The Maple Tree Inn started life as a rich man’s farmhouse. “Old Nick’s a rich man, indeed,” my father told me. “He won’t eat hot dogs.” We lived over the ridge from Nick and there was a rolling pasture where I’d train my binoculars on Nick as he hobbled about on his cane. One day […]
Bert Yurt dug dirt. One night when he was four, he dug up his mother’s tiny garden with a teaspoon. As the sun rose, his mother cried, ‘Oh Bert, what will I do with you?’ Bert looked up with his eyes bright, ‘Get me a bigger garden.’ By the time Bert was six, his family […]
I met Colonel Greydon on the last day of his life. We didn’t know it was his last day, but we knew he was dying. And he wanted to die at home, in peace, without prolonging it. He’d taken great care to have male nurses around the clock, because he was a private sort of […]
For a time in my life, everywhere I looked, I saw hot air balloons. If I thumbed through a magazine, there was a hot air balloon in the sky. If I watched an old movie, there was a weathered balloon with a basket underneath and this lady and man would land and have a picnic. […]