This must be the place: Ode to Wild Kathy, ode to never slowing down, never growing old

My best girl (aka: my mother Kathy) turns 75 years young today (Jan. 21). Currently, it’s a cold, frigid Sunday here in the mountains of Western North Carolina, same goes for my hometown of Plattsburgh, New York.

The unfailing connection of a classic novel

I have always been a fan of old books. There’s a comfort I find in between the pages of a story written long ago, a sort of escape from my modern-day life.

This must be the place: ‘And I thought that I’d found a light to guide me through’

A soothing mid-fall breeze floats across my front porch, through the screen door and into the apartment, ultimately swirling around the writing desk facing a bustling Russ Avenue within sight. 

This must be the place: ‘The questions of a thousand dreams, what you do and what you see’

It’s never easy to go home. And I think it only seems to get harder, perhaps more abstract and blurry, as one gets older — further and farther between from the starting line, literally and figuratively. Case-in-point, I recently returned home to my native North Country. 

This must be the place: Ode to The Weathercock, ode to the fine folks of Chazy

I caught first word of The Weathercock burning to the ground mid-afternoon on Saturday. Scrolling the Facebook news feed, I came across a photo of a familiar old building engulfed in flames, a huge plume of smoke radiating into the skies high above the small North Country town of Chazy, New York. 

This must be the place: One man practicing kindness in the wilderness is worth all the temples this world pulls

I had about an hour window of no rain before the remnants of the tropical storm would slowly, but surely, slide into the North Country. The clouds were already darkening above the Adirondack Mountains as the nose of the truck was aimed west, heading out from my parents’ farmhouse on the outskirts of Plattsburgh, New York. 

This must be the place: It takes a lifetime to find, a life like the life you had in mind

It’s a dreary early late fall afternoon here at my folks’ farmhouse, tucked away on a side road, just off Route 22 outside of Plattsburgh, New York. And although the red, orange and yellow leaves on the ground signal November, the odd 70+ degree temperatures say otherwise.

This must be the place: I’ve been running so long on the same old ground, gonna rattle these chains till the morning light

Sitting down at the old wooden kitchen table in the kitchen of my parents’ farmhouse in rural Upstate New York, all is quiet save for the sounds of the burping coffee pot on the counter and a few birds in the trees outside the nearby screen door.

This must be the place: There were oh so many roads, I was livin’ to run and runnin’ to live

It’s Saturday evening here at my parents’ 1840 farmhouse in Upstate New York. The temperature is hovering around 15 degrees with a wind chill ducking below zero. It’s Jan. 8 and I was supposed to be back at my humble abode in Western North Carolina on Dec. 30. 

This must be the place: Ain’t nobody slowing down no way, everybody’s stepping on their accelerator

It was about 4:30 a.m. when the cover of the hot tub was finally pulled off and we jumped into the warm waters in the early hours of New Year’s Day. 

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