Yesterday I posted a picture of a tiny cone on a hemlock tree struggling to survive at the North Carolina Botanical Garden. Today I’m sharing a picture my sister took last week back home in Connecticut. The snow covered branches belong to one of the few remaining hemlock trees my brother-in-law has been fighting to save.
And below is an illustrated poem someone shared of Facebook, Dust of Snow, written by Robert Frost.
image credit: Suzanne Schafer Bakert
Playing around and meditating under the hemlock trees in winter kept my heart full of joy all the winters I spent growing up there!
My grandmother took these pictures of me and our family’s adored pet Sheltie, Skipper. I was 13 years old, a brand new teenager, and Skipper was about 4 years old. My sister has been diligently digitizing my grandmother’s huge slide collection and it’s been fun discovering these glimpses back into our childhood.
Cape Cod, Massachusetts
Skipper was the only dog I’ve ever had. When I was a toddler I was bit by a dog, an event I don’t remember. But I do remember my parents encouraging me to pet a friendly dog at some point afterwards, in order to help me overcome my fear. It didn’t work. My fear of dogs has plagued me for my whole life, although now it’s only with larger dogs.
I was about 9 years old when my mother brought a little puppy named Skipper into our lives. I was afraid of him in the beginning. The first time my parents left me at home alone with him I got very nervous and climbed up on top of the dining room table. Skipper kept running circles around the table and there I sat until my parents came home. Goodness knows what he must have been wondering about me!
Eventually I lost my fear of him and we became good friends. My mother took him to obedience school and he was very well-mannered, affectionate and loyal. One day I brought a new kitten home. Christopher and Skipper got along well, right from the start. One evening while we were watching TV, Skipper nonchalantly walked into the living room with a playful kitten hanging on to his belly fur, upside down. 🙂
We took Skipper camping, hiking and canoeing with us on summer vacations. During the school year my sister and I were responsible for “running” him when we got home from school. (We were latchkey kids because both of my parents worked outside the home.) He was good about fetching sticks and balls, and obeyed the “drop-it” command flawlessly, but eventually he couldn’t resist his natural instinct to herd. And he loved to herd us around the yard and into the woods.
Since my father was a research scientist at the University of Connecticut, originally an agricultural college, he got permission to take Skipper to the sheep barns on campus. They allowed him to herd the sheep around the fields. It was fun to watch him zipping around, completely in his element.
He had one quirk we laughed about often. When visitors drove down the driveway and came to the door he would never bark to announce their arrival. But when my parents came home he would bark and bark until they got inside. My father kept joking that he didn’t make a very good guard dog. 🙂
Even though I do miss Skipper, I’m pretty sure he was one-of-a-kind and I’ve never desired to have another dog. But whenever I’m out and about and happen to spot a Sheltie my heart stirs and I ask permission to pet them.
Adolescent angst captured in a sketch by my art teacher, whose name I have long forgotten… Still sorting through the boxes of stuff from my parents and grandparents…
Do you have any memories of the 1968 flu pandemic?
I have finished reading a book on the 1918 Influenza Pandemic and was surprised to learn that there have been two flu pandemics since 1918 and both of them were in my lifetime. The 1918 flu was caused by the H1N1 virus. Another pandemic in 1957, the year I was born, was caused by the H2N2 virus. And in 1968, what we called the Hong Kong flu at the time, H3N2, happened when I was 11 years old.
The 1968 pandemic killed an estimated one to four million people worldwide. I had no idea! We haven’t got to one million deaths from COVID-19 yet, though it seems likely we will soon. Did my parents protect me from this news as it was happening? They weren’t shielding me from news about the Vietnam War…
It was the “Hong Kong” flu, though, because that’s what everyone was saying we had. For Christmas vacation in 1968 we (parents, sister and I) drove from Connecticut to Florida, picking up a couple of widowed aunts along the way, to spend the holidays with another aunt and uncle at their mobile home in Fort Myers, Florida. (I think some more relatives might have been staying in nearby motels. Not sure that all of us could have slept in a two bedroom mobile home.) But that is where and when we all came down with it.
All of us, except one, a 26-year-old cousin who kept harping on the “fact” that he wasn’t sick because he took lots of vitamin C. My sickbed was an air mattress in the living room so I wasn’t spared his endless crowing and the groaning, moaning, miserable grown-ups telling him over and over again to shut up. And that is my only memory of that Christmas and that pandemic.
I wonder how terrified I might have been had I known so many were dying.
Tomorrow we break out of our bubble to get our yearly flu shots. It seems worth the risk. Instead of wandering into CVS and waiting around, we had to make appointments and have been instructed to wait in the car until we are called in for our turns. Feeling jittery.
1973? ~ Tim and Dan (#2) They look more alike now than they did back then!
Tim (#1) had five younger brothers. Recently brother Dan shared these photos from his collection with us. Sometimes being in quarantine starts a trip or two down memory lane. Sadly, Toby is no longer with us.
1973? ~ Tim and Toby (#4) (1960-2013)
So Connecticut started to reopen yesterday, apparently the last state to begin loosening restrictions. Time will tell what this will mean for us. But since the state had 314 new COVID-19 cases the day before we will remain in our bubble for the foreseeable future. The deadly virus is still out there.
Our mayor has decided to open the beach for the summer on June 20, with plenty of restrictions. No day passes. Only season passes with no guarantee that you can get in if the beach is full. No picnic tables and no concession stand. Restrooms will be monitored and only one person with a mask allowed in at a time. Masks to be worn at all times unless you’re sitting or lying on your blanket. People in high risk categories (like us) shouldn’t come. I actually agree with all of this. It seems like the best compromise. The mayor was in a tough spot, damned by someone or other no matter what he decided to do.
What I will miss the most is the chance to see my gull friend with the mangled leg. And to sit on a bench with my husband and eat our supper while watching the ferries and sailboats and gull antics. Enjoying the sea breeze. But it is a necessary sacrifice we’re willing to make.
We now have 103 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in our town. Our county (New London) has 880 confirmed cases. Of those 24 are still in the hospital and 66 have lost their lives.
