A path, a wall, a gate – space into place into home

We’re closing on Monday. We’re going to do this! And even before it begins, I feel the urgent need to document it all. Hopefully I’ll have the time to write here more often again. Last week a new septic system was put in, which tore up the entire front and back yard. We knew about …

Home Ground, edited by Barry Lopez

A while ago I was given a review copy of Home Ground, Language for an American Landscape. Barry Lopez, the editor, set 45 writers to writing over 850 new definitions for the terms Americans use to describe their land. What a book! It has revived my love-affair – lately somewhat neglected -with America and American nature writers, …

Amie’s Map Book

The second project I started right after Amie was born fared better than her now defunct Baby Journal, in that it is still up and running. It is a Map Book, or Place Book. I love maps: topographical ones, city, architectural, personal, subjective, objective, three-dimensional, temporal… you name it. From the beginning of Amie’s life I …

Outing on a Fall Morning and a Yard Sale

Amie and Baba at the Park  Yesterday morning was blustery and a little cloudy, but sunny and quite balmy. The three of us went to the Larz Anderson Park, where Amie ran and ran, up and down the hill, in a field of leaves and dandelions, hemmed in by trees changed to all kinds of colors. …

We met Henry at Walden Pond!

Amie and Baba at Walden Pond (click on My Flickr to the right for more) The Pond All three of us went to Walden Pond today (Amie no longer calls it “Walrus Pond”). It was 83 degrees F, that’s 28 degrees C! We had not expected it, so we were rather overdressed (long pants). The …

Marie-Louise Gay’s What are you doing, Sam?

The Sam and Stella Books We love Marie-Louise Gay’s Sam and Stella books. Amie loves the repeated “Stellaaaaaaa!” or “Saaaaaam!” exclamations, Stella’s red hair, and Sam’s funny dog, Fred. And, o yes, the stories – always surprising, uplifting and subtly wise – and the illustrations – delightful watercolors and pencil works of art (colorful, but easy on the …

Child Belonging

Thoreau’s gift to me  Walking around “Walrus Pond” the other day, I had that great feeling of belonging. I haven’t gone there often (this was my third or fourth visit in the ten years that I live here), and perhaps that is why it is each time so special. I’ve read Thoreau, of course, lots of …