier, regretful guilt that can weigh on you like a stone.
     Sometimes, if she had said something that I found hurtful, I would avoid seeing Cissy for a week or two. I would be mad at her from afar, sitting with my own poison. And then I would get over it and give her a call, as I did the Tuesday before we found her, when I left a message asking her to come to dinner, not knowing she was dead just feet from the phone.
     Sometimes, I felt an absurd competitiveness with her over who was the better journalist/camper/whatever, as if we couldn’t both possess the same gifts.
     And sometimes, I was just too swept up in my own life to think about her, or think to call, or include her in my plans. I have wondered if I could have been a better friend.
     Then last night, her brother Richard came for dinner and handed me something he had found in a box in Cissy’s bedroom, not realizing what a gift he was giving me or how he was putting my guilt to rest.
     It was a photograph taken several years ago when Cissy and I and another friend, Beth, went away for the weekend to Ogunquit, Maine where the public garbage pails were painted and named. The photo shows the three of us standing in front of one such pail, laughing in the sun, each with a hand on the pail.
     Painted across the pail is a single word: “Forgiveness.”
     I swear, I think she sent it.

Cissy's arrangements

No words of my own, today. Just this obituary which has information about her arrangements at the end.
I hope to see you there and share our memories.
May she be resting in peace, without pain, without care.

MANCHESTER - Margaret "Cissy" B. Taylor, 64, of Manchester, died April 9, 2012.

Born in Cynthiana, Ky. on May 1, 1947, she was the daughter of E.W. and Margaret (Osborne) Taylor Jr. She resided in the Derry area for several years before moving to Manchester in 1988.

She graduated from Harrison County High School, class of 1965. She attended Eastern Kentucky University.

Early in her career, she was a writer and reporter with the Derry News, as well as the Lawrence Eagle Tribune, New Hampshire Edition. Until her retirement, she was a reporter with the Union Leader Corp.

Cissy will be remembered for her yearly Kentucky Derby celebrations. She enjoyed the outdoors, especially camping and hiking. She was fond of her greyhound. She will be missed by all who knew her.

Family members include two brothers, Edwin W. Taylor III, of Grand Rapids, Mich., and Richard R. Taylor of Ruskin, Fla. and many cousins and dear friends.

.

services: Following cremation, a memorial reception will be held Friday, from 3 to 6 p.m., at the Connor-Healy Funeral Home and Cremation Center, 537 Union St., corner of Concord Street, Manchester.

A memorial service will take place at the Cynthiana Christian Church, Cynthiana, Ky., at a later date.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Manchester Police Athletic League, 409 Beech St., Manchester 03103.

For more information or to view the online guest registry, visit: www.connorhealy.com.

Memories of a green-eyed girl

No profound words, just sweet memories.
     Cissy and I driving back from a vacation in Maine, stopped dead in turnpike traffic, engines and drivers growling, irritation hanging over the highway like exhaust, horns beeping, people yelling. And Cissy, reaching into her suitcase and pulling out one of those dime-store bottles of bubbles that you blow through a little plastic circle. Bubbles floating down the stalled interstate, children reaching out of their windows, laughter rising, a barometric change starting, Cissy laughing and blowing more bubbles.
     Cissy, just rousing from a surgery to save her life, the fuzzy stuffed cat I’d given her under her arm, smiling, her eyes green as the sea.
     Dawn at a remote campsite on Lake Umbagog, no creatures around us but moose. I zip open my tent and see… nothing. Fog has set in like cataracts. I can’t even see Cissy’s tent feet away. Finally I hear her stir. We grope toward each other, then grope toward the picnic table we know is somewhere nearby so we can make coffee. Then, we stumble toward the lake, steaming mugs in hand, stand at the edge of the water and wait until first the shrouded lake is revealed, then the far shore, then the trees, as if we are watching a Polaroid develop, standing there together in speechless awe.
     Don’t’ get me wrong. She was human like all of us. She could be prickly and maddening and I know we drove each other crazy sometimes.
     But the bigger part of her was loving and giving and generous to a fault, blower of bubbles, giver of gifts, lover of life.
     Tomorrow, her brother Richard arrives to execute her estate, which I am sure he will do ably and lovingly. Plans for any services will be given as soon as they’re determined.
     Today, Rick and I spent most of the day in the garden, pulling up old landscape fabric, yanking out last year’s weeds, roto-tilling the soil into tidy little rows, trying desperately and in vain to impose order on our helplessness.

There must be some mistake…

     “Let me be the first to say ‘Happy Birthday’ as you approach your 65^th birthday,” began a letter addressed to me.
     Wait. I’m turning 65? Oh, yea, I guess I am. In just a few months. It just doesn’t seem possible.
     It was my first solicitation from a broker interested in selling me products to supplement Medicare, and I’m told I can expect dozens more.
     I’m also told wading through the Medicare maze is not for the faint of heart. Two of the smartest women I know – a medical physicist and a retired high-ranking editor from the Boston Globe, both recently 65 – told me independently they were both flummoxed by the assortment and variety of plans proffered by would-be Medicare supplementers out there. I’m sure I’ll be getting many more such birthday greetings.
     As of now, I am employed full-time with full medical benefits but, as we all know, anything can happen at any time.
     So, if anyone has any advice on Medicare supplements, send it this way.
     Just don’t start by wishing me happy birthday, please.

The singing Easter Chihuahuas

     This Easter, as we do every year, Rick and I spent the holiday at the home of our friends, the Millers, in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont.
     And this year, as usual, our talented musician friend Alan Greenleaf was among the other guests.
     But this year, for the first time, he brought along his talented “grandsons,” the Chihuahuas Bruiser (2 years old?) and Squirt, 4 months, who sat on the lap of their “mother,” Alan’s 21-year-old daughter Willa, while Alan sang the lovely ballad “Let Me Off at Greenwood Station.”
     You can see the results for yourself.
     Amazing how easily amused are the locals (and their friends) in Peacham, Vermont.

What? An aerobics class where they play Frank Sinatra?

     Today I went to my first “Silver Sneakers” class which, according to my gym club’s website, is meant to provide a gentle workout for older gym-goers.
     I had my suspicions. I recently went to a “Zumba gold” class – described as a slower-paced class for older dancers – and thought I should have been hospitalized afterwards.
     But it was true. I walked into the exercise room and saw… chairs! And really nice people, 20 of ‘em, all, I believe, older than me, which was delightful in itself.
     The teacher started us off with some gentle side-to-side taps, some marching in place, a little mambo action and grapevines – which activity had some of the participants holding on to their chairs as they moved.
     Then we sat down and did some slow, basic free weight exercises – bicep curls, tricep movements, you get the drift – followed by similar exercises using resistance bands and, finally, more stand-up movements and some stretches.
     I never broke a sweat. Not sure I’ll take this class again because it wasn’t quite enough of a challenge, but I loved the way it incorporated free weights, which few classes seem to do.
    And after not picking up a free weight in months, I can tell you I am now SORE right down to my silver sneakers.

Writing for exactly 12 minutes

Spent all day yesterday at Writers Day, sponsored by the New Hampshire Writers Project – and for those of you who are New England writers and don’t belong, I urge you to consider joining (you don’t have to be from New Hampshire).
     One of the workshops included an exercise I had never done before – writing on a theme for exactly 12 minutes. (I don’t know how or why the facilitator, Joni Cole, chose 12, but it seemed to work well.)
     It’s amazing how eloquent some people can be in so short a time, as many of the pieces that were later read blew me away with their uncensored, unfiltered beauty.
     I didn’t read mine, and it’s not sterling prose, but it did bring back a memory that blurred my vision with tears as I wrote. The theme was to think back on something and write about “This is the time when…”  Here was my memory:
     “This is the time when all the magic between us is so palpable. We sat around a campfire, my mother and I, each with a plastic wine glass in hand, sipping and laughing into the night. She was in her late 70s then. The campground was Vista Linda, outside Jemez Springs, New Mexico, and the campsite had a ramada with tiles the color of New Mexico – that kind of peachy adobe and sky-like aqua – and it covered the picnic table next to the tent we had just erected.
     “The night was still and in the distance, just across the shallow river, the Jemez Mountains rose up, and in them were coyotes and snakes and the ghosts of dead Indians, which did not frighten us, as we were part – though not very much – Indians ourselves. The firelight reflected in her face and we may have worn jackets or sweaters against the night chill, and we just laughed and talked  and I’m not even sure about what and it doesn’t matter – memories from my childhood, maybe, or whether she really loved my father – but it wasn’t so much the talk as the being there together in a place we had both come to love, with its mysteries and its starry night sky and the crack of the fire and the smell of the juniper and the dance of the shadows just beyond the perimeter of our sight and the taste of the wine and the sound of her laugh, with her head tossed back, all happy and full. I think we got a little bit drunk that night. I loved her so much.”