Originally published on or about the 3rd of April in 1998, this is yet another post about a seemingly never ending winter - or the equally pessimistic never arriving spring. Please enjoy. “ ‘April is the cruellest month,’ ” my wife quoted as we rounded the corner of a building in Saint John, and were met with the full force of a nasty east wind the other day. It certainly seemed as though T.S. Eliot was right, although he goes on to talk about “breeding Lilacs out of the dead land,” a feat that around here is going to have to wait for the nearer side of two months hence. Somehow, that spectacular last day of March, when the sun shone and the temperature in the shade got up into the middle seventies Fahrenheit, severely dislocated our thoughts, and made the inevitable return to a grudging spring a good deal harder to take. And an east wind, I don’t care when it arrives, tends to set one’s teeth on edge. When the wind is in the east ‘Tis neither fit for man nor beast. A lovely piece about the ambiguous nature of the changing of the seasons. Originally published approximately fifteen years ago on the 19th of April, 2019... yes, late for snow. Snow! At five o’clock this morning even though day was (theoretically) beginning, the view out the windows was no view at all. Later this morning when Environment Canada was telling us that we were getting flurries, we could barely see the trees at the back of the home field below the road. And now three hours later it is still snowing. Hey, ho, it’ll all be gone in a day or two. Or, was that what I said last year around this time and a week or so later the snow was still with us? Only by then it had congealed into ice and the ruts we had made with the car when the snow stopped had also congealed. The car, as I recall, slipped and slithered in the grooves and the steering wheel was quite useless. By the time it became clear that the snow had no intention of going in the foreseeable future, it was also clear that nothing short of a bulldozer would budge it. Our little snowblower ran happily about on top but when directed at an edge, behaved like a small dog who has been told to tear a concrete lion limb from limb.
We heard an interesting piece on the CBC the other day about the increasing rarity of cursive writing. There is an exhibit at the New Brunswick Museum running through the first of May 0f 2019 asking whether writing is still relevant to you? Please enjoy this column that was originally published in the Kings County Record on March 8th of 2005. I had occasion, the other day, to take up a writing implement which does not plug into the electrical service, and an innocent bystander, observing the whole operation said, “How can you write like that?” Of course, I knew right away that the questioner was right-handed. And of course, I as a lefty, also realized that I had unconsciously gone back to holding the paper the way I had been taught in grade school. In our day, the approved method of making marks on the page was something called “Palmer penmanship.” I don’t know who Mr. Palmer was, but as far as I was concerned, he certainly had it in for kids. I have a little book on Slant Gothic (1918) that brings it all back. Consider the first page: “What is to be desired is quality not quantity… Do not leave a single poor letter on your Exercise sheet if you can improve it in any way. Therefore, make each letter so lightly that it can be erased with two or three strokes of an eraser.” This column – originally published in the Kings County Record on February 23rd, 1999 – seems appropriate given the long, cold, wet winter that we have been experiencing. As always, please enjoy! The upheavals in the postal system that had people practically in tears in Sussex a while back have not yet penetrated to these distant outposts of civilization. But we are already seeing signs and portents, and must assume that what the prophets of the Old Testament were fond of calling "the Last Days" are soon to appear over the horizon. We have had our emergency services numbers for quite a while now and are pleased to think that, if need be, the emergency services can find us. In fact, they have already found us. One of NB Tel's service men had come out here to explore an odd glitch in the line and the next thing either of us knew, first one, then two, police cars steamed up the driveway and wanted to know why we had called 911. It was gratifying to know that the response was so prompt, only neither the telephone repairman nor I had felt the need of reinforcements at that particular moment. And when I called 911 back as requested, it turned out that our street number on record with 911 was different from the street number we had been given as our very own, and no-one else's. That raised the question as to how the two police cars had found us so quickly, but it didn’t seem that just then was a good time to explore the matter. Sifting thorough the archives, this feels appropriate given the winter weather we've been having. Originally published on February 16th, 1988. Please enjoy. University Microfilms International lives and works in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on North Zeeb Road. Do you suppose there is an Oreb Drive somewhere handy there? Speaking of roads, I've been thinking about all these spiffy new traffic lights that are going to make driving in Sussex so much more exciting than it has been. They should help the congestion that occurs during the rush-minute just after Barbours lets out at five o'clock. Apropos of none of that, in The Old Farmer's Almanac “Farmer’s Calendar” for January, Castle Freeman, Jr., tells about his problems in getting to and from his woodpile. We stumbled across this column originally published on Valentine's day in 1989. No, it isn't about Valentine's day; however, we hope you chuckle at it much like we did. Enjoy! I am currently having a problem with the coefficient of friction around this place. Now I know that most of you out there know a lot more about the coefficient of friction than you are inclined to let on, but for those not quite up on the subject just let me remind you that the constant ratio of the friction to the force pressing the two surfaces together is called the coefficient of friction. Press two stones together hard and there is a lot of friction. That’s a good thing, too, because my cellar walls – and yours too, probably – have no cement to bind the stones together. All that’s holding them is a high coefficient of friction, although I doubt that the settlers who laid those stones up, stood around admiring their handiwork and saying: Typically we post on Thursdays, but we couldn't resist an early release given that "forty-five" will be delivering his State of the Union this evening. Fittingly, this column was originally published in the Kings County Record on the 5th of February 1991. Also of note... the artwork for this week's missive was painted by our "staff artist" circa 1991 as a response to the conflict alluded to at the beginning of the column. As always, we have edited slightly for content and clarity; and we sincerely hope you enjoy it as much as we did. Seeing that the President of the US of A delivered a State of the Union address the other day, I might as well have a look about me here and do the same. A month and about a week into the year I have to say that the war is going – more or less – according to plan, and our side is predicting victory within a couple of months at the latest. The expected invasion from the northwest has been stopped in its tracks, except for the occasional sortie at the upper end of the line beyond the barricades. Except for the staff car no personnel carriers or heavy equipment has been lost. While we acknowledge that the staff car was halted and disabled in a skirmish, we must also state that it was recovered undamaged by allied forces the next day with no loss of life. Due to the extreme conditions, our chief offensive weaponry has been tied up, but the engineers assure me they are working on the problem and will soon have the ground offensive back on schedule. I hope you enjoy this column that evokes both the spirit of winter (hockey) and a longing for summer (baseball). Originally published in the Kings County Record on February 2nd, 1988, and slightly edited here for clarity. There’s no connection a man can figure out Between his just desserts and what he gets. ~ Robert Frost, in “The Death of the Hired Man.” Actually, when I was younger, I was pretty certain there was a clear connection. There was more than a Ford in my future. The waiting world was hushed in anticipation of the great deeds I was going to do. All that was required of me, was to put my shoulder to the wheel, or my hand to the tiller, or pen to paper, or – whatever to which. The blanks tended to be filled in differently from day to day, as the enthusiasm of the moment dictated. |
Words & ImagesWe moved to our farm in Sussex, New Brunswick from Toronto in 1977, only moving away in 2014. Archives
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