The Reindeer Keeper

  I was hanging clothes out on the clothesline the other day when I noticed something moving in a field across the road. I couldn't figure out what it was, so I went inside the house for my phone and told Brian I'd be right back. As I crossed the road, I still couldn't figure out what it was until "it" moved. What I'd seen was the top of a hat. I discovered it was worn by an artist from New Jersey, Catherine Whitehead. She travelled here to participate in Morristown's Plein Air event. I could only see the top of her hat because she was sitting in the field, painting. The field was a collage of beautiful, colorful wildflowers swaying in the gentle breeze. When I think about it, such a scene is repeated alongside so many of our country roads. After introducing myself, I learned this artist was infatuated with the fields drenched in purples and yellows and oranges and shades of white and green. Catherine Whitehead was delightful. Very welcoming despite my int...

My grandfather was a hard-working farmer. He and my grandmother provided a good life for their six daughters. They did it all. Each had their list of duties from ice harvesting on the St. Lawrence in the depth of winter to haying in the hot sticky days of June; along with planting gardens which led to weeding, picking, slicing, cooking, canning produce and filling the root cellar. Then there was the sewing, knitting, cleaning, tending to children, tending to barn animals and machinery and the list goes on. Point is, my grandparents worked hard every day with no days off. Memories of my grandfather are precious. I can see him splitting wood in the woodshed just outside a door of the kitchen in the farmhouse. I can hear the ax hit the wood; remember the splinters of the wood go flying through the air. I can see him coming in from the backfield with a load of hay driving his small red Ford tractor over the plank bridge spanning Sucker Creek, then over flat rock and on to the bar...