Kelly Stand Road

Vermont is a place I know well , having spent lots of time there since I was young.my favorite place in the whole state is Kelly Stand Road. here is a couple of photos I took this morning , if I'm up for it I'll head back tomorrow.   


enjoy

Just another black sheep

having lived a colorful , interesting and at times even bizarre life , I have come to realize that not everyone appreciates my carefree , happy go lucky attitude. such being the Canadian government , which views it more as a blight on society.


heading out to attend a workshop in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia I arrived at the border crossing in Calais, Me. only to find out I was going to be turned away. I must admit I have had better moments, mostly due to the ridiculous way the whole situation was handled.

Lord knows over the years I have made more then my share of mistakes and have a few regrets along the way but I have lived my life on my own terms and have always been willing to pay the high price that comes with it. and continue to pay for the choices I've made.

thanks to the support and sense of humor of my family and friends it wasn’t long before I buried this and moved on.I would also like to thank the people of the workshop group for their support , kindness and understanding . their efforts will always be remembered and appreciated.

it’s been a wild , crazy and goofy ride so far , with this having been just another pothole along my wacky trail.

On the road again

when I seen these clouds the other night I knew immediately I was going to combine them with another photo in the future. I literally have thousands of photos stored away , waiting to find a matching heart for their soul.

after tomorrow , it's vacation and I'm out on the road , hopefully I'll catch a few of the photos I envisioned for those stored away.

every once in a while Im lucky enought to find a love for one or two of them. for me , building these type's of photos is much like building relationships. sometimes slow , sometimes difficult and always time consuming but worth every moment's struggle.

then again , what love isn't?

Excited

getting pretty excited about spending a couple of weeks on the beaches, listening to the waves and sorting out my thoughts. for me it's a cleansing of the heart, mind and soul.I will come home prepared to face the summer's heat, able to think and ready myself for Martha Vineyards in October.

Spring vacation

after a long brutal winter my spring vacation is quickly approaching. this year its a week of rock hopping along the coast of Maine and then a week driving the lighthouse route in Nova Scotia. God! I do love the ocean.


below is a couple of wave photos , one taken last May somewhere along the Outerbanks and the second at the Cape in October. or maybe it's the other way around , who knows ,  I can't remember anymore.


ps  it has now been 7 weeks since I last had a cigarette. hard to believe.

smoke free

today starts the second month that I have not smoked a cigarette . nor any other flammable temptation for that matter. heading into the city this weekend for dinner and a show I was going to treat myself to something extra special like scalping Knicks or Yankee tickets. ex-smokers and those that have tried time and time again  without success know only to well how difficult it is.


so after thinking about it a little more I have decided to wait and see if I can make it to May 24 , the day I get back from Nova Scotia. If I haven't smoked by then I'm going to treat myself to a vacation next year that I would have normally used for Cape Cod , lake Placid or Maine and instead I will go travel crazy .


So for the next 54 days  I'll will be dreaming about places like the Serengeti , Patagonia , Japan , Israel and Newark NJ.

     Where would you jet set too?

Heading into Spring ( I hope )

St Patrick's Day

As I turned the corner onto Sullivan street , running down the little hill to my grandma Skelton’s home I could already hear the singing of old Irish songs . as you entered there were no green hats , scarf’s or shirts . just the Spiegel patterned clothes they all stitched together themselves. welcomed was how everyone was made to feel as you walked into the kitchen greeted with handshakes, smiles and a glass of draft , for today , like everyday here was a celebration of Ireland.

There was my grandma , always the first one I ran too . her sisters and cousins visiting from who knows where , it seems like they were always there. the men were mostly in another room or outside depending on the time of year. should they enter for refreshments or to talk it was always from the outside of the table .this was grandma’s domain and no man dare cross that line. The only ones allow that honor outside the ladies was the children.

While I didn’t understand the why of this daily social gathering at the time I did know I loved it so. by the end of each day after spending time with each lady I had heard new tales , learned the words to another song and tripped over my other left foot trying a dance step one of them would show me. these are the real golden years , the years that are to shape the rest of your life.

I was 10 when my grandmother passed away and it didn’t take long to realize what she was to the family. After that it seems like most everyone drifted in different directions , moved on or disappeared altogether. the sounds of the stories , songs and laughter faded away into the winter wind.

after all these years I understand now that it was more then all that , it was the stitching of family to one’s heart so that we can carrying on the memories to where ever life takes us , to share and pass onto the next generation so that none of us will ever forget where we come from. So this Saint Patrick’s day , as usual I will spend a quiet evening listening to Celtic tide and thinking about our time together and the things she taught me , ending this post with the same thing I said to her at the end of each night.


              “I love you Grandma “

Still Falling

I now know how a dog feels in hip deep snow.