Roger Brown remembered.

I don't remember exactly when I first met Roger, but I was Assistant Minister at the church he and his parents attended, back in 1957-1960, and that is probably when we met. His father, Maynard Brown, was a local pharmacist, and was the brother of Stuart Brown, who built our house, back in 1973. So I knew the family. Back then, Roger might have been in school, or at least not living at home. Roger was unusual in the breadth of his interests. He had a particular interest in science, and the interface of science and religion. He also had an interest in China, and studied Mandarin. His ministry was mostly as an intentional interim, and he served 12 churches in that capacity. I have never been close to Roger, but this retired clergy group has given me a chance to know him better. He is a thoughtful person, and we are very much diminished by his death. Roger has a brother David, who is a UCC minister in Oregon. He will probably be here for Roger's funeral, which will be next spring.

Roger Brown (from his Facebook page).

Oliver!

New England Youth Theater produced the musical Oliver! this past weekend, and Ellen and I went to a 7p.m. performance on Sunday. We had a special reason to go - Peter and Mary Alice Amidon's grandson, Desmond (son of Stefan Amidon and Zara Bode), was cast in the lead role of Oliver Twist. He may have been the youngest actor in the whole show, but he did well. We have heard him sing many times at church. I like Oliver as a musical - John was in it in a community production in Appleton, WI back in 1972 or so (he was ten or eleven years old) and think there was a high school production when John was at BUHS. We've also seen a previous NEYT production. The choreography was especially good in this one. The soloists were all capable, but none stood out - if anyone did, it was Nancy. Fagin was played by a girl, and she did well with a very demanding role. Desmond did himself proud and it was most enjoyable throughout. I was in the front row and practically in the play itself. I snuck a few photos - didn't want to be a distraction.

"Food, Glorious Food"

Work House Gang

"Will You Buy?"

Oliver with Artful Dodger

The weekend.

Friday noon, we went to Greenfield Community College for a Holiday concert of the GCC Community Chorus, of which Brendon is a member. The program was a mix of anthems and carols, from the Gaudete of the 16c. Piae Cantiones to Deck the Halls to Winter Wonderland. The choir was singing in the lobby, and there were no panels to focus the sound, but they made a sweet sound. Of course Katie, Dusty and Dorothy, and Karen and Brian were also there. Nice little fan club for Brendon.

The GCC Community Choir in the lobby Friday.

Brendon in his place in the choir. *********************** Friday evening, Ellen had to spend about 3 hours at the church dealing with cookies for the Bazaar. While Ellen was away, Andy Davis came and spent that time with me and helped me with supper and hydration, and other personal needs. I skipped the Friday eve news programs on PBS and spent the time talking with Andy. We spent some time listening to music too - like Kitka, which he had not heard before, and Maddy Prior, whom he knew of and had heard in the past, but had not heard the specific CD we have. We had a good time together. Saturday, I was pretty tired after a full Friday and not much sleep Friday night. So I didn't go anywhere. I could have gone to the Bazaar, but didn't. Actually, both Ellen and I stayed in bed late and listened to Friday news programs on the phone, and then I spent time either in my comfy chair by the fireplace, or in bed, dozing, or doing exercises. Ellen was mostly in the kitchen, and we listened to more music from the "Christmas Box." A quiet, restful day. Ellen did go out shopping, and I had a little time alone. I managed fine. Today, Sunday, we considered going to church and set an early alarm, but I felt sort of "woozy" when I got up and decided to stay home and attend church via live Zoom. So we had church in our living room. Later, early evening, we will go to the New England Youth Theater to see the musical Oliver, starring Desmond Amidon, Peter and Mary Alice's grandson, Stefan's son. Very musically precocious. More on that later!

More snow.

Today there was to have been a gathering of our retired clergy group to discuss Wilkie and Noreen Au's Aging with Wisdom and Grace, chapter 1. But last night it snowed quite a bit - 3-4 inches anyway, and I had questions about going out at all. Lee Moore, another member of the group, also expressed concerns about the forecast. So I shared my concerns via email and eventually there was a consensus to scratch today. We will meet next Monday. So today is an unexpectedly open day. Ellen is baking cookies for the Guilford Church Christmas Bazaar, and I am the D.J. - i.e., I select CD's from the Christmas Season Box of CD's to play while Ellen works. So far, we have heard Kitka, Maddy Prior, the Boston Camerata, a CD Ellen and I made in 2004, and Peggy Seeger. A nice variety, if I say so myself. I just bought tickets for John and Cynthia, and Ellen and myself, to attend an Irish Christmas concert by John Doyle at Next Stage on Dec. 19th. That should be fun! Tomorrow we will go to a Greenfield Community College Chorus concert that Brendon is in. I suspect every day this month will have something. I will need to monitor my energy carefully.

Noreen and Wilkie Au, authors of Aging with Wisdom and Grace.

John Doyle, Irish Musician

Maddy Prior, British folk singer.

Thanksgiving weekend - plus.

Heavy snow cancelled our plans to have Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday in Shutesbury with Katie and Brendon. Ellen and I had a quiet day at home; no stress. Friday, John and Cynthia came here for a Thanksgiving meal, but Katie and Brendon couldn't come, so no turkey, dressing and gravy leftovers! John is vegetarian and gluten-free, so we had Ellen's wonderful walnut and cheese balls in a non-meat gravy, squash, mashed potato and mushroom gravy (J&C brought that) Cranberry sauce (Ellen's home-made version), pumpkin pie, pecan pie, and cranberry crisp (J&C). A delicious meal! Much to be thankful for.

Thursday snow scenes from our deck.

My Thanksgiving dinner: Two walnut-cheese balls, cranberry sauce, squash, bell peppers, mashed potato with mushroom gravy.

Thanksgiving dinner with John and Cynthia. **************************** Saturday, Ellen went to Doris Feinland's 90th birthday celebration down in Stamford, CT. I stayed home and John spent the day with me. A lovely day reading and visiting and eating leftovers! I'm a lucky guy! Sunday, we went to GCC for church, but did not sing in the choir. In the afternoon, we had a River Singers rehearsal. By the time I got home, I was exhausted! Monday was a quiet day of reading Toni Morrison. Tuesday, last night, was Sing Nowell, the new version of Nowell Sing We Clear. Eight members of a new generation have joined with Andy Davis and Fred Breunig. They are fantastic! Everyone misses Tony Barrand, but this group is a worthy successor to NSWC.

Andy Davis, Arthur Davis, Guillaume Sparrow-Pepin, Fred Breunig, part of Sing Nowell. Andy and Fred are original members; Arthur is Andy's son; Guillaume is son of Lise Sparrow, former pastor of GCC from 2003 to 2021.

The group Windbourne which is now part of Sing Nowell: Jeremy Carter-Gordan, Lynn Mahoney Rowan, Lauren Breunig, and Will Rowan. Lauren is daughter of Fred Breunig. Lynn grew up in the Guilford Church. Andy, Fred, Arthur, Lauren, Lynn and Guillaume all have strong ties to the Guilford Church.

The full group, with Emma Schneider and Laurel Swift added: Andy, Jeremey, Guillaume, Arthur, Lynn, Lauren, Emma, Laurel, Will, Fred.****************** Katie and Brendon joined us for the Sing Nowell concert, as did Nan Tierra. I managed pretty well in getting from the car to my seat in the Latchis Theater and back out to the car again, despite icy conditions under foot outside the theater. Today (Wednesday) we will have our Swarthmore class on Toni Morrison - specifically, tonight, on her novel, Beloved, part 1. It's an amazing book, but also bewildering at times, so I'm looking forward to learning from Phil Weinstein's lecture. Tomorrow, our retired clergy group meets, and we are now discussing Wilkie and Noreen Au's Aging With Wisdom and Grace. This is also the week leading up to the Guilford Church Christmas Bazaar - cookie-making time! Maybe not quite so many this year. The other thing that is happening is that the University of North Carolina "Tarheels" men's basketball season has started. I haven't seen them on TV yet, but I've heard a couple of games on the iphone radio app. They play Alabama tonight. That will be after Toni Morrison. At some point we'll go to Cliff and Eliza Bergh's house and watch a game on ESPN.

Scenes from Black Mountain

John looking out from the top of Black Mountain

Granite and Moss.

Aslan's table: an allusion to C.S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and the. Wardrobe. Aslan is a Christ-like lion who is sacrificed by the dark forces of Narnia on a rock which is split in the process. This formation on the mountain reminded me of that story. I will add more scenes from Black Mountain from time to time.

John at the top. People have built seats out of available chunkcs of granite over time.

Black Mountain scenes

Snowy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! We have about eight inches of wet, heavy snow! More to come this afternoon. Wa had planned to go to Shutesbury for Thanksgiving, but that is cancelled. However, we are planning to have a Thanksgiving leftovers lunch here tomorrow (Friday), and Katie and Brendon, and John and Cynthia will join us. We should be well plowed-out by then. Happily, we got all the wood stacked under the deck before the snow came. Twelve people came to stack wood last Friday: Andy and Robin, Peter and Mary Alice, Fred and Patrice, Dunham, Tom G., Manny, Terry, Mary G., Stefan. They made quick work of almost two cords of wood. That feels good. I think our water supply is adequate too. The only "undone chore" is that we didn't get our snow tires mounted. We waited too long to make a date and had to accept Dec. 30th at Pete's Tires. Maybe we can find something earlier somewhere else. We did get the car to Doug Richmond yesterday for some work on brakes and suspension that John discovered needed to be done when they borrowed our car earlier this week (they had crises with both their cars), but Doug does not mount tires. So I guess we are reasonably set for a sudden change to wintry weather after weeks of a lovely, sunny, mild fall. Today is a quiet day at home -no complaints here about that!

Snow scenes from the deck.

Woodstackers!

Rain, at last.

It rained hard and long yesterday - the first rain after weeks of none - which has been wonderful in one way in that it has provided a stretch of beautiful, mild fall weather, but it has also led to draught, which has caused the level of water in our spring to go down, which has been a concern. It has not been low enough to turn off the pump and haul water, as we have had to do in some past years, but low enough to conserve water = i.e., use dish water to flush the toilet, not flush with fresh water unless absolutely necessary, use as little water as possible in washing dishes, wash clothes less often and make at least occasional use of the laundromat, take fewer showers, etc. THat has paid off - the level has not only not gone down, it actually was up a bit when we last checked it. I say,"we" checked it - John checked it for us on Tuesday. John and Cynthia stayed with me while Ellen hade a 3-day trip to Swarthmore, Sunday-Tuesday. Ellen was visiting Sarah, Harry and Wallace, her dear friends there near Swarthmore. She dropped me at the Guilford Church Sunday morning and went on her way, I attended church, but did not stay for the Annual Meeting of the church afterward. John came and picked me up at about 11:15am and brought me home. I also gave up going to the Windham-Union Association meeting in Ludlow, VT Sunday afternoon because the church building in Ludlow sounded a bit demanding in terms of getting to various levels. I haven't had a lot of energy lately, and that sounded like too much. I was sorry to miss the meeting, because it sounded interesting and I am a strong supporter of the Association. But I need to pay attention to my energy level because if I get too tired, I could easily fall. One thing in a day is usually enough - in this case, going to church. Thursday, however, I had three things: I had my retired clergy gathering to discuss a book on "aging" in the morning - we have moved on to Aging with Wisdom and Grace by Wilkie Au, after spending six sessions or so on Joan Chittister's The Gift of Years. In the afternoon I had a foot care appt. at 4:30pm, and then a Hallowell rehearsal at 6:15. That could have pretty well done me in. None of those things are strenuous, but they all involved getting in and out of places. Fortunately legs held up. While John and Cynthia were here, Cynthia put together a slide show of pictures she has taken up at the top of Black Mountain behind the house. I can't hike up there any more, so that was wonderful to see. It is a beautiful, magical place. Time has made a change in it since my last trip up there, several years ago. I don't have her photos on my computer, but maybe she can send me some. LATER; It is Friday noon, and about ten people from GCC are here to stack wood. As I said above, it rained hard yesterday-which was great for the spring, but now it is partly cloudy, which is perfect for stacking wood. Yay! Ellen got a photo. Pictures later - I'll publish without photos for now.

Two views on Black Mountain from the Nature Conservancy website.

Here is a picture of some woodstackers!

Update

I've been wondering why I feel so tired, but looking back, I see that we have done a lot. The fifth of November was election day of course. We voted last week, so we didn't go to the polls Tuesday, but I had an appointment with my neurologist, Dr. Green, at 2pm, and after that we went to the GCC Lectionary session at 3pm, stayed for an election day service at 5pm led by Andy Davis, then on to River Singers at 6:30pm, after which we went to John and Cynthia's home to watch/listen to election returns. That was a full day! We went home very late, and listened to the radio, and it was on all night. I got very little sleep that night. I was awake when AP awarded North Carolina to Trump. For me, that was the big red flag - something was happening that we were not expecting, certainly not wanting. Wednesday I was wiped out, but Wed. evening we had our course from Swarthmore college on Toni Morrison (on Zoom)so I'm sure we spent much of the day listening to Toni Morrison reading from her novel, Song of Solomon, Part One. Very engaging book and course! Thursday I went to the Dummerston Church for a session with my retired clergy group. We finished up our reading of Joan Chittister's book on The Gift of Years. Those three days were full without much sleep - no wonder I'm tired! It didn't slow down - Friday we went to Shelburne Falls, MA for a concert of Greenfield Community College Choir (which Brendon sings in) at Trinity UCC Church (a pleasant concert); Saturday is sort of a blur, but Sunday was church at Guilford, and we hung out until Margie Serkin's 65th birthday party at her home at 1pm. The theme was "Old Fashioned" and I took two old photo albums, one of our house being built, the second of a vacation trip to the Fex Valley in Switzerland which Margie's mother, Irene, helped make possible and where Margie had gone as a child. She was thrilled to see these pictures. After Margie's party we took a scenic ride home which included a stop at the Guilford Center Cemetery - site of the original Guilford Meeting House. Sunday evening we were at home. Monday, we were in a small group that sang for Betty Putnam at her home in Guilford, and Tuesday we had Lectionary gathering at 3pm, and River Singers at 6:30. Somewhere in there I made a trip to Planet Fitness and did a little time on the bike. So - I'm not sitting around twiddling my thumbs!

Trinity, UCC Church, Shelburne Falls, MA - before the concert.

Brendon in the concert.

Part of the choir Sunday at GCC.

Margie Serkin and her birthday cake (made by Ellen).

The Guilford Center Cemetery.

The Openness of late fall

We drove to Grandma Miller's bakery yesterday and got our usual order of Morning Glory muffins and chocolate eclairs. The drive was lovely but very different from recent weeks. The foliage season is over, as these photos, taken from the moving car, make clear.

The leaves are gone! ********* But I love this season, the openness, the lovely, fragile, lavender tint that covers everything. This little excursion followed my last physical therapy appointment, for now at least. Sort of a gift to myself for a job well done. My assessment showed gains in strength and balance. Now it's up to me to continue the daily exercises.

Zara Bode’s Little Big Band

Zara Bode is Stefan Amidon's wife and mother of Desmond and Vera. She is a fine singer and has a band which has a repertoire of "big band" songs from the early-mid-20th century, but only 7 people, and thus is only a little "big band." But those 7 people are all fantastic musicians and can really put out the sound. The seven are: Guitar: Alton Lathrop; Bass: Ty Gibbons; Percussion: Stefan Amidon; vocals: Zara Bode; Clarinet: Anna Patton; Saxaphone: Ron Kelly; Trumpet: Don Anderson. We went to the BMC Sat. eve for a concert, and it was great! They had gone through the vast big band repertoire and pulled out sort of spooky songs to make a Hallowe'en-themed concert, and it was fun. They even came out for the first song in ghost costumes! We heard a lot of songs we had never heard before.

The ZBLBB dressed as ghosts.

Alton, guitar, Ty, Bass; Stefan, percussion.

Zara, vocals; Anna, clarinet; Ron, sax; Don, trumpet.

The ZBLBB. ***************** Today is Hallowe'en. Not sure if we'll have trick or treaters or not; we have some candy, just in case. For us, a quiet day at home. Tomorrow I have a physical therapy appointment - it may be my last in this series. We are reading Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon for our Swarthmore Class - partly reading, partly listening to it's being read onAudible by the author. That is very satisfying. It has been very dry and the spring is on the low side. So we are being careful about water usage and hoping we will not have to turin off the pump. I don't think we are up for hauling water!

The last ten days

Ten days since the Underground Railroad OLLI presentation! There is another OLLI today, but we are not going. It's on "spooky Vermont places" - could be interesting but not high on our "must do" list. The big feature of these last ten days, I would say, has been the fall foliage and weather. It has been a beautiful fall - sunny, mild and colorful. I have not been out there getting fall foliage shots, but I did these very representative ones behind the Guilford Church

At River Singers, we had John Harrison as a guest leader. John comes down from Plainfield, VT, where he used to lead his own Gospel Choir. He taught us 3 songs from that repertoire. He is a character, but is a good teacher and fun to work with.

John Harrison.
Sunday, we sang in the choir at Dummerston and after church we went across the road to see the "mummers" - a local group of Morris Dancers who at this time of year go around to various towns and put on a mummers play - a mock "death and resurrection" play. very humorous and sometimes downright silly. We know several them well - e.g., Fred Breunig, Arthur Davis, and Paul Eric. Here are some scenes:

The Underground Railroad

Yesterday, we went to our second OLLI session in Springfield, VT - the topic was the Underground Railroad before the Civil War in Vermont. The presenter was Michelle Arnosky Sherburne, who is what I guess you could call an amateur historian - she does not have a PhD in history or an academic appointment, but she does have a passionate interest in the topic and has devoted 20 years or more to researching it and has self-published several books. She is most interested in finding people of that era who were involved in the U.R., and actual, still standing homes, barns, etc. where freedom-seeeking slaves were actually housed in Vermont. There is discussion among historians about how "cloak-and-dagger" the U.R. was in Vermont. Some think that while it is true that escaped slaves did travel through Vermont on their way to Canada, they did not have to be very worried about being caught because slave-catchers didn't usually come this far north. Ms. Sherburne thinks that might have been true to some extent early on, but after l850, the new federal law - the Fugitive Slave Act - upped the ante considerably, and agents did come into Vermont and people assisting escaped slaves were at risk of arrest. She focused her presentation on 4 "hubs" of the U.R. in Vermont: Springfield, Thetford, Burlington and Ferrisburg. She has identified several persons, and located some houses. She had a slide show, but we were in the back of the hall and couldn't see the screen very well. But we could hear just fine, and it was interesting, though it was not crisply organized. But there is a lot of information online, and my interest was certainly aroused. One item I was particularly interested in: a local Vermont minister, the Rev. Joshua Young (First Congregational Church (Unitarian), Burlington, VT), a "Garrisonian abolitionist" very much involved in the U.R., got wind of a funeral service that was to be held for abolitionist John Brown, executed for his role in the Harper's Ferry Raid. The funeral and burial were being held at John Brown's farm in North Elba, New York, just 60 miles or so west of Burlington. Young was the only ordained minister attending the funeral and was asked to preside, which he did. When he returned to his church in Burlington, he was viciously attacked by members of the congregation and forced to resign because of this involvement with John Brown. I wrote fairly extensively about John Brown in this blog back in July, 2010 (see the post titled "Weathersfield Congregational Church Service) when I was seeing some connections between John Brown's struggle against the evil of slavery and the contemporary struggle against fossil fuels and global warming, triggered by the Deepwater Horizon Oil Gusher which released an estimated 134,000,000 gallons of oil into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico over a 3-month period, April-July 2010. All of this still has a lot of resonance today in the current election season (Trump intends to undo all restraints on oil production if he wins).

Michelle A. Sherburne, lecturer.

Company Galore

This past weekend we were visited by four people: two women friends of Ellen's from Salem, Oregon, and two men friends of mine from California (and Maine). None of them actually spent a night here at the house, but Ellen's friends, Bonnie and Shelby, spent part of Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday here, and my friends, Phil and his son, Tom, my godson, met me for breakfast at the Guilford Country Store Sunday morning at 8:30a.m., and after breakfast we went to church at the Guilford Community Church (which is about a 100 yards from the store), and they left early to go to Logan airport in Boston for Tom's flight home to California. Phil returned to his summer home in Maine and will fly to Claremont, CA next week. Bonnie and Shelby flew home to Oregon yesterday. Bonnie and her husband, Roger (who died a year ago yesterday), became Ellen's friends when she lived in Salem and her then husband, John Peel, was on the faculty of Willamette University, where Roger taught art history. For a while, Ellen worked with Bonnie at The Arbor Cafe, which Bonnie co-owned, in Salem. Bonnie is also an artist. We have visited them frequently in Oregon since I came into Ellen's life, and we have had many wonderful times together. Ellen started sending Bonnie a post card every day some years ago, and came to call it her "snail blog." She has now sent Bonnie over 5000 post cards! Shelby, who is a VP for Development at Willamette, and whom Ellen had not met before this visit, heard about the "snail blog," saw the boxes of cards at Bonnie's house, was entranced, and wanted to meet Ellen. She wants to put on an exhibition of the snail blog in Salem! So she came out with Bonnie, and recorded an interview with Ellen talking about the whole project. That interview will provide a sound track for a video that will accompany the exhibit. Eliza and Robin came over on Friday to meet Bonnie and Shelby. Saturday, Ellen and I had supper with them at Burdick's Restaurant, in Walpole, NH, Sunday they went to church with us, and Monday Shelby made her recording. There was a lot of visiting at our house along the way. A very special visit. When we went to Burdick's, I had a big bowl of mussels, as did Shelby. I ate them all, by golly. While I was eating, Bonnie made a sketch of me on the brown paper used to protect the table cloth, tore it off and gave it to me. My time with Phil and Tom was much shorter, but still special. Tom is ratcheting up his involvement with music and is preparing both a concert and a CD (or whatever substitutes for a CD these days). He is a singer-songwriter and accompanies himself on the guitar. 26 years ago, he accompanied me when I sang at his sister, Susanna's wedding in London. In talking with Phil, I mentioned John Cobb, whom I had learned about from Shelby - a faculty member at Claremont School of Theology whom Shelby came to know when CST (a Methodist school) was considering merging with Willamette (also a Methodist school). Turned out Phil knew John Cobb because he is a resident of Pilgrim Place, the retirement community where Phil lives in Claremont. And while I had never heard of John Cobb, a bit of research revealed that he and I shared a teacher at U of Chicago Divinity School: Bernard Loomer, who taught my Constructive Theology course. John Cobb (like Loomer) is a "Process Theologian" and has written extensively on process theology and the ecological crisis in ways that seem similar to my son John's work on "Contemplative Ecology." So ... lots of resonances in these visits!

Bonnie and Shelby

Bonnie, Shelby and Ellen.

Robin and Eliza.

Bonnie and Shelby at Burdick's.

Bonnie's sketch of me she made at Burdick's.

My bowl of mussells.