The morning dawned cold and rainy. I fastened the buttons of my coat, pulled my green wool cap over my head, and tightened my red plaid scarf around my neck. Did I wish the weather on that Belgian morning had been more agreeable? Sure, I did. But I was heading to Flanders Fields and the site of what was once known as the northern part of the Western Front during World War I. During the years of 1914 until the end of 1918 this was a place of unspeakable horror for hundreds of thousands of young men.

So, no. I was not going to complain about the weather on that morning of March 14, 2023, the day I turned seventy years old. I was still alive and about to pay my respects to youth who no longer were. The weather could be endured.

Sometimes the primacy of nature and nurture are hard to separate. I was born seventy years ago as a male and as a male I was raised. Strongly embedded within the experience of growing up male is the meaning of manhood. We are nurtured with unmistakable messages as boys that to be a man involves the adoption of very specific traits. High among them is to display a selfless bravery to squarely face danger without hesitation. To battle when needed. To overcome one’s foes. And if vanquished, to go down fighting, which will at least preserve honor, even if life is extinguished.

Beyond this manner of masculine upbringing, I also have speculated about the role of nature in shaping men to be men. The expectation for boys to grow into men who are virile, strapping, and courageous is a presumption that is as old as history. At some point in this long and patterned progression of raising boys to be warriors it could be that the widely associated behaviors of manhood became finely integrated into the souls of men. An a priori masculinity may accompany the birth of each and every baby boy born into this world. This axiomatic essence of dutiful manliness then simply needs to be massaged during rearing to result in a fighter, a defender, a soldier.

Whether or not a boy grows to become a crusader, a crucial part of being a man is in reconciling or harmonizing the man one has become with the type of man one is supposed to be. Sometimes this urge toward manly expression goes awry, leading to overly aggressive males. However, for most of us men we need to find causes to sustain, people to protect, and missions to fulfill. These proclivities may not be played out on a literal battlefield, but they must find expression somehow, even in passivity. Like it or not, we men are preordained to live out as best we can the manifest calling inherent in our gender. Exploring this notion was in large part the motivation and need for reflection I was drawn to pursue on that birthday at Flanders Fields.

Young men from Germany, the British Commonwealth countries, France, the Low Countries, and eventually the United States and Italy converged at the Western Front, which stretched from Flanders Fields to the Swiss frontier with France. They were there to engage in a slaughter of one another. Their precious manhood was both exploited, abused, and celebrated during this horrific enterprise. The soldiers of the First World War were robbed of their innocence, their zest for life, and in far too many cases, their very existence.

The confrontation known as the Great War or World War I was among the greatest tragedies of humankind. It did not need to happen. But it did. Most of those who fought and died during the conflict were born during the last decade of the nineteenth century. As young boys they had every right to expect a high standard of guidance from their elders. They should have been shown by their parents’ generation how to love all people and how to try to make the world a better place than they found it.

Instead, this generation of young men were let down by their elders. They were squandered, misused, and harmed. Their lives were deemed expendable and not of precious value. Those poor souls who came into this world only to leave it too soon were robbed of their manhood and of their lives. Shame befalls those who encouraged this cataclysm to happen. The decisions, values, and hubris of the elders driven by their xenophobic mindsets starkly displayed a stunning lack of morality.

Some backstory will bring clarity to what happened. However clear history may be, the justifications for this debacle will never make sense of what happened. Historians categorize the causes of World War I into four domains: mutual defense alliances, imperialism, expanded and modernized militarism, and nationalism. I tend to group all these causes under the rubric of one foremost cause, that of domination.

The world of 1914 was a powder keg of outdated and maniacal monarchies committed to a ruthless competition for control over as many people and resources from around the world as could be made possible. Command, control, authority, and supremacy were the overriding principles of the world’s leaders, particularly in Europe. European empires, along with their colonies and spheres of influence, jostled for advantage. This led to a tangled network of alliances allegedly designed to ensure domestic stability and security while providing a nationalistic influential edge in world affairs.

By 1914 the stage was set for a ruinous chain reaction. European empires had been in existence for hundreds of years led by Great Britain, Spain, The Netherlands, and France. However, nationalism as we know it today has been a relatively recent phenomenon. Nationalism is based on the idea of group identity with common beliefs, values, languages, stories, and cultural traditions. The practice of forming nation states had been exercised all over the continent throughout the nineteenth century. At least this was true of those parts not already under the thumb of an empire.

The motivation to nationalize was strong by the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. For example, by 1871 smaller kingdoms were culturally compelled to unify into the nation states of Italy and Germany. One downside of nationalism is that it can leave people of different nations distrustful of one another. Borders can help to protect and to preserve, but they also can confine and cause cultural atrophy.  Unhealthy rivalries can result based on resource distributions and perceived threats to cultural integrity. Such mistrust took hold in Europe.

The inspiration to nationalize swept across the Balkan region of southeast Europe in the years leading up to 1914. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania are among the many countries that make up this region today. At the time, the people of the Balkans were squeezed between two prevailing and powerful empires, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire. These empires exerted influence and pressure in the Balkans, which only encouraged nationalistic tendencies.

Meanwhile, a complicated assortment of defense alliances was established across much of Europe. Key alliances which led to World War I were that Russia was allied with Serbia in the Balkans and also with France, Germany was allied with the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Great Britain was allied with France and Belgium. Such was the international stage when a Bosnian acting on behalf of Serbia assassinated the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife while they were visiting the Balkan city of Sarajevo on the 28th of July 1914. The consequent string of war declarations became the First World War.

The brutality of this war was made worse by the steady militarization of the European powers in the preceding years, which included the development of weapons marking the advent of modern warfare. Much more massive artillery guns and shells, machine guns, tanks, poison gases, and military aircraft were strategically introduced creating exorbitantly high death counts.

For those armies reliant on outdated battlefield strategies and tactics these weapons proved to be especially lethal. Along the Western Front in Belgium at Flanders Fields, infantry charged on foot from deeply dug trenches into machine gun fire, exploding shells, and even chlorine gas, which choked its victims, and mustard gas, which caused skin burns. The absurdity of asking young men to rush into such an onslaught is unthinkable.

A significant part of my wanting to visit Flanders Fields on that rainy and chilly day was to not only reflect on and feel sorry for the inhumanity inflicted on those unfortunate men, but to wonder what it would have been like for me to face the horrible challenges they did. My seventy years have never come close to war or any conflict that carried with it the risk of death or bodily injury. The stresses and strains of life that we all experience, which in my case were nearly all the result of my own flawed decision making, pale in comparison to the tensions of war.

Looking back to my younger years, I remember the confusion and uncertainty tinged with fear of the possibility of having to fight in the Vietnam War. I was on the young side of the age when unseasoned men were being drafted to fight in that conflict on behalf of the United States. My thinking was quite resolute in that I did not want to participate. The thought of moving to Canada was a serious notion I considered for a while.

My father, a World War II veteran who lost his only brother during that war and who was a proud American, said to me when I was sixteen or seventeen years old that he did not want me to fight in Vietnam. Even he could see the clear pattern of one generation after the next of young men fighting and dying in what seemed like an endless succession of foreign wars. My father’s realization of wanting to resist having his son go to war led to his distancing from the veteran’s organization, The American Legion. This memory is one of the very few where to this day I am grateful for my dad’s love.

So, had I been born in 1898 instead of 1953, and had I been born in Germany, Russia, Britain, France, or Belgium or in the United States at that time, I could very well have been confronted with the imperative that I must viciously fight for my country. I do not doubt I would have felt fear. What I do not know is if the nationalistic propaganda I would have been steadily fed would have trumped my fear.

Would I have felt that my life really amounted to a calling to “defend” my country even if it meant making the ultimate sacrifice? Would I have charged across fields of mud with a bayoneted rifle screaming a battle cry as bullets whizzed by striking down my comrades? Or would I have cowered in the trenches wide-eyed and gulping air as if each gasp were to be my last? Or would I have clung to my last shred of self-determination and committed suicide? I will never know. This deliberation will forever remain open-ended.

During that day at Flanders Fields, I paused at different cemeteries to place my hand on random gravestones. I tried to remain unrestricted and free to notice if I felt any kind of sensation or had any kind of inkling resulting from gently but intentionally touching those stones. At the German cemetery I crouched to place my left hand on a ground-level dark gray stone with the words, “Vier Unbekannte Deutsche Soldaten” etched upon it (translation, “Four Unknown German Soldiers”). I felt only pity. At a British cemetery, I placed my hand on the clean white standing gravestone of R. Porter, of the West Yorkshire Regiment, who died on the 28th of October in 1915 at the age of twenty-two. I was witness to a tragedy.

Toward the end of that day, I was at another British cemetery. The rain had stopped. Sun was breaking through the still thick clouds. A stiff breeze rendered the air from cool to cold. I was starting to feel fatigue from the long day. This time, while standing amidst the rows of white stones, I reached over to rest a hand upon the top of one from behind. I deliberately did not look to see whose stone it was. On this occasion, I felt something else. A ripple of energy coursed gently through my body. I experienced a slight disequilibrium. Was this a quantum or supernatural sensation of sentience, I wondered. Maybe it was just a symptom of not having had much water that day. I still wonder.

The flat green fields of West Flanders.

Now moist and quiet and peaceful.

Near Ypres the land rises. 

Once Germans held the high ground.

The British held the city.

Evil descended upon the area.

A half million souls lost

In a steady ugly stalemate.

Numbing.

A waste.

To be human can be severe.

 

 

 

 

 

My understanding of the founding of the United States, by which I mean the “1776” founding as opposed to the “1619” founding, is that the European Enlightenment inspired our founders to build a new democratic nation upon the fundamental values of freedom and equality. In the Declaration of Independence Jefferson wrote a line that has resonated throughout American history encapsulating these core beliefs —  “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Clearly, within what was a new experimental American democracy the standard of equality was unambiguously spelled out. Also, the phrase, “they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”, spoke to individual freedom and liberty. Can it be interpreted in these words, or anywhere else in this esteemed document, or for that matter in the overall founding endeavor itself, that one democratic value is considered more moral or weightier or more important than the other? I suggest not.

It seems evident to me that the founders concluded that for a democracy to function both freedom and equality were not only required, but were inseparable and equivalent in scope and magnitude. These principles were two corresponding pillars upon which rested the ideology and conviction of the new nation. We were to be a people who honored the right to exercise individual free will throughout the course of our lives while simultaneously respecting that this right is to be extended to all individuals.

Of course, the founders were flawed leaders despite their unique ability to systematize selected philosophical thoughts from Enlightenment thinkers such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Charles Montesquieu, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Despite their infatuation with the concept of a social contract to encourage individual freedom and equality, the founders nevertheless lived prosperously under a social system that permitted slavery, Native American genocide, and concentrated power in the hands of property owning males at the exclusion of women.

These failings however, should not take away from the ideational benefits which the founders debated and documented and left for generations of Americans and other lovers of democracy around the world to ponder and use as a guide from which societies can operate honorably. As Winston Churchill famously said, “Democracy is the worst form of government — except for all the others that have been tried.” It is reasonable to say today in the twenty-first century Churchill’s words still ring true.

Nonetheless, there is one troubling consequence which arises in matching the significance of freedom and equality. It comes in realizing there is a natural disengaging tension between the two. We are unable to optimize and to enjoy the fruits of both freedom and equality simultaneously and in similar measure. Let me explain.

When we allow individual freedom to be maximally expressed we soon discover a troubling reality settling in. A sorting of society’s individuals occurs like the pecking order of chickens in a barnyard. Wealth and power become concentrated among a self-professed elite group. The rationales for this aggregation may be centered on race, ethnicity, tradition, or generally perceived merit, but the result is always the same. A lack of social equality is the inevitable effect. Equality becomes diminished.

Similarly, an escalation of equality can lead to detrimental impacts. There can come a point in a social assigning of equal measure to each individual in a society when an over-homogeneity results. This can be characterized as a socially stultifying blandness in which people are pressured to all act the same and not drift from rigid social behaviors and thought patterns. Difference and innovation are reduced to being oppositional and uniformity is elevated to unnatural heights. Freedom becomes diminished.

We have a conundrum. As described above, freedom and equality are both of identical importance. But when each is augmented as much as possible an essential conflict emerges. Their shared power cancels out the advantages derived from each. What is to be done?

To start, we have to accept that each value carries with it great possible reward, but also great potential hazard. So instead of seeing co-nullification as an inevitable consequence when society attempts to practice the two virtues in tandem we can rather view them as keeping each other in check. It is a type of symbiose in which democracy needs both to survive. Yet a balance needs to be achieved in order to derive as much benefit and as little downside as possible.

In America, this striking of equilibrium is practiced by the two major political parties. One, the Republicans, seek to advance the cause of freedom over equality, while the Democrats vigorously promote equality above freedom. The outcome of this tug-of-war is the closest this society comes to a consensus of the freedom-equality strain of priorities. If the electorate sees too many disadvantages from an overemphasis of one side or the other, then election cycles should right the ship, depending on the pertinent issues of the day. So, if one is a diehard partisan, one has to learn to live with the heuristic that you win some and you lose some.

The greater problem, which America and other democracies are now facing, is when one political persuasion or the other decides to change the rules of the game. When striking the delicate balance between freedom and equality is thought of as too difficult to achieve or if impatience to get one’s way becomes too unmanageable such that undemocratic tactics become justified, then democracy is in trouble. When the arts of compromise and persuasion are abandoned in favor of a raw takeover of power leading to autocratic governance, then democracy ceases to exist and an unpleasant form of fascism or communism takes over.

I am writing this piece days before the 2022 U.S. midterm election. In other words, I and my fellow countrymen and women are both observing and participating in one big case in point. On the ballot, so to speak, is the question concerning whether or not American democracy, and its history of attempting to conduct free and fair elections, is to be continued, suspended, or abandoned.

The Trump-fueled right wing insurrectionists and their supporters, i.e., the Republican Party, sound as if they feel justified in canceling the electoral tradition. They are angry American society isn’t functioning the way they want it to. Of course, they are free to have their political leanings, even if their leanings are Euro-White-Male-dominated. But why is their grievance so pronounced that overthrowing free and fair elections can be considered just?

Sorry. I don’t see it. Coming of age during the 1960s I have seen social and political unrest. It is surely an experience of social disequilibrium. And it unquestionably both agitates and frightens significant segments of the culture. There can be both sound and absurd claims made by people. But that’s life in a democracy, isn’t it?

Things not going your way? Wish more of us would adopt your view of reality? Then be persuasive!  Convince us! Don’t change the rules to suit your own narrow interest. Who the hell do you think you are?!

Hopefully, I am needlessly worked up. The next several days will be instructive. How the 2022 midterms are conducted will portend the activism of the next couple of years. A satisfying endgame would be to see this MAGA movement as but one of several social-political episodes that occur periodically throughout American history. Like other unruly digressions of the aggrieved, it will soften and diminish, but nevertheless leave its mark on policy making for some time to come.

Long term, these societal spasms are likely necessary if democracy is to survive for centuries. However, they are weighed against other constants such as unconstrained elections and the tussle between freedom and equality. Striking a necessary balance between freedom and equality is truly an exercise in making sausage. It leaves democracy messy. However, let us not forget. Despite its innate churn, democracy contains within it the most civilized and just conception of how people are to live together that has ever been devised. Let us agree that its fundamentals should not be messed with.

 

 

 

 

“Toby! Toby! Where are you? Come here Toby!”

Toby was standing in the driveway of his family’s home gauging the wind speeds that morning by staring at the tops of a nearby stand of white pines. This meant he was close enough to hear his mother’s cries even with the windows closed. As was often the case, Mrs. Pelgren’s plaintive and desperate pleas were unrelenting once they started.

“Toby! I can’t do this alone. Come here, Toby! I need you!” Toby pivoted and slower than usual went for the side door of the house which let him into the kitchen where his mother was sure to be.

What is it this time?, he wondered. Something to do with his father most likely. Toby’s dad now required custodial care that was reaching the point beyond which Toby and his mother could competently manage. But the Pelgren’s, being who they were, did not consider obtaining additional care providers. Their situation was to be endured collectively, despite the burden each family member underwent individually.

“Yes, Mom?”

“Please sit down Toby before you go running off somewhere again,” Mrs. Pelgren said. “I need to talk to you.”

Toby sat obediently knowing more was about to be asked from him.

“I can’t do it all with your father, Toby. It’s just too much! Mrs. Pelgren looked at her son with her signature pained expression — the facial feature she seemed to wear most often nowadays.

“I know it’s difficult, Mom. You know I do what I can to help out Dad and I’ll do more as I have the time.”

“I hope so dear. I really hope so. It’s so tough. He needs so much. There is never enough time for me to do the things I need to do.” Mrs. Pelgren’s eyes became moist.

“I know Mom.” He did not like to see his mother in this state, but Toby knew he couldn’t change things. He stood up to go out to his car. He needed to get away from the house and his parents. As he walked behind his mother to get to the door he kissed her on top of her head.

---

Toby set the canoe into the river downstream about a half mile from where the river began to serve as a drain for the lake near the village. This stretch of the river required patience on the part of anyone hoping to navigate any kind of boat. True, a kayak would be more maneuverable when weaving in and out of the tangle of low-hanging boughs and half fallen trees that punctuated this wooded portion of the river. But Toby didn’t want to fish from a kayak. He grew up fishing with a canoe, was comfortable fishing with a canoe, and that was that.

Practice allowed Toby to zig and zag and work his way to the opening of a pond that was not too far downstream and which was cut off from houses and people due to its being surrounded by impenetrable wetland and the rough surrounding woods leading up to it. These same conditions made back casting during the summer in this small pond nearly impossible, so Toby decided to try wading.

Given the lack of rain ten days prior the water depth was manageable for his waders and he knew from past experience that the muck on the bottom in certain spots would not be too gummy. Toby was particularly excited to use some caddis flies his friend Dave had made. With the boat secure Toby waded in from the pond’s edge and spent the next three hours catching several 10-inch brook trout.

As Toby stood thigh-deep into the water of the still pond his mind vacillated between two states of awareness. One sensitivity involved being absorbed by the nature encircling him. The natural world and God were one and the same for Toby. There was no distinction. The shimmering light, the temperature of the water, the songs of birds, and countless other ambient expressions of nature at this time and in this space felt like caresses from the Creator.

The other impression occupying his consciousness was the seduction of fantasy. There were several at play. But they were all variations on a theme. They entailed Toby moving through life with confidence, finesse, and joy in his heart. Actions played out in locations that were imaginary — a reflection of his disdain for rootedness and routine.

Flipping between these mental states left Toby confused and imbalanced. It often did.

---

It happened again. Toby was in that place where he was too alert to nap, but to fatigued to function. He knew from experience that if he gave himself enough time he may eventually grab an hour or so of shut eye.

What intruded his thinking that afternoon was one of his reoccurring thought obsessions. Toby first read about this incident in one of the boy adventure books his grandmother used to give him at Christmas when he was younger. This book, the title of which was now long forgotten, consisted of a collection of tales meant to capture the interest and imagination of boys, who of course, liked risky and hazardous escapades. Perhaps Toby’s grandmother felt he needed a prod or two in that direction.

The yarn which struck Toby hard when he first read it at about age ten and which now was keeping him from sleeping was that of the wreck of the Monica Hartery. The Monica Hartery had been a seventy-three foot coasting schooner built in 1927 in Newfoundland and was being used by its owner at the time of its demise in 1933 as a trading vessel in and around the coast of Newfoundland.

In December of that year the Monica Hartley had sailed from Channel, Port aux Basques, Newfoundland to North Sydney, Nova Scotia to pick up a load of Cape Breton coal. The ship carried a crew of five.

After the coal was loaded, nasty winter weather set in. It delayed the departure of the Monica Hartery for several days. The crew members, all of whom ranged in age from 28 to 32, were anxious to set sail for Channel, Port aux Basques so they could be home for Christmas. Despite the continuing bad weather the impatient crew left North Sydney on December 23.

It is known that the night of December 23 and into the early morning hours of December 24 in 1933 the southwest coast of Newfoundland experienced a furious wind and blinding snow. A portion of the schooner’s decking was discovered floating near the entrance of Rose Blanche harbour, some forty-six kilometers to the east of Channel, Port aux Basques, on Christmas Eve. Later that day three bodies were found washed ashore nearby. A fourth was discovered three and half weeks later.

Toby felt so sorry for the lost crewmembers and their families. It seemed so unfair. Injustice disturbed Toby very much. And God was being very unjust on that day in 1933. The men just wanted to get home for Christmas. What kind of God would do such a thing! Toby still pondered the same thought.

---

Toby picked up the cappuccino for Nellie and a black coffee for himself. He balanced them carefully as he walked to the round high top table in the café where Nellie sat waiting.

“I’m glad I could get you to meet with me today, Toby,” Nellie said. “You’ve been hard to reach lately.”

“Well, you know. There’s work and there’s always stuff to do around my place,” was Toby’s response.

“Oh, yes. Your place. You mean your parent’s place, right Toby?” Nellie tried to make eye contact with Toby as she spoke, but his gaze would not meet hers. He looked downwards instead.

“Yeah, well, our place. I live there too,” said Toby still avoiding Nellie’s eyes.

“When are you going to get out of there, Toby? It’s way past time, don’t you think?”

Toby had feared Nellie would do this if they met for coffee. They had been friends since first grade and they knew each other well. Maybe too well was how Toby felt at that moment.

“It’s not so easy, you know, Nellie. Dad is sick as shit and Mom is going batshit trying to take care of him. I have to be there right now to help out.”

“Yeah, it’s too bad about your dad.” Nellie paused. “But you’re going to have to get of there sometime. You’re not going to be one of those losers whose always living with his parents, are you?”

Toby winced slightly. Nellie noticed. “I’m only trying to help you, Toby.”

Clearly Nellie was being impatient with him. Toby did not like it that she was.

---

“We’re going over to Jimmy’s shop after work, Toby. How about you coming with us?” It didn’t often happen that the guys Toby worked with would ask him to join them for beers after work.

Toby hesitated before responding. It left just enough time for Larry to quip, “C’mon Toby, drink a beer with us!”

“Sure. Thanks. OK,” Toby stuttered. The invitation left him floating somewhere between grateful and anxious. He knew he should do this. It is healthy and good to interact with others Toby was often told. But social situations almost always left him a bit fearful.

So, the four of them that comprised the crew of Don’s Landscaping hopped into their pick-ups and went over to Jimmy’s garage, which served as a tinkering workshop for many of Jimmy’s crafty hobbies and also as a man cave where beers were drunk and cigarettes and joints were smoked.

After his second Bud Light Toby knew he had had enough, but as was often the case at times like these he wasn’t quite sure how to extricate himself from the gathering. “Gotta go,” Toby said as he straightened himself up from the folding metal chair.

“But Toby”, said Don. “We want to hear more about what you think, you know about the big stuff. Life. And what it all means. You’re the thinker here. You got your ideas cooking up there. Give us regular guys some of your wisdom.”

Toby was the quiet one at work. He did his tasks silently and rarely got involved with the dramas that always seemed to occupy the other guys. Whenever he did give an opinion on some matter there were winks and nods and comments like, “So, this is what the professor thinks, guys!”

Toby didn’t mean to sound different from the others. He really did want to fit in.

“Sorry, but I got nothing more for you today. Thanks for the beers. See you tomorrow.” Toby walked out of the garage to the sound of three guys shouting, “Awwww!” and laughing loudly.

“OK, Toby!” Don yelled. “Maybe next time!”

---

Toby’s father was ill. It had been nearly two years since Mr. Pelgren began to display debilitating symptoms. He was devoid of most of his energy. He tried to navigate his thoughts through a sea of brain fog. And he was chronically short of breath.

“Hi Dad,” Toby called out as he entered the living room walking by the dusty old recliner where his father most often slumped.

“Hi son,” Mr. Pelgren said.

The sun was rising. The television was on. Domestic details were all in their place that morning, including poor old Mr. Pelgren in his chair.

“Do you want me to take you for a drive today after work, Dad?”

Mr. Pelgren angled his head ever so slightly in Toby’s direction. “Maybe, Toby. Let’s see how I’m doing then, OK?”

“Sure, Dad. We’ll see how you’re doing then.”

Mr. Pelgren returned to staring at the TV with his now typical blank and absent glare. Mr. Pelgren’s gaze told Toby that his father did not comprehend a thing going on with the television program. But Toby also picked up on the fact that his dad did not seemed distressed or in pain. He was just there. Not comatose, but also not animated. I guess this is a good thing, Toby thought.

“See you, Dad. Gotta go to work.”

“Bye, Toby.”

Mr. Pelgren knew he was dying. Every element of his reality was colored by that fact.

---

Toby liked his alone time. He did not exclaim to others that he liked to be by himself. Everyone who knew Toby simply knew he preferred to be solitary.

There were spaces in the woods near his home that he had discovered as a boy and which he returned to often even as a young adult. These were among his places of solitude where Toby went when he needed to feel more grounded.

That sense of being rooted, of being stable, was far too elusive for Toby. What with work at Don’s Landscaping and the constant pressures coming from his parents combining to drain him of not just his energy but of his soul, Toby desired respite. The woods gave him peace. The towering pines and oaks were his sentries and his angels protecting him and providing comfort.

During the week passed, Toby tried to get along with people as he did most times, but much of the effort left him more spent than usual. So on this day, Toby walked along his trail, one he had trod enough over years to establish as his path, ushering him to the cliff.

The cliff was a granite outcrop shaped perfectly by the glacier which had scraped and shaped this land ten-thousand years ago. It was a forty-foot drop from the precipice to its base, which is where Toby built a campfire site of ringed stone about fifteen years prior. Beside it he placed a log he had found, which held a divot just right for him to sit on.

Toby did not light a fire that day. Instead he sat still scrutinizing the beech and poplars and maples nearby. He was restless. He felt it and examined the feeling as if on high looking down on himself, detached and disembodied. Toby thought that if he could just see the true cause of his anxiety, then he could somehow effect his emotions — make them more positive, more enlightened.

Despite his mental exertions, his unpleasant and restive mood remained. So, Toby just let the rustling of the leaves by the gentle breeze and the undertone of bird song wash over him as he continued to stare at the beech and poplar and maple trees.

---

Nellie called his phone. “Hi Toby! I’m going over to West Leb for some shopping. Want to come with me? I can pick you up.”

“Thanks, Nellie. Yeah. God knows I need to get away.” Here Toby paused. “But Nellie. Don’t be going on about how I need to leave home and strike out on my own and be independent and all of that kind of shit. Can you not be doing that today?”

“Sure. OK. I promise,” Nellie chirped. “You know how I feel about it, but I won’t stress out your fragile mind this afternoon. I’ll be over in about twenty minutes, OK?”

“See you then,” Toby replied.

Toby had known Nellie since they had attended elementary school together. They had been friends ever since. Toby used to get teased by the other boys for having a girl as his best friend, but in his heart Toby could never understand what was wrong with that.

One line Toby and Nellie never crossed was to refer to each other as boyfriend and girlfriend. Neither one of them ever pushed for that designation. They were simply happy to just be friends.

Nellie wanted to buy some clothes and other things that Toby did not pay much attention to. He wandered around the stores Nellie took him to looking at the merchandise with no particular interest in any of it. What caught his eye more was watching Nellie examining this and that as she determined which items to put into her shopping cart.

She has confidence, Toby thought. She doesn’t worry like I do.

Toby saw how Nellie’s countenance was genuine. Her appearance was relaxed. And the natural look on Nellie’s face settled into a slight smile even when there was nothing obvious to be grinning about.

Toby took comfort in observing these traits of Nellie’s. He was glad she had asked him to join her that afternoon. And she did not press him about how he needed to be more autonomous and separate himself from his family. Not once.

---

Toby could not shake the memory of what had happened back up at the hunting camp on Cooper Hill Road. He was passing the road’s entrance in his truck on the way to a job site. The incident had been four of five years before as best Toby could remember.

A group of fathers from the town, including his own, had taken their sons to do some bear hunting up at a camp some of the dads owned jointly. Toby did not want to hunt black bears, but his dad did, and Mr. Pelgren wanted Toby to join him.

One thing about the experience that began to grate on Toby’s nerves early on was when he observed a few of the men and lads baiting bears with old junk food from the town’s general store. It was stuff like stale Drakes Ring Dings and Devil Dogs and expired Hostess Twinkies. It seemed to Toby cheap and lazy and unfair to “hunt” bears that way.

Sure enough, Tim’s dad, Mr. Thurston, shot an adult black bear which sported a thin white crest on the side of its neck. He strung it up back at the camp for everyone to see. Mr. Thurston called for the boys to gather around, so he could demonstrate how to butcher the bear.

When time came around for Mr. Thurston to slit open the bear’s gut out fell bile-covered Drake’s Ring Dings, Devil Dogs, and Hostess Twinkies. Most of the junk food was still enclosed in its packaging.

All of the boys and some of the fathers laughed. Toby looked around him in disgust and his mind was suddenly transported to a state he rarely dwelt in.

“This isn’t funny!” Toby snapped. “This isn’t real hunting. It’s fucken’ gross!”

Everyone stared at Toby. Mr. Pelgren looked toward the ground.

“Hey, Pelgren,” Mr. Thurston called to Mr. Pelgren. “Your kid’s got a big mouth! If you don’t have the stomach for this Toby, look away.” The snide use of the word “stomach” made the guys laugh again. Mr. Pelgren looked up at his son with consternation, if not alarm. He knew this was not going to end well.

The next morning a note was found by Toby pinned to the cabin door of the room he was sharing with his father. It read, “Ur not wanted. Go hom.”

Toby and Mr. Pelgren left the hunting camp and the boys and their dads and went home. They were never invited back to the hunting camp.

---

It was one of those nights.

Toby laid awake in the dark of the bedroom he had had for as long as he could remember. The house had a deafening silence. Toby did not know what time it was. Three or four in the morning? He didn’t know and it didn’t matter. He was wide awake. A dream had awakened him. That he was sure of. But what the dream was about he did not know. He was left only with impressions and feelings, mere remnants, no clearly recalled details.

Toby propped himself up in bed and did not turn on the light deliberately so that he could more easily let his emotions flow through him. He had enough experience with his own style of emotional reflection to know to not fight his feelings or suppress them when they were potent enough to awaken him. His sentiments were guideposts, signs of changes to come.

That night he recognized anxiety, fear, and uncertainty. He also discerned anticipation — a type of expectancy which helped to smooth the rough edges of his more agitated feelings. These sensations were conspicuous enough, but for this night anyway, they did not carry the force to develop into some kind of actionable plans.

Instead, Toby sat in bed and in the dark suspended in what was like an ether consisting of part imagination and part objective reality. He communed with his demons and gave thanks to his angels while floating there. The wait until first light seemed to take forever. It often did.

---

As Mr. Pelgren declined, Mrs. Pelgren grew increasingly agitated. The combination made the Pelgren home insufferable. Toby knew what he could control and what he could not control. The circumstance he found his parents in he could not control. Realizing the lack of command he had gave him some degree of ease in an otherwise unbearable situation.

If Toby’s father understood or accepted his fate he did not let others, especially the members of his family, know about it. His energy and self-control lessened as his sullenness and despondency grew.

“How are you doing today, Dad?” was Toby’s typical line of greeting to start each day.

A grunt with flat affect was the usual reply.

“I’m sorry this is happening to you.”

“Yeah, well I’m sorry to.”

“Want to go for a ride today?”

“And have me shit up your truck seat again?”

“I’ll cover it proper this time.”

“No. I don’t think so.”

After a couple of minutes of silence except for the blaring television Toby asked, “I’m going to turn down the TV, alright Dad?”

“I don’t care.”

Toby lowered the volume. Mr. Pelgren stared at the television screen unmoved. The repeats of old shows from the seventies played on while Toby and his dad sat quietly. Toby felt trapped and sorry for his father and mother at the same time.

Mrs. Pelgren sat quietly by herself at the kitchen table gnawing on a fingernail and looking worried.

---

Loneliness was far from an all encompassing experience for Toby. He rarely felt lonesome. However, today was different. Toby wanted to be with Nellie. He wanted to be near her self-reliance and her serenity.

Toby texted her. -Hey, wass up?

-I’m trying to figure out this sewing machine.

-Sewing machine? What sewing machine?

-One my Grannie had.

-So, ur starting to sew?

-Yeah. Thinken about it.

-Since when?

-Since I decided to sew. -Did you text me for a reason?

-I want to hang out with you.

-OK. Come over. -I’m gonna stay with this machine though.

-OK. See ya soon.

By late that evening Nellie and Toby could stitch together two pieces of old fabric on Nellie’s Grannie’s sewing machine. They smiled at each other enjoying the thought that they had done something new together.

When Nellie hugged Toby goodnight at her kitchen door as he was leaving she kissed his left cheek. This was an unusual thing for Nellie to do. Toby liked it. A lot.

---

It was a Saturday morning in winter. The snowbanks on the side of Route 4A were still white and not yet showing the grime of late winter.

Toby was driving his truck, but he had no destination. This was a fantasy drive. That is what Toby called these drives when he just wanted to let his imagination expand unhindered. On that day, Toby’s mind was conjuring possible places he could be aiming for as destinations as he drove his truck.

He was envisioning places far away. Locations he saw on YouTube videos or on the several travel sites he liked to scan.

Toby first pretended to be going to Door County, Wisconsin. He remembered seeing a picture of a restored red pick-up truck parked against a blue painted barn with white trim. An apple tree was nearby. The picture made him feel peaceful. So he wanted to be in Door County.

From there he would drive north in Wisconsin and connect with U.S Route 2 heading west. He saw himself traveling across northern Minnesota trying to find the headwaters of the Mississippi River.

Toby’s next make-believe was of him feeling free and untethered driving mile after mile on Interstate 10 in Texas. He would explore the hill country west of San Antonio.

Finally, he pictured himself in Indiana parking his truck beside a cornfield just before its harvest. In his daydream he walked deep into the field of cornstalks, all of them taller than he was. He visualized becoming fearful that he would be lost amongst all that tall corn.

In the evening, he would feel content sitting alone in his motel room with his only task being to figure out where he was going to drive the next day.

 

 

 

 

Provocations

All Drunks are skid row bums living in donated tents under bridges.

All Trump supporters are racist backwoods rednecks.

All Techies are self-obsessed nerds with no social skills.

All Lefties are self-righteous, insular, uncompromising prigs.

All Children are whiny, self-interested, unsophisticated brats.

All Pro-gun nuts are fearful, paranoid, faux courageous extremists.

All People of color are lazy and unreliable and always looking for a hand out.

All Whites are privileged, wealth hoarding, power hungry aristocratic wannabies.

All Christians are holier-than-though, intolerant, nationalist, white supremacists.

All Suburbanites are socialist sympathizing and corporate consuming phonies.

All Democrats are bleeding heart, atheistic, pie-in-the-sky spendthrifts.

All Republicans are cheap, selfish, cold-hearted, hidebound fuddy-duddies.

All Poets are naval gazing egotists who believe other people care what they think.

 

Soul Energy

My cursory study of

quantum mechanics

has hit a snag.

It seems to me

rightly or wrongly

that all matter is really

just energy.

All there is

is energy

behaving in different ways.

Energy behaves.

Now what? I ask.

Science is leaving me

stranded in a cul-de-sac.

Then I think, well,

what about

the energy which is

in all of us humans?

The energy giving us life.

The energy that existed

before we were born and

will exist after we die.

Soul energy.

Our soul is the eternal energy

expressing itself in each of us

individually.

Something to ponder for a while

I think.

 

Bread and Butter

He wore the same

baker whites as my father.

An old, kind, quiet man,

who took an interest in me.

I, a small boy.

He, a kitchen worker.

The slices of white bread

were toasted a light brown.

With the broad knife

he scooped a generous portion

of butter from the crock.

A quick spread, evenly distributed,

and placed before me.

The toast tasted delicious!

I am mystified

why such a memory

of a mundane moment

has stayed with me

for so very long.

It was nothing special,

just a warm, pleasant, and caring

experience.

That is all it was.

I guess, that is all it needed to be.

 

Where Is She?

It has been 36 years

since she implanted herself

outside of the uterus.

The growing union of cells

survived for some days and weeks.

How many is unknown.

Her destiny was to not be.

Her presence became a danger.

Her life force needed to be

snuffed out in order to

save her mother.

Her soul

as rich as anyone’s

needed to find a new

cluster of cells

in which to flourish.

I want to believe

she found it

and is living

a thriving life.

Excuse me

while I cry.

 

Mortality Dream

It happened again last night.

I awoke

gently

at about 3:00am.

I recognized the feeling.

I have felt it before.

More and more frequently

in recent months and years.

The dream that awakened me

has no memorable content

or occurrences.

Only a theme.

My life is coming to an end.

Not imminently,

or so I think

and hope.

But my advanced age,

my eventual demise,

occupies a more prominent

position in consciousness,

both when awake

and asleep.

I felt no fear.

Only sadness.

By 5:00am

I crawled back into bed.

She, in her sleep, reached over to

touch me.

At that moment

I felt blessed and

returned to sleep.

 

Angst

We begin with the angst of childhood

Being concerned about being loved.

Then comes the angst of adolescence

Do I have enough friends?

The angst of young adulthood is weightier still

I must measure up to what a normal adult is. I must.

Oh, the angst of middle age

So much to hold together — marriage, finances, work, kids!

Late career angst can also bite

Planning a well-earned retirement in Shangri-La requires a lot of fantasy.

To live long enough for post-employment angst

Making that fixed income last while sliding toward senility and decline.

And finally — the simple angst of end of life

Being concerned about being loved.

 

Prints in the Snow

The snowfall was heavy.

The cold was deep.

 

From the window I saw

the blanket of blanco

lay soft, firm, and virgin.

 

As days passed

the snow became speckled

with small disparate prints.

 

They would appear in

morning.

Made during the frigid

night.

Noticed by me throughout the

day.

 

Why, I wonder, are they expending energy

by moving about

on this patch of frozen landscape?

 

Who made them?

Squirrels, deer, fox,

a lone turkey separated from its rafter,

or the elusive fisher,

whose screams we have heard at night

like a lost freighted child calling out for help.

 

Protected and comfortable

in my woodstove-heated home

I try not to anthropomorphize

their plight.

 

But I do anyway.

 

God Will Save Me

(Remembrance of a story once told.)

Come away from the edge!

You could fall into the water!

 

Not to worry.

I am religious.

God will save me.

 

The boat lurched starboard and in he fell.

Here! Grab this life ring!

 

Not to worry.

I am religious.

God will save me.

 

A rescue boat appeared along side him.

We have come to save you!

 

Not to worry.

I am religious.

God will save me.

 

He went under.

Lungs filled with water.

He drowned.

 

At the Pearly Gates he approached God.

I have long worshipped you!

Why did you not save me?

 

God looked down upon him kindly.

I gave you ears for listening to others.

I gave you fingers for grasping onto helping hands.

I gave you a mind for reasoning.

The question should be,

Why did you not use your God-given gifts?

 

Uppers and Downers

Homeostasis is so

elusive.

Like a statistical norm it

exists in ether

not in our real lives.

 

Energy can be difficult

to direct.

Its simple options are

to go up or

to go down.

 

Like a constant

calibration.

Turn energy up or

turn energy down.

This way or that way.

 

Reach for the upper

to be productive

to feel exuberance

to practice acuteness

to enjoy wakefulness.

 

Reach for the downer

to relax

to be reflective

to go adrift

to smell life.

 

Equilibrium,

Sustainability,

Balance,

Perseverance,

Homeostasis,

is the ultimate goal.

 

The Old Family Photos

With hesitant

but expectant

fingers

he opens the old photo

albums.

To even hold

these collections

is stepping back

to distant times

long gone,

but residing still

in presents past.

 

His emotions are

mixed.

Warmth, sadness, and

subdued happiness.

A stark reminder

of gifts he had

been given

and squandered

by being less

than he should

have been.

 

Love and regret,

grateful and apologetic.

Reminded of Thoreau,

“The mass of men live lives

of quiet desperation.”

Unfortunately,

he joined the family

of these men.

Such a turn of events

for a rich life

endowed with beautiful

children and wife.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Trail Cat

Walking steeply down a hilly and remote Scottish footpath

On a glorious sunny Spring day

When below us emerging from the wood and crossing the stream

Appear two women with several young children

But wait! What is that?

Trotting determinedly along behind the last child

Like a loyal dog

Was a cat! A trail cat

Yes, a cat was marching with the women and children

A sleek, gray, attentive, and unusually compliant cat

The troupe climbed the hill toward us and we stepped aside

Ascending slowly but dutifully up the hill the cat panted

Uncommon sight it is to see a cat huff and puff

After a brief pause to study us

The cat answered to its name called from up the path

And resumed its hike leaving us to gape in surprise at the trail cat

 

An Unspoken Conversation

It’s a conversation he hasn’t wanted to have with himself.

Even though he knows it is necessary to do so.

Funny to think of avoiding a topic of which only he knows.

No one else need judge or reprimand.

He could speak to himself, but does not.

And that too scares him.

 

Pain and despair press down making it hard to breathe.

This weight suppresses any light or spirit he may have remaining.

There is no one else to blame.

Decisions were made.

Risks were taken.

The only one holding him back from taking the next step is him.

But, the future is wide open and so very frightening.

 

Back Among the Trees

We came back in late May.

The trees had fully leafed a couple of weeks earlier.

They’re hovering now over us and the house in a quiet, but imposing manner.

The wind is still and so are the trees.

But they can still shoot the color green all over and around us.

And the oaks alpha over the maple, birch, and beech.

These are things one notices.

Such can be life living under a dome-like canopy.

In a forested land that rolls and stretches as far as the eye can see.

 

The Rain

The Spring on the coast of western Scotland was very rainy. Unsurprisingly.

The Scots seemed to take it in stride and some let on they even appreciate it.

Returning to New Hampshire we found the Spring to be dry. Surprisingly.

The rain today clears pollen from the air.

And gives the thirsty plants a wee, but so far insufficient drink.

Usually I do not like rainy days.

They depress me and leave me feeling confined and annoyed.

Like an energetic child stuck inside a boring house.

But occasionally a rainy day comes along that soothes and comforts.

I make an extra pot of coffee to nurse throughout the day.

Allow myself more daytime reading than usual.

Listen to the steady sound of water striking leaves and ground.

It can be easier to sense the rhythm of nature.

On one of the good rainy days.

 

How Old People Can Keep Fit

Remember what we did so naturally as children?

Run

Jump

Stretch

Bend

Climb

Lift

Roll

Crawl

Reach

Kneel

Swing

Fall

Crouch

Hop

Skip

Twist

Dig

Balance

Squat

Flip

Let’s continue doing these activities as old adults.

(Except maybe Flip)

Doing so keeps us feeling alive.

 

The Introvert

People

Interactions, relationships, encounters, friendships

Reveal cringe-worthy memories.

Moments that produce anxieties, fears, fumbles, gaffes, regrets.

And of course, faux pas.

People

Was I smart enough?

Friendly enough?

Witty enough?

Charming enough?

Moral enough?

People

Cant’ live with ’em. Can’t live without ’em.

So many feelings to hurt, offenses to make, blunders to smooth over.

People

Avoid them purposefully.

Shift my focus.

Choose solitary tasks.

Allow thoughts to wander.

Reclaim a center.

People

Sorry, but I am out, done, finished.

Forever.

 

Seasonal Affective Mood

The muted light

illuminates the woods

in yellow.

Lively winds

from the northwest

send dry leaves

fluttering and spinning

to the ground.

Despite this beauty

I feel apprehension.

Another lengthy, frigid, dark, and biting

winter is just around

the corner.

The stratus clouds

are steely gray today.

They form a canvas

against which a V-shaped

flock of honking geese

fly south.

Firewood is stacked.

Flower gardens put to bed.

Colorful summer gear stowed.

The precious sun

sinks lower in the sky.

And I brace

myself for the advancing

onslaught.

 

The Bicycle

A borrowed bicycle

belonged to the homestay

in Hoi An

where I stayed.

Old and red

it rekindled a sentiment

of being a kid again.

I wove through a street market,

past tropical houses,

along dusty roads,

toward the sea.

Being a foreigner

among natives and locals

of Vietnam

who barely gave a notice

to this American

riding through their homeland.

This land

spoke fear and war

to my teenage years.

But today

the sun is warm

the ocean is bright blue

I am free

to ride a bicycle

across this land.

 

Listening Intently

We walk along the dirt road

located through the old woods

that was once a stagecoach route

which started carrying passengers in 1831

from Hanover to Lowell in a single day.

 

Today, as is true most days,

the road is quiet and seemingly still

as it penetrates this patch of forest

with its tumbledown stone walls

and a visible opening left over

from a logging operation five years ago.

 

We pass the pond with its far-off view of Mount Sunapee

as soon the road begins its rise to a stand of hemlock

where the wide path to the right invites

us to the lonely clearing on Shadow Hill

that displays the remnants of a campfire

and a high view of the pond and western hills.

 

Here the dog is off-leash sniffing and exploring

as I try to read the story of today’s woods

told cunningly and gently

through blowing of soft winds and solitary warbling of birds

and filtered light amplifying the lapping of water against the steep hill.

 

For those with an awareness and an attentive ear

and a consciousness which takes in the delicate vibrations of nature

can also be heard the orchestra of trees growing

with fallen wood rotting and humus decomposing

and the creaks and groans of water freezing

all punctuated by the tone of the decaying flesh

of a squirrel who lived its brief life among these trees.

 

A Day

Another day to float through.

Free of agenda and schedule.

Except for picking up your pieces.

Or so I tell myself.

What did you say?

I couldn’t hear you clearly.

You know, I’m not what you think.

Although maybe you know that.

With your head thrown back.

And your eyes closed and mouth gaping.

Excuse me, but…

Choices are strange, you know.

Life is a lot of risky business.

With stinging rebukes.

And nods of agreement.

Just by stumbling through another day.

Which reminds me.

Of the confusion of youth.

And silly false choices.

Combined with conflicting images.

From 1973.

Of cornfield mazes.

Abandoned gold mines.

Hitchhiking through Ohio.

Trying to be alternative.

While embracing middle class life.

And doing neither particularly well.

Doesn’t matter now.

It’s in the past.

Heaven and Hell can wait.

There’s more living to be done.

Beneath the full moon.

Which was here before birth.

And will be here after death.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My heart had finally settled back to its natural rhythm a short while earlier. My mind on the other hand had not. It had been about an hour since the near miss on NY Route 67 as it neared Interstate 87 north of Albany. The fright I experienced once I realized my tires were starting to be overpowered by the shoulder’s soft sand was a slap to my psyche. An oncoming van drifted into my lane forcing me to the right. Thankfully, the van’s driver snapped to in enough time to center the vehicle within its lane, but not before I found myself contending with several seconds of outright uncertainty, and to be honest fright, as to whether or not I would lurch sideways, flatten the 1960’s era guard rails, and land starboard side on a downward sloping embankment with a full load of beer, soft drinks, and bottled water.

Twenty-two year’s worth of driving know-how together with a sudden visit by Lady Luck prevented the worst from happening. Optimally calibrating a soft touch on the brake with subtle steering allowed me to securely grab enough pavement to right myself. With a jerk the truck was back on the road again heading east in the direction of New Hampshire instead of sliding downhill into a ravine.

It took a minute before I cursed aloud. I imagined having my thickset hands around the van driver’s throat and squeezing until he (or she) went limp. This image stayed with me longer than it probably should have, but such is rage. I wasn’t feeling very analytical or understanding or sympathetic. I was pissed. Eventually, as I replayed the incident in my mind I had to admit it wasn’t necessary to pull my rig so hard to the right as quickly as I had. There was clearly an element of overreaction involved. And I do recognize that sometimes my overreactions were more trouble than the initial cause. Fatigue more than likely played a role. After all, I had driven twenty-five of the previous forty hours, by far breaking trucking regulations. Truth be told, I was a wreck physically and emotionally. I just wanted to get home.

Sarah would be there. Ahh, Sarah. I knew she wanted more in life than to be settled with me in our mostly finished simple prefab house a couple of miles from the village in our desperately rural Sullivan County town. The truth was, I was the best she could do back when we met. At least that is the narrative I’ve been telling myself since she moved in six years ago. With little money, an ex-boyfriend who her threw her out, an abandoned GED program, but with a country-girl cuteness that still weakens my knees, I offered to take care of her. That’s what girls want, right? A man to take care of them.

She took two days to think about it, but eventually showed up in my driveway just as I was returning from a run to Connecticut. We had sex for hours that night. I thought I had won the lottery. But even though I could tell she didn’t share that level of excitement about me as I did her, I told myself, no worries. She’ll come around. She’ll realize I am the best she’s going to do.

And then Sarah announced a few months ago she was pregnant. She took the test to tell us the baby was to be a boy. I was both thrilled and scared. I hadn’t planned on becoming a dad and was afraid it would change my life too much. However, the more I thought about it the more pride I felt. Unexpectedly, the idea of being a father made me feel more complete, more proper, more mature. I liked that feeling. Knowing Sarah was going to have a baby boy made going home after a run like this a little better than before. I looked forward to seeing her in a way I hadn’t in the past. That was how I felt that afternoon. Ready to be home with my girlfriend who was going to have our baby. I shook off what remained of the jitters from the near-accident and continued driving east across Vermont. It would dark by the time I got home, but not too late. One more cup of coffee should do it, I thought.

It’s funny how a certain kind of outdoor space, a natural space, can shift my mood in an instant. I’ve driven this route west to east through Vermont many times and it contains several views on the roadside that catch my eye, give me slight pause, and induce calmness. Today, it was the one with a sweeping hillside that is grassy and kept clear of overgrowth due to having been hayed a couple of times per season presumably and which reaches a line of stout oaks on a hilltop forming a tight canopy. In the late afternoon on sunny days the hill and trees receive an angled light, which amplifies the colors and brightens the picture just the way I like it. Glancing this image for a mere two or three seconds as my truck rumbled by brought me a momentary feeling of peace and contentment. Things were feeling better. The near-accident was fading away from my thoughts.

My coffee was nearly done when I crossed over the river into New Hampshire and then south on route 12A. I pulled the rig to the outside edge of a parking lot near Walmart, so I could run in and get Sarah a bag of peanut butter cups. She’ll like that I did that, I thought. Twenty more minutes or so and I’ll be home. Once back on 12A I again appreciated my not having flipped the rig back in New York. Getting home in one piece felt like a reward.

Something felt off as soon as I stepped from the mudroom door into the kitchen. Sarah’s ‘hello’ to me was inauthentic, almost guarded. Her smile seemed somewhat forced. The air felt thicker than usual for some reason. I instantly sensed anxiety and apprehension seep into my consciousness. I hated times that didn’t go right. Suddenly, this felt like one of them.

She reached for can of seltzer sitting on the kitchen counter. It allowed her to take her eyes from mine, if only for a moment. I told Sarah I would be right back. I took my travel bag to my small office off of the living room where I dropped it to the floor thinking, I’ll need to ask her what’s wrong, because it sure felt as if something must be wrong.

While asking Sarah, what’s up, I opened the refrigerator door to grab a beer and noticed two six-packs of unrecognizable beer. I knew it was some sort of expensive craft beer, the kind of thing I never wasted money on and confusingly, either did Sarah. There were also two unopened bottles of pinot grigio, which is Sarah’s drink. Or at least it was before she became pregnant. But even before pregnancy, she typically kept only one opened bottle in the fridge at a time. Not two unopened ones. This didn’t look right.

I asked if she was planning a party or something. Her face looked fake. A mixture of discomfort and unease. Bubbling from her were insincere comments like, “Party?! No, of course not. I thought you might like to try a different kind of beer. So I’ve got some booze in the fridge. It’s not that big of a deal, is it?”

As I said, “I don’t get it”, a pickup rushed past the house on our dirt road kicking up a cloud of dust. Through the living room picture window I saw what looked like the back of Frank’s F-150, a good friend of mine in town. For a split second I thought, what is Frank doing around here now and why the speeding by without a stop?

I turned back toward Sarah. She had noticed the truck as well. Fear was spread across her face. She tried to hide it, but it was unmistakable. “What’s going on, Sarah?” I was tired and now feeling stressed. Sarah was pissing me off with her evasion and now this sudden look of dread. “Tell me what the fuck is going on, Sarah!”

She couldn’t or wouldn’t speak. Sarah never was a good liar. And her silence told me she wasn’t going to even try. Her eyes began to moisten and her mouth opened slightly as if she wanted to speak, but no words came out. Sarah’s left hand then slowly moved toward her raised stomach where it rested. My eyes followed her hand as she touched our baby.

I may not be the brightest bulb in the marquee, but I eventually do figure most things out. Frank! He drinks those fancy-boy beers! Was he coming here to drink them with Sarah? My heart quickened. The silence was broken.

“I’m so sorry,” Sarah said. “I didn’t know you were coming home today. Thought you would be in Buffalo tonight. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“Are those beers Frank’s? Tell me what you’re up to! Tell me now! Don’t bullshit me, Sarah! You and Frank were going to drink? And you’re pregnant! You’re not drinking these days. That was him driving by just now, wasn’t it? And he didn’t stop.”

Sarah started to answer me. “Me and Frank…we…don’t want trouble…have to do this. She quickly turned from me, grabbed her purse from the kitchen table, and bolted from the house to her Corolla. My surprise at her unexpected flight was momentarily paralyzing. By the time I got outside she had started her car and jammed it into reverse, barely maintaining control on the road. And then she was gone.

Sarah and Frank? What the fuck?! I gasped for air. A sinking feeling in my gut took hold as I realized my whole world had just collapsed. My blood reaching the boiling temperature gave me the energy and motivation to act. On a wall of my office hung my Ruger American hunting rifle. From my desk I grabbed the box of .30 caliber rounds and loaded the gun.

My mind was racing. “He’s been screwing around with Sarah while I’m on the road? I’m gonna kill him. I’ll blow his fucking head off!”

There was no sadness. No remorse. No second guessing. Just a feeling of disbelief mashed up with rage, leading to a single goal. To kill Frank. My truck was in the barn where I kept it while I was away on the road. With the rifle resting in the gun rack behind me, I charged dangerously fast to Frank’s place. Upon arriving, my truck vaulted from the road to his front lawn, leaving deep ruts where I had slammed on the brakes.

His truck was in the driveway. Behind it was Sarah’s Corolla. “I’m gonna kill you Frank, you bastard! Get out here!” I shrieked at the house.

There was no response. I screamed some more. Still no response. I figured Frank had his gun ready to use on me if I tried getting into the house, but I didn’t care. To get their attention I started shooting out the windows of his Ford and of Sarah’s car as well.

Strangely, it never occurred to me that the scene I was making would bring out the police. Even before I started shooting, Mrs. Lambeau who lived across the street from Frank’s house must have heard me, seen me with the rifle, and called the town police station. Officer Charpentier must have been the only one on duty to take the call, because she is who showed up to confront me.

“Put the gun down on the ground and step away from it, Mr. Dean,” Officer Charpentier called out from behind the town cruiser. “Once you do that we can talk about this. Do what I ask right now, please.”

“Not until I blow Frank’s brains out!” I yelled back to the police officer.

She responded with, “I’m not going to let you do that, Mr. Dean.” I saw that her service weapon was drawn. “Now put the rifle down slowly onto the ground and back away from it in my direction.”

“C’mon, Jim. Do as she says. Put it down.” Roy from down the road was speaking from the back of an oak on the corner of Frank’s property.

“Thank you, sir, but I have this,” Officer Charpentier said to Roy.

“So, Jim,” Officer Charpentier said to me in her even voice, “follow my directions and put the gun down.”

I don’t think it was what the town police officer said, but how she said it. Officer Charpentier was composed, steady, and taking command of the situation. As I listened, I was able to regain a shred of mental acuity. Enough clarity of thought anyway to allow me to realize Sarah was gone. As pissed as I was, she wasn’t coming back to me. I was no longer wanted. My breathing dialed down from huge gasps of air. I put down the gun on the lawn and walked to the cruiser.

The pain of the entire experience lives with me today, many years later. I would put it that I’m hurt and wounded more than I am defeated. I have my son a couple of days a week and I have something of a life. Working on being grateful for what I have is something I really do try to work on. Yet, crying comes to me much more easily than it used to and I kick at the rickety old boards of my barn in frustration a lot. It’s just that the anguish of betrayal, lost trust, and rejection continues to haunt me. Why we don’t make the best of our short time on earth, I’ll never know. I’ll just never know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I haven’t written much over the past three months. Some, but not as much as I expected to given I had a three-month period with precious few things needing productive attention and which were largely months that were mine to use as I chose. I can’t point to my lack of output to a busy schedule, or identify others as making too many demands of me, or even claim I was the victim of a damnable unexpected obstruction life sometimes throws across our paths without warning. Instead, I think I’ll blame it on Spain. After all, this is where those three months were spent.

Spain, or to be more specific, Andalusia, the autonomous southern region of the country where this time was almost exclusively passed, is a total distraction for an introverted, goal-oriented, New England-bred old man with an imagination deficit. I’m used to getting things done concretely in an environment where cultural and meteorological conditions are conducive to setting aside scheduled time dedicated to accomplishing large and small tasks every day. Especially during winter, with its sharp and biting edges, urging us poor souls to find warm shelter where we’re forced to occupy our time with meaningful indoor pursuits that keep us grounded and somewhat sane.

But winter in Andalusia generates no such exigency. Nearly every day exhibits traits seemingly designed to prevent an over-indulgence of objective-achieving activities. Plans to work on something can be easily thwarted. One’s normal laser-like focus can become refracted illuminating options for your day you didn’t earlier consider. Days can slip through your fingers with velvety abandon. Another night makes its presence and you are again surprised how smoothly the retreating day slid by like a passing skater effortlessly flowing down the paseo maritimo.

This part of Spain sends a message that living matters and we should be here on this earth to enjoy it. Rather quickly upon settling into these surroundings the senses begin influencing the brain to divert dusty patterned and sequestered thoughts and feelings outwardly toward possibilities only revealed by an abundance of sunshine filled skies and the big blue sea. The charm of Spanish culture ushers American sensibilities to a seat at any one of many cafes or bars where attentive and unhurried service awaits. Sipping this existence slowly can relax jumpy minds, reverse impatience, and if allowed, excite. Andalusia has a distinctive style shaped from a rich and turbulent history to share with those who go there willing to look, listen, and learn. It is a place confoundingly compelling and engaging and enticing. And that is why I haven’t written much in the past three months.

 

Arriving in Spain at the beginning of December for a pre-planned stay that involved living in a rented casa along the Mediterranean’s Costa del Sol for as long as the European Union visa laws allowed (three months) meant we were here for a relatively long haul. On the docket was a desire to visit other parts of Andalusia in addition to venturing out of Spain briefly. What eventually transpired was a two-week trip to southern Germany and Austria in late January. Other than this out-of-country trip, our time was encircled in Andalusia, including greater Malaga and the cities of Granada, Sevilla, Cordaba, and Cadiz. Also of note, this was not our first trip to Spain or to Andalusia. We rented a casa in the same locale for two months during the winter of 2015. So, we had a pretty good idea of what we were likely to face. Nevertheless, this fresh encounter with Spain expanded my appreciation of its more salient and positive traits.

High on my list of observed positive Spanish attributes, and one counter-intuitive to my own manner of being, is the Andaluz passion for life. The people strike me as very social and outgoing, especially among each other. Much time is devoted to long visits and energetic conversations, particularly over food and drink. Meals can go on for hours consuming entire afternoons or stretching late into the night. Family and community are revered. Time is gratefully committed to growing relationships. As has been observed by others assessing the Spanish psyche, the Spanish don’t live to work, they work to live.

This is not to say Spain is an unproductive country. On the contrary, it appears to function quite well. Municipal and private services abound. One observes things getting done, although patience is sometimes necessary. The manaña syndrome, or tendency to get around to task completion when one is good and ready, does make a not infrequent presence, or so I’m told. Urgency may not match northern European or American levels, but by adjusting to the Iberian pace quality of life need not suffer a decline, rather it can possibly be improved.

Another appealing feature is the weather. My, but the sun shines a lot there. Costa del sol is an apt description. Real estate agents, backed up by the country’s national meteorological agency, claim there are 320 days of sunshine per year. A harsh winter day is a cool, cloudy day with some rain and temperatures in the mid-fifties Fahrenheit. Coming from New Hampshire, this is a joy to take. Most days over the three months in Andalusia were sunny and in the sixties. Perfect winter weather!

Over recent years, I’ve noticed that I really like sunny days. Sunshine lifts my spirits, improves how I feel, and assists me in having a more positive outlook on life. These consequences appear to be having a greater impact as I age. It’s said sunshine boosts the brain’s delivery of the hormone serotonin, resulting in enhanced mood, calmness, and focus. Given my need for help in all of these areas I was very grateful for the daily solar exposure.

My daily walks were a pleasure. Energetic romps through the streets of town and especially along the paseo which followed the shoreline of the Mediterranean gave me not only exercise and time to think, but contact with the aforementioned sun. I often explored the streets where tourists did not venture, but instead where generations of local residents made their homes. Sure, they sniffed me out as someone not from there, but I was never made to feel uncomfortable. Whenever I travel I love wandering and observing people and places different from own experience. I am not so naive to know this is impracticable and unsafe to do in many locations around the world, but so far my excursions in many far flung spots has been rewarding.

To imply my stay in Spain was all comfort and leisure free of any mental exertion, leading to my dearth of writing is not completely accurate. There was another reason. I seriously tried to take my understanding of the Spanish language to the next level. This was really hard and pushed my brain to what felt at times like its limit.

Let me back up to make a disclosure. The learning of another language has been an unfulfilled lifelong desire. I studied my mother’s native tongue, German, for all four years of high school and one year of college. But as most of us know, this encounter rarely produces a proficient speaker, listener, reader, and writer of another language. Life went on and I never was able to comprehend and express myself in German beyond a rudimentary degree. Then, after our 2015 stay in Spain, I developed an enthusiasm for their language. Given its widespread use across the western world, including its growing presence in the US, I thought I could and should handle this one. I still think someday I will.

Learning a new language in one’s sixties is considered tough to pull off. I recently heard a linguist contend the older one gets the more difficult it is to learn a new language. Agreed. He went on to disclose, perhaps in an attempt to make people like me feel better, it was only necessary to learn about 500 keywords to become functional in a language. However, he didn’t say which 500 they were. Nevertheless, I persisted. And I made progress I’m happy to report.

As a base from which to build more Spanish language aptitude I had a year and a half of occasional lessons with a teacher in Mexico conducted via Skype over 2017 and 2018. This helpful introduction in combination with some more recent online grammar work, or should I say dabbling, provided me with a little background from which to extend my learning.

The approach I began with during this three-month language intensive largely consisted of trying to master those words and phrases most needed to conduct business in stores, restaurants, and other commercial contexts. From there I ventured into conversational attempts with locals. I relied heavily on two aids in tandem to accomplish this. One, the Google Translate app on my phone and two, my memory. I can’t applaud Google Translate enough. I would anticipate what I wanted to say prior to an engagement, look it up on the app, and then try to memorize as much of the text as possible. This exercised my visual memory in ways I haven’t done in years. Over time, this approach increased my learned vocabulary and communicative functionality immensely, not to mention giving my memory a well deserved workout. Before long I had a serviceable list of words and phrases I could speak in a natural manner without relying as much on the app. This was satisfying, indeed.

My most demanding situations were social ones, during which I tried conversing with native speakers who knew little to no English. Granted, these discussions didn’t get into great depth, but I found that when pressed I could conjure a large enough number of words to make myself mostly, or ahhh, should I say somewhat understood. To be honest, these sessions were mentally exhausting. Nevertheless, it was exciting to see myself begin to learn a new skill. As we age we typically rely on engaging in activities with which we already have some familiarity. It’s part of our chosen need to remain in our comfort zones. Trying to expand my ability to speak Spanish was a deliberate attempt to step out of that zone.

Of course, every glass is at least half empty, right? Being more a visual rather than an auditory learner in general I anticipated difficulty in comprehending the Spanish spoken word. Was I ever right. I left Spain knowing I never made as much progress in listening to people speak and understanding what was said as I wanted to. If the language is in print, it is much easier for me to process. Coming at me as verbal speech and I’m often lost. The one shred of progress I can claim in this auditory area is that spoken Spanish doesn’t sound as rapid fire as it used to. For most of my life I always thought Spanish speakers talked really fast. Now that isn’t necessarily the case. The speech now strikes me as slower, but unfortunately so is my ability to understand it sonically.

 

So, I have left Spain physically behind for now, but have taken a piece of it with me. I will continue to practice the language with the hope of one day being able to say and demonstrate that I can speak, read, write, and LISTEN to Spanish fluently. Also the pace of life revealed to me in Spain is one I hope to incorporate into my retired life. If not now, when as they say? And though I can’t take the Spanish sun with me wherever I go I can always carry the memory picture. I look forward to returning.

And now no more excuses. Back to writing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wanting 

A child 

Sees the clear difference 

Between what she and others have 

Material riches, self-worth, dignity 

Not sure what is wrong 

But something definitely is wrong 

 

Work hard. Be like us. 

The message others give 

Nighttime hunger, outgrown clothes 

No new shoes at the start of school 

Fatigue, vagueness, fog, indignation 

Hard to be what they want me to be 

 

Depression, misbehavior, stern looks from teachers 

Why not?  

Life is unfair 

Living from rental to rental to rental 

Despairing parents 

Missing future 

Absent opportunity 

 

She stares into space 

 

Dying 

Brain takes command 

as always 

to prepare for death 

 

No more plans to make 

short-term memory 

loses importance 

replaced by life review 

decades-old events 

revisited 

 

Sleep prevails 

systems slow 

consciousness wanes 

peace descends 

 

Food and water 

are rejected 

for days and days 

while the catheter 

fills less and less 

 

The body 

dwindles and declines 

sliding into 

cocoon-like embrace 

slow reach to 

terminal stillness 

 

An Old Picture 

I ran across 

An old picture of my daughter 

Taken during the 1990s. 

It makes me sad 

That I can’t relive just one day 

Of her at that age 

Ever again. 

 

Moments 

To feel 

Moods strike stealthily 

Good humor, bad sentiment 

Push and pull of psyche 

Habits hard to break 

Circumstances take control 

Stronger than mind 

Stronger than heart 

 

Peer through haze 

Touch habitual responses 

Cultivate curiosity 

Embrace growth 

Gamble with uncertainty 

 

Impulses emerge  

Patterns arise 

Pleasure and pain are what they are 

Observe their nuance 

Free of judgment 

Live with what is 

Like never before 

 

Folk 

Family 

Wife, Son, Daughter 

Extraordinary lives 

Core of being 

Live in love 

Live in fear 

 

Don’t be taken away 

Appreciation is lacking 

Immeasurable passion 

Devotion to die for 

The choice is mine alone 

 

Young families 

Coordinate child care 

Am now free of that burden 

But at what cost? 

Groundlessness and self-centeredness 

Poor substitutes for nurturing 

 

Los Angeles 

Density 

Drone of ‘The 2’ 

Voices across properties 

Layered aircraft 

Hot days 

Cool nights 

Dry polluted air 

The Moon shines here too 

Mixed cultures 

Brown skin 

Interaction 

So many stories 

Sea of humanity 

Neighborhood islands 

Small houses 

Eccentric styling 

Reputation 

Creative flow 

Music and acting 

Hub of entertainment 

Domingo 

Highland Park supermercado 

Barbacoa de pollo e carne  

Bueno con cerveza fria 

Walk along Verdugo  

LA middle class 

Din of cars 

Birdsong background 

 

Orange 

Orange needles, once green, lie on the ground 

Orange leaves cling ever tenuously to maple trees 

Ripe pumpkins sit on a stonewall 

Passing light displays an orange radiance 

Once inside, the first warming fires cast an orange glow 

The calmness of yellow merges with the urgency of red 

To signal the demise of summer and winter’s inception  

 

This pigmented time of year produces associations 

And reminders of traditions 

Walks across campus quads and leaf strewn trails 

Establishment of studious and productive mindsets 

Plans made previously unfold with predictability and anticipation 

Gardens put to bed and warm weather paraphernalia packed away 

Sweaters and corduroys briefly forgotten are reintroduced  

 

Oaks foretell mice, chipmunk, hawk, and fox populations 

By the volume of their acorn drops 

Floral life, verdant and full not so long ago, languishes 

Mountain sides pop as palettes of complexion 

Auburn crowned birches lean over running brooks 

Lakes reflect angled beams of light, yielding their annual shimmer 

Air carries the pungent smell of decay and disintegration 

 

Cool air prompts more campfires 

There is still dried pine to eliminate 

The flames dance with orange brilliance 

Against hard granite stones 

Staring for hours into the blaze 

Contemplating the present moment 

And the frigid winter to come 

 

Dogs 

Their soulful, expressive eyes 

Short fur on tops of heads 

calling to be stroked and scratched 

Layers of affection and anxiety 

We finessed, managed, and loved them  

for so many years 

 

Rusty was the first 

When I was a little boy 

The big shaggy Collie didn’t last long 

Chasing cars, chewing shoes 

My earliest remembered profound sadness 

to know he had been given away 

 

Kemo came from a New Bedford shelter 

My life partner loved dogs 

We tried together to keep him 

Nervous, desperate, unpredictable 

“Damaged goods” is a usable phrase 

to best describe the poor boy 

 

Karga was on loan for a year or two 

A huge German Shepard and 

gentle giant 

Diligently guarding our son’s home birth 

in a rural New Hampshire farmhouse 

 

Sikkum, the Lhasa Apso 

could turn women’s heads 

when I walked him on Concord streets 

Our boy’s first dog  

who required more patience than I showed 

 

 Ahh, Else, the “girl biter” 

The Chocolate Lab lasted fifteen years 

A true family dog 

Was present when our daughter arrived 

Beautiful dog, loving relationship 

who would sell her soul for just one more bite 

of food 

 

Elwood, a most handsome German Short-haired Pointer 

needed a new home 

We were seduced by his tri-color palette 

but tested by his fears 

which grew worse over nine years 

We all tried so hard 

We all tried, Elwood 

 

Regal Tess had been abandoned 

An aloof and strong-willed Standard Poodle 

who preferred women over men 

A curly gray ghost with a singular agenda 

that was hard to penetrate 

I think, but am not sure 

she was grateful for what she was given 

 

Pepper stayed for her final eighteen months 

Her old owners had to depart 

for a nursing home 

She departed for our home 

A ragamuffin mix of Terrier this and that 

My only regret is that 

she had not spent her whole life with us 

 

Ernest came to retire in New Hampshire  

from urban California 

Our first hound. A howling experience 

Between us he sat 

on cold winter days and nights 

before the flickering woodstove 

melting our hearts 

 

Cringeworthy 

An uncomfortable 

but valuable (I think) 

phenomenon is occurring 

now that I’m retired. 

 

Unprompted and spontaneous memories of 

stupid-ass, 

embarrassing, 

awkward, 

tactless, 

faux pas situations 

I committed 

over many years 

are stinging my consciousness. 

 

There are many years to cover 

and numerous instances on which to reflect. 

Having stepped into it  

as frequently as I have 

gives my deep memory 

much grist for my mental mill. 

 

Why this is happening 

I am not sure. 

Perhaps I’m primed 

for a life review 

coupled with a slap 

upside the head. 

God knows I deserve it. 

 

My response 

after my initial cringe 

is resolve. 

Live more present. 

Observe more acutely. 

Be kinder. 

Reach out intentionally. 

Add and not subtract 

from future interactions. 

 

Beats just feeling like shit. 

 

Rooted Aimlessness 

Physics takes a recess while 

disparate experiences blend. 

 

Dream-like views prevail and 

suggestion becomes what it is. 

 

Like counting blueberries picked 

during moments leading to death. 

 

Also, weather becomes predictable 

like it has all happened before. 

 

Mothers and fathers fade away 

while suns burn hot. 

 

The aging actor only gets roles 

for characters who are old. 

 

Nurses heal, teachers teach, and 

everyone tries to carry on. 

 

The bridge’s incline keeps rising 

leaving me scared to gape over the peak. 

 

Peering into the eyes of dogs and horses 

is like seeing life itself. 

 

I miss the country when 

I’m too long in urban sprawl. 

 

Can I please be excused? 

A reflection written during the Spring of 2019

My earliest political memory is from the early evening of Tuesday, November 8, 1960. It was the night John F. Kennedy won the presidency. My mother needed to run out to a store of some sort and I sat in the back seat of the car. It was cold and dark. I was seven years old and living in Lenox, Massachusetts. My mother’s nervous energy and intense concern were palpable. She and my Massachusetts Irish Roman Catholic Democrat father wanted very much for Kennedy to win. The car radio crackled, because my Mom was desperate to not miss any news about the election that on this special night was dominating all broadcasting. This was the night I began to learn that politics was a big deal. 

In many ways my reverence for politics, history, and the importance of government came from those few years of President Kennedy’s administration. The Massachusetts Irish Catholic Democrat side of my family adored Kennedy. He was held up as the best thing to ever happen to this world—just shy of Jesus of course. My mother was a young German immigrant and she took her cues of what to believe in America from my father’s family. Regardless, she readily embraced the adoration of Kennedy. As a result, politics and the government were introduced to me as hopeful, inspiring, and fundamentally positive constructs. This belief shaped my approach to politics that in many ways continues to this day.  

The Kennedy story ended tragically of course. It was the afternoon of Friday, November 22, 1963. I was sitting in my fifth-grade classroom at Lenox Elementary School listening to a lesson our teacher Miss Neill was presenting, when our principal walked into the room, walked up to Miss Neill and whispered the news of the president’s assassination into our teacher’s ear. The shocked look on her face sent waves of anxiety throughout the room. In retrospect Miss Neill handled it all very well. She calmly, respectfully, but with obvious pain told a room full of ten and eleven-year old boys and girls what had happened to the president. It couldn’t have been easy to announce this news to us and it wasn’t easy for me to hear it. 

My mother cried for four days. The black & white television was on continuously carrying news of the shocking account. The grief was cutting and profound. I remember watching Oswald being shot on live TV, the president’s casket lying in state under the Capitol rotunda, and the salute John-John gave the funeral procession. To this day, I can relive the sorrow and gloom. It will never go away. 

One afternoon during the summer of 1964 my friend John and I made Johnson for President signs and held them up to traffic traveling on Walker Street in Lenox Dale. No one prompted us to do this. It was our idea of having fun and doing something meaningful. By then politics was of high interest. Although I don’t remember having a fondness for LBJ, nevertheless he was President Kennedy’s VP and had been sworn in on the day JFK died. That was enough reason to support him and I did so enthusiastically. Barry Goldwater, Johnson’s Republican opponent, was successfully portrayed across the country and in my circle of family and friends as a dangerous and unpredictable menace, who must be defeated at all costs. The election of 1964 cemented in my mind that Republicans were menacing and Democrats virtuous. For better or worse, the political narrative of my life has largely followed this course. 

1968 was a tumultuous year in American politics. I was in high school by then and totally drawn into the drama of civil rights and anti-war protests rocking the nation. Eugene McCarthy, a U.S. Senator from Minnesota, emerged early in the election cycle as liberal provocateur running for the Democratic presidential nomination with a demand to end the war in Vietnam as his principal issue. By this time young people were quite politically active, certainly compared to later periods. Many youthful, anti-war, counterculture types found McCarthy appealing. And therefore, so did I. My path of teenaged individuation hitched itself to this rainbow-colored, daisy-decaled bus. 

Prior to the election of 1972 I was old enough to vote. Full of urgency, I asked my father to take me to the town hall so I could register to vote as soon as I turned eighteen. The desire to vote continues to attract. I may have missed a few local elections held on a rainy Tuesday for offices seemingly far removed from my life. You know, the kind that garner 20% of the possible electorate, if that. But in general, I have been a loyal and devoted practitioner of the voting franchise. I have never missed a presidential or midterm election. Not one in 47 years.  

*** 

Politics is about values. History has taught us that for people to live in harmony with shared values is quite difficult and has too many times devolved into a deadly endeavor. Although articulated by an erudite American, the universal quest of citizens across the globe can reliably be said to converge on the pursuit of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Realizing the serious consequences of getting politics right occurred to me early on as profoundly important. Having had two parents whose young lives were consumed by World War II, one as a young girl in war-torn Germany and the other as a teenager fighting the Japanese in the South Pacific, I learned early about the repercussions of societal and cultural breakdown. 

I am also the product of the positive story America tells itself about our history and exceptionality. The myth of America as the Land of Opportunity, forged from a righteous revolution against tyranny, designed by an exceptional group of enlightened founders ordained to bring light and hope to the world was an exciting and inspiring tale to behold. It fit in naturally with a feeling that I was born into a country unparalleled in greatness and capability. We were the ones who won World War II, sent astronauts to the moon, invented products the world craved, and were large and powerful. This place and people must be special. I grew up proud to be an American. 

My patriotic optimism was soon tempered during my junior high school and high school years by the war in Vietnam. Early memories of the war are from Walter Cronkite and The Huntley Brinkley Report giving daily battle updates, news of troop movements and enemy atrocities, and the grizzly broadcasts of weekly casualty totals from Vietnam. The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese combined totals were always higher than American losses, which gave a sense of American fighting superiority. But I was a history enthusiast and remember thinking, does every generation of Americans have to fight in a war? And is this the one I will need to fight and possibly die in? It was not a comforting thought. This recognition was reinforced in 1973 when the Selective Service lottery drawing for my birth year (1953) was held. My number was 117, which was a relatively high and therefore safe number that year. I was relieved. It looked like I wasn’t going to Vietnam. 

As an aside, I did end up visiting Vietnam in 2014 with my wife. We spent a month working our way from Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) to Hanoi. It is a lovely country. My memories are fond. Regarding any connection to the war, there were visits to jarring and sobering war museums, but most significantly for me was to focus on the reception we received from the Vietnamese, who knew we were Americans. It was genuinely warm with no sense of animus, even in Hanoi, the locus of the former enemy. While on the streets of that city one afternoon my eye caught a group of local middle school-aged girls walking together on a sidewalk. Having once been a middle school teacher this was of interest to me. Amidst that cohort of friends as they receded from view revealing their backpacks was one who had on it stitched an American flag. Time can heal, I thought.        

By 1968 the war in Vietnam and the protests made me a cynic. I accepted rather briskly the idea that there was a dark side to the American enterprise. Why I found that my home country was capable of imperialist and grievous behavior and why many of my peers, as I’ve learned over the course of my life, did not is a mystery I’m stilling trying to solve. Needless to say, I became sympathetic to counterculture memes and the politics of liberalism, civil rights, toleration, peace, and a Rousseauian back-to-the-earth naturalism, infused with an anti-business/anti-capitalist belief. These influences guided my political thinking for many years and are addressed to this day in my political musings, but with greater maturity and sophistication—or so I would like to think. 

I have been a reliable Democrat voter. I’ve voted Democrat for every presidential candidate election since 1972, save one. In 1980 I voted for John Anderson, an independent challenging Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. I have regretted that vote ever since, wishing I had voted for Jimmy Carter’s reelection, even now despite knowing the outcome. The pattern is the same for other elective offices. Almost always I voted for Democrats, occasionally for independents, but never for Republicans. I’ve clearly had a loyalty to the party. I remember my Aunt Betty telling me once while chatting with her about candidates in an upcoming election as we sat on Seabrook Beach, New Hampshire one afternoon when I was about twelve or thirteen years old that she routinely voted “straight ticket” for Democrats. I asked her to tell me what that meant. She said that a ballot gave a voter an option to vote for every candidate of a given party without having to select each one individually and that this was how she usually voted. This admission was another influence in my becoming a Democrat.  

*** 

A lifetime of interest in a particular field produces a depth of understanding. Much of my reading on a daily basis is political news. Since the creation of the internet it is easy to get deluged in political reporting and commentary. I love it. In addition to such study, I have found it very useful over the years to not just reinforce my political perceptions, but to challenge them. Indeed, much of the growth or maturation of my political beliefs is due to this simple dictum. Another useful practice has been to engage with others in vigorous political debate. This is a time that tests conjectures to see how they hold up to critical scrutiny, especially if communicating with others of differing persuasions. Together these habits have helped me to shape a personal ideology, dynamic to be sure, but serviceable in determining what I believe at any given time. Values clarification is grounding and political thought is really not much more than that.  

Despite George Washington’s reservations about Americans bifurcating themselves into two principal political parties it happened as soon as his term as president was over. The names and governing themes of both parties have changed over our history, but the paradigm of two competing political powerhouses ascertaining and articulating the values and ruling priorities of the country remains constant. To a large extent the popular will of the people can be comprehended by understanding the preferences of each party. Following is my objective assessment of the Republicans and the Democrats in 2019. 

Today’s Republican Party is harder to define than in recent years due to the rise of Trumpism. Prior to the presidential candidacy announcement of Donald Trump in 2015 I would have ascribed the following characteristics to Republicans: They believed in small government, low taxes, little regulation, personal freedom/responsibility, hawkish foreign policy, free trade, a right to gun ownership, and the facilitation of business growth. But since the rise of Newt Gingrich in the 1990s Republican campaign and governing tactics took a sharp turn toward abandoning democratic norms of mutual tolerance for political opponents and forbearance, by which is meant applying restraint when exercising institutional leverage. Gingrich advocated for hyper-partisanship and enhanced combativeness in dealing with political rivals that is now commonplace, reaching its zenith in the presidency of Donald Trump. 

The Republican Party has become an amalgamation of anti-establishment, anti-institutional, anti-immigration activists motivated by a populist return to a time when white men were the controlling demographic group. They are threatened by multiculturalism, claims of climate change, economic globalization, women equality, gun regulations, free trade, and pressures to curb corporate intervention in governance. Republicans have also adopted a much more non-interventionist approach to foreign policy, abandoning traditional international alliances and holding back on committing American troops to overseas hotspots. Despite this they see fit to increase military spending. What remains from Republicans of old is a penchant for low taxes of the rich, pro-business policies, and individual freedom. 

The Democratic Party, with which I am affiliated due to cultural and familial reasons already mentioned, and with a history reaching back to Thomas Jefferson and James Madison is the oldest active political party in the world. It went through significant changes over this time and its background is a blend of both admirable and egregious positions. The current Democratic Party can be traced back to the robust federal interventionism, some would say intrusion, of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal programs of the 1930s. The result is a modern party that promotes the interests of labor, minorities, women’s rights, gay rights, immigrant assimilation, universal healthcare, environmental protections, opportunities for the disenfranchised, consumer safeguards, higher education, and urban issues.  

Democrats are faced with a big challenge at present concerning wealth inequality. From the time of its founding in the early 19th century the party aligned itself with agrarian concerns and away from banking and business interests. In short, it has a long history of being the party of the “people”, by which is meant in today’s vernacular the working class. However, in recent decades an unforeseen abnormality has occurred. As many of the Baby Boomer children of the mid 20th century received college educations and correspondingly higher standards of living than their parents the affairs of the working class increasingly receded from among affluent Democrats. This became glaringly obvious when many of the types of voters who historically would have voted Democratic voted for Trump and the Republicans instead in 2016. This has led to a bifurcated party of progressives, who in part want to re-establish outreach to those lower on the socioeconomic spectrum primarily through wealth redistribution and the centrists, who see capitalism and economic growth along with redistribution as a foundation for financing programs for the poor and lower middle class.  

An argument can be made that we may be seeing another realignment of the party system, in which former working-class Democrats are shifting to Republicans permanently and educated high income suburban voters who in the past leaned Republican are shifting to the Democratic Party. The 2018 midterm elections supported this view and the 2020 election may reveal more about whether such a partisan transformation is in fact occurring. My sense tells me that it is. 

*** 

What I have presented thus far is a prelude to my prevailing political thought. It is worth noting in describing these values that I am consciously and intentionally trying to avoid animus, malevolence, and acrimony despite my day to day strident feelings toward the political opposition. Rather, I am relying on a combination of innate optimism regarding human nature and what I see as a refined observational astuteness of contemporary conditions within a historic context. Afterall, I have been paying attention to this stuff for about 50 years.  

In describing my ideology, I intend to paint with a rather broad brush, finding it unnecessary at this time to “get into the weeds” concerning political positions. This will not be a well-researched white paper detailing policy prerogatives supported by sophisticated rationales. Relatively expansive themes concerning what I see to be political fundamentals will instead be the order of the day.  

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I begin by laying out what I’ve been calling for some years the “3 dichotomies”. At around 2007 or so I had this epiphany that explained to me some, if not the, elemental differences between liberal and conservative thinking. Boiled down they are: 

Distribution vs Production, Community vs Individual, Equality vs Liberty  

The left side of each “vs” is predominately a liberal value and the right side is chiefly a conservative value. When I first concluded these dualities made sense, I quickly realized that I was a political moderate or centrist. And that was fine. All of these values I shared. Sure, I leaned left historically and emotionally, but it was now much easier to not demonize those on the right.  I felt relieved at not having to remain in a defensive posture supporting liberalism as the only valid dogma. Tension between each of these dichotomies is how the political philosophies struggle, engage, and debate. If conditions skew too far in any one direction, then the balancing tendency of American democracy asserts itself. I am still comfortable thinking this simplistic rationalization is functionally accurate. To me it explains a lot of partisan wrangling. 

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Politics is largely about economics or the distribution of wealth and power throughout the population. Individuals want to know that the system of resource apportionment is fair. Of course, political conflict comes from how all of the disparate people of a nation define ‘fair’. As a result, questions of policy, programs, and initiatives often seem to be about what priorities are worth the appropriations of tax revenue. However, I think all of this activity, while incredibly valuable, masks or distracts from what is most fundamental and paramount regarding politics — the continuation of cultural traditions and identity.  

Culture, more than politics or even nationalism binds us as a people viscerally and elementally. It’s what ties us to our past, informs our present, and inspires our future. Languages, religions, values, histories, holidays, shared knowledge, proverbs, and accepted behaviors just begin to describe the unifying power of culture. That which we believe sustains our civilization motivates our politics. The force of cultural expression cannot be easily understated or challenged. 

The deep sensibility of culture needs to be calculated when appraising the cogency of a political focus. Appealing to tradition can take a positive or a negative turn. For example, Ronald Reagan was smart to entice voters with images, such as “Morning in America” and America as a “City on a Hill” that poetically reached into the heart of the nation. Donald Trump on the other hand conjured trepidations of immigrant invaders and the rise of the ‘other’, by which is meant non-whites, taking over our way of life. Such fear-mongering significantly contributed to his 2016 win. 

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A quote from Zen teacher Diane Musho Hamilton serves as a good opening to my next value: “Rather than relying on a thin, idealized hope that we will all one day just get along, we can approach conflict resolution as an art form that we are privileged to develop and hone.” 

I long ago abandoned the fantasy that there is only one right way to think. Especially when it comes to the best way to solve problems or improve the world. Politics emerges as soon as two people confront a shared reality. If there is motivation by one or both individuals to alter in any way that reality a negotiation takes place. The ensuing transaction is almost always influenced by a power dynamic. Each person tries to exert compelling leverage to most influence the outcome. The individual most able to persuade, generally achieves that goal. This everyday practice seems natural to me.  

I link political power and persuasion as foundational to a democracy. The more convincing one is the more powerful they become. Democracy assumes an equal footing for all individuals and groups to practice persuasion in order to effect change or continue traditions. If that basis is perverted by one party grasping political power through unjust means, such as over-exerting the inducement of money or taking control by military-style force, then democracy ceases as a practical governing   model.  

I am most often impressed with political exchanges that yield progress by reflecting an amalgamation of differing viewpoints constructed from the persuasive attempts of multiple parties. In short, compromise. Forging agreement among opposing interests is very difficult. It requires four things: 

All negotiating groups are committed to the concept of compromise as a fundamentally fair practice and agree to negotiate in a civil manner. 

A search for common ground or shared interests is conducted. 

All sides are able to claim a win to some degree in whatever the final outcome turns out to be. 

Everyone agrees to abide by the terms and conditions of the comprise until a renegotiation occurs.   

  Political maneuvering that is fair, mature, courteous, and respectful while also being calculated, tough-minded, strategic, and forceful can be a beautiful thing to behold.           

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Much is made of American exceptionalism. Interpretation of the concept is multifarious. And it seems everyone who uses the term seems is exceptionally confident they have the right meaning. There are variations of American exceptionalism espoused. They range from a view that the United States has a historically unique origin born from ideology and revolution to the notion that we have a missionary imperative to spread the ideals of liberty, egalitarianism, and democracy across the globe to a belief Americans are ascendant. I’m comfortable with all of this conviction except for American superiority. Accepting we are better than everyone else smacks of tribalism and plants the seeds of unnecessary conflict.  

I recognize and embrace that we have something special here in America. In particular and perhaps most important is our 243-year experiment in representative democracy. Within a group of like-minded individuals, who share similar histories, ethnic backgrounds, and cultural traits democracy is not an especially challenging governing method. Majority opinion is easily formed and debate about how to best approach issues is reasonably tame. This is not our experience. The United States is a multicultural nation in which a diverse set of influences flow to form a volatile and ever contentious mix of power, rights, beliefs, assessments, and perspectives. Reaching consensus among the many disparate interests that make up our country is incredibly arduous.  

As Winston Churchill said in part during a speech before the House of Commons in 1947 “…democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried…”. How true. I have a deep reverence for democracy. It blends the best parts of individualism and collectivism, representing a mature form of governance. To be sure, if not well managed, it can lead to oppressive majority rule. After all, Adolf Hitler rose to leadership as a result of a democratic process. We should never be complacent in thinking democracy once established is permanently to remain in place. Democratic governance has not been the norm throughout human history and there remain powerful forces, even here in the United States, which could topple democracy.  

For democracy to remain vibrant and useful the people of the country must respect each other. Fundamental conditions include mutual toleration, accepting the political legitimacy of competing political forces, and the results of free and fair elections. Without this basic level of regard for our fellow citizens, then we cannot work in political harmony even as we vigorously oppose each other’s positions. Democracy sets up rules of engagement that all agree to adhere to. Sometimes your side wins, sometimes it loses. Developing the art of persuasion becomes paramount within a democratic system. Exercising inordinate force that delegitimizes or overly weakens one’s political opponents threatens democracy, the nation, and the citizenry. Therefore, I revere democracy over ideology. An ideal that triumphs as a result of extra-democratic power is not an ideology worth celebrating.   

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The two grand pillars that support and define politics are culture and economics. I pay a lot of attention to how these foundational concepts play out both in contemporary politics and historically. However, it is the latter of these two principles that I would like to address the following thoughts. 

A dominant view is economics boiling down simply to the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. With regards to politics, I include the general welfare of people as the core point of the economic activity just identified. All individuals and communities need both goods and services, otherwise known as resources, to consume in order to establish and sustain quality lives. Also crucial is the dignity and purpose involved in producing and distributing those goods and services to others. We are all economic agents. How and for whom many resources are produced, distributed, and consumed informs much of political discourse and government intervention.  

The “pie” continues to be a useful metaphor for reducing a complex social science to a comprehendible instrument for lay people. This economic pie shrinks and grows and is sliced in any number of ways. It is these three actions—growing, shrinking, and slicing—that consume much of the discussion about the pie. Correctly calibrating the right amounts of pie growing, shrinking, and slicing to induce social benefits, such as full employment and relative wealth equality, but also business benefits like maximum production of high value goods and services is a most difficult undertaking.  

Systemizing this challenge has been tried worldwide with a variety of economic models over recent history, ranging from highly centralized government command measures (Socialism and Communism) to laissez faire free market systems (Capitalism). In reality, what emerges from the philosophical give and take of politics is an amalgamation of the two extremities. I’m fine with the tug-a-war between Socialism and Capitalism. The struggle strikes me as natural. However, I recognize that over the arc of my political thought, I have moved from a greater belief in the merits of Socialism to an adherence of Capitalism.       

Although well intended Socialism requires a heavy concentration of power in government. It is this notion of condensed power, whether in government or any entity for that matter, where I get uncomfortable. Diffusion of authority across several institutions or agencies, such as government, business, and a free media creates a check and balance system not unlike the self-regulating arrangement within the federal government of executive, legislative, and the judicial. Socialism assumes there is an all-knowing group of decision makers who put the economic interests of everyone first. The problem is as history has shown multiple times that those in charge of socialist regimes tend to fortify themselves with levels of power not susceptible to democratic criticism or compromise. Additionally, socialism typically produces slow economic growth and reduced motivation and innovation among workers.  

Capitalism assumes private ownership of industry with profit as the prime motivator. History shows capitalism to provide robust economic growth, characterized by innovations that have improved lives worldwide. Since the onset of market economies, which were a key result of the values of individualism and reason spurred by the Age of Enlightenment, capitalism has contributed significantly to modernity and many of the benefits millions enjoy today. Of course, any paradigm has its shortcomings and capitalism is not exempt. Without regulatory controls capitalism can lead to wealth inequalities with a small number of very rich people controlling most of the capital, an exploited working class experiencing hard work and low wages, manipulated consumer prices, and an unstable series of booms and busts. 

Simplistically stated, capitalism determines the size of the economic pie and socialism, or a term I prefer—liberalism, decides how many slices are carved. The resulting tension between these two philosophies is natural to me. And played out in the context of democracy everyone’s interests can be addressed.  

*** 

This discourse is a snapshot in time. Political thought is dynamic. It will undoubtedly change more over the years I have left. The boy who first recognized the significance of politics and the man who continues to follow its importance will remain engaged by observing, reading, writing, and in other ways weighing in on political topics of the day. To me, doing so is more than just interesting, it’s fun!   

 

 

 

 

      

 

 

         

 

A reflection written during the Spring of 2019

I live in the hills of western New Hampshire.  

Rocky and forested it is a place of lakes, ponds, and rushing streams. Especially in the late winter and early spring. The hills of western New Hampshire are sparsely populated. Of the 3,000 plus square miles that make up this region there live around 200,000 people. We’re pressed up against the megalopolis, but not subsumed by it. At least not yet.   

Someone wise once said your paradise is where you choose to make it. I take this to mean one need not travel to all of the world’s glorified and hyped hot spots to find wonderland, but rather it can be right outside your door. Now I’m not sure I can call the hills of western New Hampshire Shangri-la—indeed I know I cannot—but I’m happy to call it home. The hills of western New Hampshire exemplify an intricate sense of place, one reaching to my youth and stimulating lifelong sensorial benchmarks along the way. I feel the hearthstone of these hills. 

It makes a difference to live in a place with distinguishing characteristics. It matters to discern and delight in the exceptional traits a place exhibits. To feel connected is to feel at home. To bond with the environment, its nature and its cadence can unite a person with an entity beyond oneself.  

The hills of western New Hampshire await personal attention. The relationship can be austere, but also cordial. To live here calls for stamina. Resilience is rewarded. Solitude awaits, ready for the asking. Becoming charmed is always a possibility.         

My granddaughter 

seven years old 

from Los Angeles 

visits the hills of western New Hampshire 

during winter 

eagerly anticipates northland climate 

it is novel and unique 

like her beloved movie, Frozen 

snow and ice and cold 

my expectation 

she would remain beside the warm woodstove 

did not happen 

dressed in seasonable garb provided by her grandmother 

winter coat, snow pants, boots, mittens, and warm hat 

she plays outside 

snow appeals 

cold does not intimidate 

air tastes fresher 

I am pleasantly surprised 

 

The comforting sense of place can happen almost anywhere. The wide plains of the heartland, the misty mountains of a northwest peninsula, the bustling streets of an eastern city and countless other settings become sources of visceral bonding. It depends on where you were raised. If that space is where an initial and sustained awareness of surroundings occurred, then the profound connection is made. Helpful too, is if a correlation becomes established between the comforts of life and the site where they were first sensed.  

For me this transpired in the Berkshire Hills of western Massachusetts. I was raised there. The rolling green hills morphing into splashes of October color and eventually yielding to snow encrustation afforded me a panoply of visual beauty and regularity that was annually anticipated and unconsciously respected. All of life’s dramas, joys, anxieties, and expectations materialized against the backdrop of this place. It was the way things were and the features of the place have always been with me. 

My current corner of the hills of western New Hampshire sits only about 160 miles northeast of where I rode my bike, played in the brook, and sledded as a boy. Given that both locations are fragments of the larger Appalachian mountain chain they are similar in appearance and feel.  

After raising children and constructing a career elsewhere in New Hampshire this geographic familiarity had an influence in driving my residential decision as I neared retirement. The appeal of the hills of western New Hampshire is that they remind me of where I grew up while permitting me to remain in a state I know well.  

Nostalgia has a way of playing a supporting role in the thoughts of an aging person. Memories percolate to the surface, long-held familiar feelings are triggered by prevailing stimuli, and lessons learned—or unlearned—meld into a reoccurring reckoning of what is and has been important. Linking location with its lasting peculiarities triggers a personal values clarification.    

   

Winter loses its firm grip  

clouds coat horizon to horizon 

light filters through robed evergreens and naked deciduous 

the lake, a white plain with ice out weeks away 

distant woodpecker taps rhythmically 

crow caws 

 

Winter stirs and ponders a morning stretch 

hilltops rounded by glacial activity  

eons of weathering 

cold nights, days above freezing 

sap should be running well 

dirty snow banks line muddy roads 

cool breeze  

urges hemlock boughs to sway 

nature’s pulse is apparent 

 

Be still 

align with subtle inflection 

discover  

refresh and ruminate with Nature  

offset modernity 

 

This is the New Year 

not some random day in early winter 

hope, rebirth, imagine new beginnings 

 

The sun breaks through 

illuminate granite hills 

throw shadows 

photons reflect off snow 

blinding  

the future feels imminent 

 

The hills of western New Hampshire, as much of the northern half of the northern hemisphere, was molded and configured by four repeated glaciations during the Pleistocene Epoch. The age began about 2.6 million years ago and ended a bit more than 10,000 years ago when the last of this series of glaciers finally receded to the north. These mammoth mile-thick masses of ice sliding across a granite surface left an impact. The resulting churn shaped the state’s current mountains, valleys, lake beds, and coastal plain. Cape Cod and Long Island to the south, really just alluvial deposits of moraine, in part consist of New Hampshire material plowed to those locations by the glaciers. 

In the western part of the state we are blessed with genteel hills and small mountains ranging in elevation from 1000 to 3000 feet above sea level. What strikes visitor and resident alike are large granite rocks once formed from ancient magma flows.  Scattered among this region are the many lakes and ponds that owe their idiosyncratic configurations to long ago glacial activity, which today draw both wildlife and people. The two largest of these gems being lakes called Sunapee and Newfound. The Connecticut River flowing southward carves a sharp boundary with our western neighbor Vermont. 

Much of these hills are forested with a mix of temperate broadleaf, conifers, and northern hardwoods. Large sturdy trees bespeckle much of the area. Old growth forests still persist in some remote spots. Outside our small yellow house, which sits within a wildwood stand, tower three large white oaks in a row. The middle and largest of these is estimated to be about two hundred years old. We are stewards of these gentle beasts committed to their welfare and longevity. The combined summer crown of these three sisters leave us feeling we live under a dome. The grand foliage laden boughs stretch and reach above us. As are the trees, we are rooted to this place where stagecoaches and drovers rumbled by transporting people and goods in an earlier America.  

  

Gray-haired man 

closely cut, clean shaven 

goes about his business in a taciturn manner 

not unlike many others of this place  

 

Appearance is often uniform 

worn denim pants 

high topped work boots, mink-oiled many times 

red plaid wool shirt 

khaki cap 

the visor’s edge beginning to show tattered wear 

 

Calloused hands molded from years of labor 

physical work 

accomplished masterfully with care and respect 

 

He doesn’t ask much of others 

self-reliance is valued  

and lived as much as possible 

he’s faithful 

to his wife, church, grown children,  

several grandchildren,  

the community 

 

Climbs slowly into his pickup 

to drive 3 miles home 

through hemlock woods 

and over the hill 

time to get evening’s wood in 

supper will be soon 

 

In-migration to New Hampshire has increased in recent years among people in their twenties and thirties. Good news for a state that is a graying state. Graying? Like the color of granite? Yes. New Hampshire sustains a population of old people. There are a lot of us. We are ranked third by age of population among all of the states. Only Maine and Vermont have older populations than New Hampshire’s. So, it’s good news if younger people want to start living here. We need the workforce. Low taxes, which New Hampshire has, may be good for business, but not having enough working-aged people is not good for business. 

 

The old-fashioned and traditional virtues of New Hampshire self-reliance, independence, and grit continue to be evident in the hills of western New Hampshire. From that culture springs an economy that is tied to the land, to history, and to a present-day macroeconomic transformation fueled by amplified globalization and advanced automation. 

 

Naturally, we might think of the kind of work done in these wooded hills as primarily involving lumbering, maple sugaring, landscaping, and farming. These are but a small slice of the area’s occupations despite their iconic imagery. Most employees work in less glamorous, but more financially fruitful pursuits that include healthcare, office administration, manufacturing, sales, and hospitality. To lesser extents workers earn a living performing in small businesses, education, technology/sciences, and construction. It’s a busy and largely prosperous rustic location. 

 

Statewide New Hampshire’s economy is quite robust, at least according to some key metrics. The state enjoys the second lowest unemployment rate (Bureau of Labor Statistics) and the lowest poverty rate in the nation (US Census Bureau). And we are continually in the top ten states ranked by both per capita and median household income (US Census Bureau). Also, while looking at the newest hot topic economic measurement known as the Gini Coefficient — a measurement of income and wealth inequality among individuals — New Hampshire has the third lowest level of income concentration in the country (US Census Bureau). Wealth is spread relatively evenly.  

 

Healthcare is a big employer in the hills of western New Hampshire. The state’s largest hospital is located here. Aging population and healthcare go together nicely. In fact, New Hampshire enjoys a ranking as the third healthiest state for older people in the U.S. (2019 New Hampshire Healthy Aging Data Report). Education, including higher education, employs many. This stimulates entrepreneurial enterprises. There is an outdoor ethic that pervades the area. Many residents relish being on trails, slopes, and lake fronts. This contributes to the health and wellbeing of people here. If you’re going to grow old in New Hampshire, appreciating the environment adds to the quality of life. Given how many elderly citizens choose to live in these hills we appear to be on the right path. 

 

Work tied to land 

shape, sculpt, move, knead earth 

with machines and hands 

sweat and toil 

brains and technology 

experience 

reading the land’s behavior 

align with its rhythm 

to create practical solutions 

nest in the embrace 

of this hardscrabble place 

 

He works the Bobcat with skill 

among strewn stones and boulders  

lift, carry, set rocks 

stair here 

wall there 

the shovel swivels fluidly 

to pry an elusive target 

arrange land anew 

 

The old stone wall is dismantled  

new bed installed 

stones reset 

strategically 

beautifully 

large stone support small stone 

tabletop finish 

400-foot run 

form and function  

exquisitely rendered   

 

Driving around the hills of western New Hampshire is a simple pleasure. The roads pass through valleys, follow stream beds, hug lake fronts, and traverse old main streets of small towns whose histories reach back two to three hundred years. Some towns are tony, many are not. For those of a certain age taking such a drive conjures feelings of nostalgia, scenes remembered but rarely recalled, from the viewpoint of a long-ago child sitting in the back of Chevy station wagon. 

 

I enjoy seeing the general stores, Mom & Pop diners, antique emporiums, barns in various stages of solvency, Colonials, New England frames, the ever-present woods, and stone walls, lots of them, that can be unearthed while winding along these old byways. It is estimated there are in excess of 200,000 miles of stone walls in New England. Western New Hampshire has its share of them. In general, large stones are from walls that once housed livestock. Small stones are an indicator of former garden walls. Stones were gathered by laborers and beasts of old, piled in a field, and used to create boundaries, enclosures, foundations, and mills. 

 

From the green at Dartmouth College with its late eighteenth/early nineteenth century ambiance to highpoints on the road exhibiting vistas of consecutive mountain ranges, each flaunting a different hue of blue, a random journey through these hills can bring enjoyment and contentment. Place matters. As do roots, history, and where one builds and lives a life. Many of us have a choice of where to be. For me it is in the hills of western New Hampshire.