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Treasure Beneath the Snows

By Marsha Norman

It sometimes seems like winter is in no hurry to leave and that it might just decide to stick around until May or even Memorial Day. This is especially true on the little knob where I live. It is planted in pine trees that are now 60 or 70 years old. They are tall and tightly spaced, so they block out a lot of sun. We still have snow on the yard when some of my friends are out working in their perennial beds. » read more

But, eventually and inevitably, the snow finally melts and this is when the treasure hunt begins. It is always amusing—and a little melancholy—to see what we neglected to put away in the last cleanup before the first snow. And to find what new treasures the dogs—and other creatures—have dragged in.

Feature Stories

A Safe & Sober Home

By Kathleen James

Photgraphy By Hubert Schriebl

In East Dorset, the childhood home of AA founder Bill Wilson is a meetinghouse for recovering alcoholics from around the world.

Aldous Huxley called Bill Wilson the greatest social architect of the 20th century. Time magazine named him one of the century’s 100 most important people—a list that includes Martin Luther King, Winston Churchill, Bill Gates and Albert Einstein. The organization he co-founded in 1935, Alcoholics Anonymous, has reached millions of men and women who struggle with addiction. And today, an estimated two million people worldwide are successfully following Wilson’s example and staying sober one day at a time. » read more

My Kind of Store

By Geoffrey Norman

Photography By Hubert Schriebl

You probably can’t find an ox-yoke at the new Williams store. Times do change. But in the essentials, H.N. Williams remains the same.

There was a distinct sense of trepidation and, even, awe about my first visit to the H. N. Williams Department Store (Est. 1840) in Dorset, Vermont, where I had recently moved from a small island in the North Atlantic called Manhattan. It was more a rite of passage or an initiation or something than it was an ordinary shopping trip. Flatlanders such as I didn’t simply waltz into the venerable Williams and just buy something like it was nothing out of the ordinary. No more than a visiting Yank would just drop in on a Saville Row tailor while in London and say, “Howdy. Like to try on a couple of your suits.” » read more

Terrain Parks

By Betsy Parks

Photography By Hubert Schriebl

Rails, tabletops, boxes and lots of high mountain air for dare devils in all of us. 

Not so long ago, skiing and snowboarding was all about getting from the top of the mountain to the bottom. Sometimes a bump became a jump, or a few adventure seekers took it to the rough trail edges and even sometimes off into the woods. But for the most part we all kept it on the ground. Then came freestyle skiing and the first snowboarding halfpipes, both pushing the boundaries of alpine sports from just going fast and getting to the bottom into exploring midair. These days, Stratton and Bromley area terrain parks are offering more and more of those high-flying experiences for skiers and riders of all abilities. » read more

A Home Grown Vermont Wedding -- Down on the Farm

By Kristin Mcdonald

Photography By Hubert Schriebl
 
The Taft-Pickering Wedding

Their story began on a basketball court. Both were students at Vermont Technical College in Randolph Center, both on the college’s teams, so they saw each other often. Eventually they began playing pick-up together and soon became inseparable. After three years of steady dating, Chris Taft of Springfield asked Amanda Pickering of Arlington to marry him. First getting her father, Fred’s, permission, Chris took her for a walk down a back road in the hollow near Amanda’s family farm. She said yes, and to commemorate their pledge they carved each other’s initials into a large sycamore tree that had split from the original trunk into two separate trees—CCT on one side, AJP on the other. Chris noted the significance: the two trees were joined but separate, and they had grown old together, his plan for the two of them.

But we are jumping ahead. First, they had a wedding to plan. » read more

Starting All Over Again

By Paul Fersen

Twenty years ago I wrote about building my house. When I built it, I assumed it would be the last house I would ever live in, but things change, lives take directions we never imagined and things we consider indelible, suddenly become untenable. What we needed then seems a bit much now. It’s time to build a new one.

Am I sad about this? Yeah, there’s a part of me that looks around at the familiar timbers that I put into place, the pegs I drove in, the walls I painted. I can remember every step of the process down to the most minute detail, simply because I did it myself with a little help from my friends. But is it devastating? No. In fact, I’m pretty excited about it, because this gives me the opportunity to do it all over again, albeit on a smaller scale. Building this house myself is the best time I ever had with tools and clothes on. Mimi and I designed it together, built it together, and raised our children here. Looking back on our life together it was, aside from farming, the most fun we ever had, because we were totally focused on our home. Today we’re focused on everything but our home, just trying to survive and somewhere we seem to have lost the reason for moving to Vermont. We’re tired of waving at each other on the road. » read more

Kitchen Gardens

By Ellen Ogden

Photography By Hubert Schriebl

More than just a place to plant lettuce and herbs, a kitchen garden can be a thing of beauty and a work of art

When I planted my first kitchen garden in 1980, I marked the perimeters with four sticks and a ball of twine. Borrowing a sharp edged spade, I removed the layer of turf, double-dug the remaining soil to create a loose pile, and then supplemented with a few shovel fulls of compost. I was fresh out of art school, so instead of making art on a canvas, I began to think of myself as a food artist; building color in the garden with a collage of lettuces blended with dabs of red orach, fronds of emerald green chervil and rosettes of claytonia that elevated the garden—as well as a simple bowl of salad—into a work of art. 

» read more

Going Yard

By Geoffrey Norman

In the mid-part of April around here, you begin thinking about yard work and start laying in the necessities.   Once the last scraps of snow have melted away, things happen fast and you can quickly fall way behind the curve.  And the part of the whole equation that requires the greater part of your time and attention is, of course, the least interesting.  That would be the grass.

Everything about a yard is more beguiling than the grass, which doesn’t do anything but grow.  And there are no guarantees on that. 

You have to coax it and baby it and feed it special formulas.

But first you have to rake it.  

Because the grass has been buried under snow and scoured by sheets of ice, it is brown and matted and to bring it back to life, you must scratch it briskly with a metal lawn rake.   This removes the old dead grass and, evidently, invigorates the surviving roots and blades.  It is also tedious work that consumes time you could otherwise spend on the perennial beds or the vegetable garden or the golf course where there is an actual point to grass.

All grass, however, must be attended to.  It is needy, that way. » read more

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Photo Essay

What I did on my Spring Vacation

When you move into the fourth quarter of your life and still have an adventurous bone in your body, there seems to be a certain kind of urgency—what you still want to do, still want to see, still want to re-visit? To take a metaphor from sports, there is no overtime. 

So last spring on Easter Sunday, I climbed up Stratton to meet a big group of people for the sunrise service. The same afternoon I took a flight to Europe and joined my son Jamie for some spring skiing and visits to family and friends in Lech and Graz. For the last three days, Jamie and I went to Istanbul, Turkey—a place I have dreamed of visiting for as long as I can remember (it also happens to be the 2010 Cultural City of Europe).  Names like The Golden Horn, The Bosphorus, the Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque and the Spice Market were all familiar to me and now I was seeing them for the first time. Sharing these first sightings with my son, with Istanbul in full bloom, made the experience very special. » read more

The Buzz

Join the Fun and Ring in Spring!

Burr and Burton Academy’s Parent Association is sponsoring a Spring Fling Extravaganza with a weekend of exciting events, Mar. 5–6. On the 5th will be a Student Benefit Concert and Family Dine-Around with participating restaurants. On the 6th, a Stomp and Ski/Ride Relay at Bromley Mountain during the day. or more information: 549-8281 or acomar@burrburton.org

» read more

Moved from Spring: The First Annual Stratton Summer Challenge

Join the friendly (traditionally Spring) competition now to be held on Aug. 7 & 8! Five-member teams participate in a variety of sports activities, win points, and try to meet the challenge of raising at least $1,000 per team. Sports may include swimming, basketball, tennis, golf, volleyball, scavenger hunts, horseshoes, and paintball. Festivities begin with a Welcome Party on the 7th. Games begin Sat. morning. An All-Teams Barbecue on Saturday night with live music, great food, and fireworks. Awards ceremony and brunch on Sunday. A great way to celebrate the summer season at Stratton and support the Stratton Foundation. Stay tuned to stratton.com for ore information on how to egister your team.

» read more

2010 Gorgeous Gardens & Green Living Show

The Vermont Nursery & Landscape Association announces the Gorgeous Gardens & Green Living Show, a brand-new event to premier at the Riley Rink in Manchester March 13–14. This event will draw attendees and over 40 vendors from Vermont and all over New England.  Speakers include Julie Messervy, landscape designer and author; Henry Homeyer, freelance writer, garden designer and author and Ellen Ogden, noted food and garden writer (see her article on kitchen gardens). 
Hours on the 13th are 9:30 am–5 pm and on the 14th from 9:30 am–4 pm. For more information about the 2010 Gorgeous Garden Show, call 88-518-6484 or visit www.greenworksvermont.org


» read more

See the Art, Meet the Artists

The 18th Annual Open Studio Weekend will take place on May 29 & 30. Vermont artisans will open their studios to the public from 10am–5 pm. Visitors will see where and how craft is produced and meet the artists. Variety of arts and craft includes pottery, furniture, jewelry, fine art, sculpture, glass and more.

Play “Studio Sleuth”–get a required number of artists’ signatures—and enter a drawing to win a gift certificate to the studio of the inner’s choice!

Studio Guide maps will be available at Epoch~18 Vermont Artisans, a cooperative artisan gallery at 4927 Main St., Manchester, across from Berkshire Bank. For more information: 293-5195 or email bob@gasperetti.com

» read more

Grab Your Gear: Time for Spring Training

Get ready for Trout Season on March 27, 1–4 pm, at the American Museum of Fly Fishing’s Spring Training Day.


Activities include: “Reel Them In”: see what it feels like to reel in a fish with our unique practice system; “Practice Rods”: We’ll teach you how to make your own practice rod modeled after the Royal Wulff Fly-O; “Fly and Knot Tying”: Learn all the knots you’ll need and tie some real flies! 
Admission includes supplies and admission to the museum gallery. Current exhibits: “Fly on the Wall: The Art of William Cusher” and “Gadgets & Gear:  20th Century Innovations in Fly Fishing.”
For more information: 362-3300 or www.amff.com

» read more

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