We went to a wedding in Vermont last month and when it was over we drove four hours to Marshfield, MA where our son Ned lives. Ned was off on his tugboat so his wife Victoria was our host. They had just discovered that a woodchuck had dug a hole by their house foundation. Ned had put a large rock over the hole, but by the time we returned from the wedding, the woodchuck had dug a new hole next to the rock.
Despite the 90+ degree temperatures, Teresa and I filled in the hole and covered the area with several pavers left over from another project. There were no further signs of the woodchuck during our watch and we assume the woodchuck decided he was dealing with pros and moved on.
There's an excellent state park near Ned's but it was way too hot for any hiking. We could have slipped into the cold Atlantic but our beach days are over. Most thrift stores are closed on Monday but Teresa found one above a library and I napped in the car with the a/c running while she searched for treasure. She knew she could not buy too much because we'd be picking up a stove in Maryland as well as her sister Cindy in New York on our way home.
After a week of fun with family and a visit with good friends on the Cape, we headed to our niece's in Delaware. We had initially planned to pick up Abigail's mother Cindy at her home near Annapolis but in the meantime Cindy had scooted over to her other daughter's in western New York. The trip to Maryland would give us a chance to pick up a small woodstove in Oxford, Maryland.
A friend and I are finishing work on a cabin the boys put up for me in our woods. When my brother back in Massachusetts heard about this cabin he said I could put our parent's old Jøtul wood stove in the cabin, or Cabinet as we call it. My parents had installed this stove in their house during the energy crisis of the 1970s. After a few years the crisis settled down and the wood stove went into storage. My brother in Maine took it for awhile, then it returned to Massachusetts, eventually settling at my nephew Liam's place in Oxford. No one had actually used the stove once it left my parent's house.
Liam had the stove in Oxford because he was going to use it in his rental place but the landlord said no to stoves, so Liam stored it at the boatyard where he's working on his boat. He was advised to put his name on the stove so it wouldn't walk away. The day after arriving at Abigail's place in Delaware, we drove the ninety minutes to Oxford. Liam gave us a tour of the Cutts and Case boatyard where he's working on his three masted ocean going schooner.
Cutts and Case specializes in the restoration of wooden boats. There was an amazing array of old wooden boats in various states of repair. Liam knew all their crooked histories. The sheds were also an informal museum of nautical knick-knacks from all over. Liam's boat is fiberglass and he's totally redoing the bottom. It's a huge job and he's been there so long, his wife Megan has become office manager of the boatyard. After the tour we loaded the small stove in the wayback of our SUV.
The following day Teresa and I headed northwest to New York state via the mountains of Pennsylvania. Cindy had been staying with her other daughter Elizabeth on the shores of Lake Chautauqua. The next day we started the three day trip home with Cindy sitting in the back. She was so quiet I thought she was napping, but when I looked she was watching the countryside roll by, occasionally commenting on the crops remembered from growing up on the farm. Cindy will stay here through the Fair. She can see see the family, attend her sixtieth high school reunion and when she's had enough we'll put her on a plane back home.
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| What a funny name for a library |
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