Since the beginning of October, our family has been enjoying the active company, once again, of our old family friend Slim and his loyal pack of pups. They spent the past eleven months mostly in quiet contemplation and sound sleep in their comfortable new domain, my attic art studio. Sometimes as I went upstairs to paint, I’d find them peering out from their favorite lookout perch in one of the dormers. Slim kept a pair of binoculars close at hand, along with his birding journal.
One morning in August, when our family was in Cape Cod, they were roused from napping by the sound of heavy machinery. From the attic window, they witnessed the removal of our old silver maple. It was with great sadness that they watched as the remainder of the tree was cut down, chipped up and hauled away. Slim and I are kindred spirits in our love of trees. He brushed a tear from his eye as he told me that he wept most of that summer morning.
Once the pack was feeling lively enough to venture outside to roam the grounds, they headed directly to the site of the old tree. “Hello, dear pal,” Slim said, as he settled himself in the center of the mulch pile. “I can still breathe in your essence, your goodness!”
Somehow it was news to me that Slim was an early adopter of the practice of “forest bathing.” He was introduced to the therapeutic relaxation technique during the months he spent backpacking through Japan in the early 80s. It’s one of several lifestyle choices that he holds responsible for his health, vigor, trim frame, and longevity. As we walked over to the remaining silver maple in our yard, he became my forest bathing instructor. “Get up close to this old friend,” he advised me. “Snuggle in, nice and cozy. Lean your back against the bark. Feel that solid, reassuring presence. Imagine that your feet are roots. Take deep breaths. Be aware of all your senses. Listen to the birds, watch the beetle crawling among the fallen leaves, feel the breeze on your face, and smell all those fantastic fragrances of nature. Keep breathing, slowly, deeply. ”
The practice is a great stress reducer, but it’s more than that, Slim told me. “It’s those phytoncides, you know.” I didn’t know. “They’re tree oils, great immune boosters. We breathe them in, and they have amazing healing properties. The more trees around, the better. That’s why they call it forest bathing. But we can get big benefits right here, in the company of our silver maple sister, and even from the mulch chips of her much reduced sibling.” I’ve known Slim long enough to reach eagerly for the pearls of wisdom he offers. I’ve always enjoyed being around trees, but now I know to seek them out more intentionally when life’s annoyances, large and small, start to wear on me. I expect there will be many of those times.
Slim delighted in the last of the squirrel-planted sunflowers that bloom along the fencerow.
He exulted in the clump of late-blooming Montauk daisies by my mother’s driveway. “These smell almost as good as a maple tree!,” Slim exclaimed. “Flower bathing has its benefits, too!”
During the early part of this summer, an afternoon deluge, fueled by intense heat and humidity, became a near-daily event here in Northern Virginia, as in much of the country. The cascade of events leading to the loss of our second-to-last silver maple began with one such violent thunderstorm in mid-July. An ear-splitting boom told us that lightning had struck perilously close to our house. My husband saw puffs of smoke dissipating as he stepped outside. A tall pine in my bird-feeding area bore telltale signs of the strike: pale vertical gouges where the bark had been blown away.
The storm raged on, and the power soon went out. We were expecting six guests for dinner in about an hour. Salmon was in the oven, half cooked. Earlier in the week, we’d almost canceled the get-together, when it seemed unlikely that our new HVAC system would be installed in time. We’d been largely without AC for over two weeks. But the work had been completed that very morning. The entire house had just begun to cool down when the electricity shut off. Should we forge ahead? We considered our options. This was a welcome meal for our new minister. After all the prep, I didn’t want to postpone. I could finish the cooking on my mother’s gas-powered stovetop. So we pressed on. H began a search for battery-powered candles.
In the rush to prepare for the evening, it escaped our notice for a while that an enormous, tree-sized portion of a tall white pine lay stretched across the front yard. The noise of the wind and rain had masked any sounds of its fall. The top-most part of the tree had come to rest in the crook of the divided trunk of one of the two remaining old maples.
When our friends arrived, we gathered on the screened porch for drinks (much-needed) and watched as torrential rain poured down around us. Happily, before long, the power was back on. Our new HVAC system was running again, thankfully.
The next morning we began to realize the extent of the lightning damage. Several outlets at our house and next door at my mother’s were visibly scorched, and numerous lights, interior and exterior, were no longer working. WIFI and internet were out, as was a ceiling fan that H had replaced twice before. My new computer seemed to have been affected. As we continued to discover still more ways in which the lightning strike had wreaked havoc, we decided to stop lamenting the losses, and instead to be grateful that we had escaped both fire and death.
It took a while to get the fallen pine completely cleared away. The final remaining portion resembled a long-legged creature crying out for a head. I added a plaster mask left over from a school art project, surrounded by a fall wreath.
Two weeks later, we had just begun our Cape Cod vacation. During dinner at the home of friends in Wellfleet, a neighbor called to tell us that one of our trees was down, blocking the side street. It was, of course, the maple that had been struck by the falling pine. Half of the huge tree had collapsed, crushing our mailbox as it went down. We’re very fortunate in our neighbors. Without our asking, and before we even knew what had happened, these kind and thoughtful people were out with chainsaws, working together to clear the impassable road. They sent photos to keep us informed.
Friends who assessed the condition of the remaining part of the tree were in agreement: it was dangerously unstable. An expert echoed the diagnosis, and said it would likely fall toward the house and could well hit the roof. We had little choice but to have the rest of the maple taken down as soon as possible. We hated the thought that our old tree would disappear from us while we were away. We wouldn’t get to say goodbye.
Later, as our long drive back from Massachusetts neared its end, we braced for the first glimpse of home after the removal of the tree. We still weren’t prepared, and the sight hit us like a punch. The house appeared uncomfortably exposed, like someone caught unexpectedly undressed. It looked vulnerable and a little embarrassed.
And that flat, sheared-off stump! It became the first thing I saw every morning as I looked out my bedroom window. It would soon be reduced to a pile of mulch, and will eventually be planted over with grass seed. My husband and I both mused regretfully over whether we should have left the base of the tree, as we did with the slowly decaying and battered maple nearest the road. Would that be a less painful sight? We examined the photos sent soon after half the tree had fallen. It might not have even been possible to leave a snag, a stump, because there had been a hollow space near the bottom of the maple ever since we moved in. A big, low branch must have broken off many years ago. The bark had grown back around the opening as the tree healed itself.
In this photo, the evergreen boughs from the fallen pine suggest that the maple is decorating itself for Christmas in July.
From certain viewpoints, the opening resembled a heart.
With the maple, we also lost a robust, sizable holly that grew close beside it, in the sheltering embrace of the larger tree.
I realize that in the grand scheme of things, the loss of a tree, and an old tree, at that, is no big deal. Certainly not in the face of ongoing wars in which helpless children escape battle strikes only to die of starvation. Certainly not when the killing of neighbors going peacefully about mundane activities has become a routine, even expected, everyday occurrence.
But the loss of a tree can be seen as the loss of an agent of peace. We need our silent friends in the plant realm to counter the pervasive meanness and brutality of the world we humans have managed, somehow, to build. In times of distress (and when is there not a reason for distress?) nature stands by to offer comfort and solace. In the assuring company of a familiar tree friend, we may yet experience a soul-filling escape. We may find a fleeting illusion of harmony amidst this twenty-first century disharmony.
After settling into our house in January of 2000, the silver maples out front quickly became integral to our idea of home. They were sort of like heirloom furniture–cherished and comfortable, arranged pleasantly in an expansive, open-air room. No, they were more than that; they were almost like our extended family, part of our beloved community. My husband attached a rope swing to a branch on one of the trees closest to the house, and it became a favorite spot for our daughter and her friends. Other trees served as her lookout perches. The maples were frequent backdrops for Christmas card photos and others of our daughter and dog that I sent to grandparents throughout the year. The trees have been gracious hosts to our feathered and furry friends. They’re particularly popular with woodpeckers. Last fall I watched as two enormous pileated woodpeckers worked their prodigious beaks like jackhammers on opposite sides of an upper branch in one of the trees.
Our daughter on the rope swing, 2006.
Our daughter, December 6, 2005
Our daughter and young Kiko, March 18, 2008
Our daughter and Kiko, December 2015. I love it that our dog looks comfortable perched in the hollow of the tree.
We knew when we moved in that the old trees were nearing the end of their life span. Silver maples aren’t like oaks that can endure for centuries. We tried to keep them trimmed to enhance their longevity, but our efforts had their limits.
The tree nearest the street at the center point of our front yard was the first to begin losing some major limbs. In the above photo from 2010, one of the big branches had recently fallen.
The center front tree, battle scarred.
Our house sits on a sharp curve of a narrow road. The trees along this outer edge are vulnerable to errant vehicles. We lost count of the number of times that a driver misjudged the curve or lost traction after a rain and collided with the tree above. As limbs fell or were removed, it became the stump that we decorated each year for Christmas. The protective bulk that remained continued to be a useful block for our yard, so we allowed it to diminish and decay naturally. Even in its last gasps, the tree, paradoxically, was full of life. Its final remains became a hub of fantastical lichen growth.
The tree toward the center of the photo above became a home for a family of barred owls in the spring of 2004. I remember standing on the front porch with my father as we spotted a big, beautiful owl soaring toward the tree. Its wingspan was immense. Amazingly, the bird disappeared into a cavity high atop the tree. A bit later it emerged, flew away, and returned to repeat the process. I was peering through binoculars when I saw a huge eye staring back at me from inside the tree, right after the owl had departed. We gaped in awe as a second large owl emerged. Wow! Both parents were coming and going, we realized. Often, one owl would keep vigil on a branch near the nest. Slightly smaller than the other, we presumed her to be the female. Exuding gravitas, she eyed our family with cool confidence. Did we imagine that she was sizing up our small daughter, who would start kindergarten in the fall, as potential prey? Could she manage a catch of that size? We doubted it, but we didn’t let D go out in the yard alone. While the mother guarded the nest, the male typically remained within eyesight, watching from a more secluded post.
After a while, we began to catch glimpses of their young. Two pale, fluffy heads began to peek out from the cavity. Then we started to see the mother owl disappear inside the tree and pop back out nearly immediately. She did this over and over. Next she’d sit on a nearby branch and gaze intently at the nest. Soon, we’d see an owlet emerging, tentatively, from inside the tree. The mother, it seemed, was encouraging her young to venture out, to give their wings a try. How scary that thought must be for a young bird! After a while, the female appeared to dive emphatically into the tree cavity, as though she were losing patience. “Come on!,” her body language said. “You can do it! Trust me!”
We didn’t witness the owlets’ first actual flight, but I saw proof of their new-found ability. One morning I was out in the yard shortly after dawn, when I saw the two owlets outside the nest. Their fuzzy, pearl-gray bodies were draped, liked minimally stuffed dog toys (or those melting Dali clocks!) over the branch of a nearby tree, just above my head. Their eyes were closed. I remember gasping audibly, because I thought they were dead. I waited in trepidation, hoping for signs of life. Just when I was about to assume the worst, the owlets began to stir. Their big, dark eyes opened. They groggily roused themselves and gradually summoned the energy to sit up. Whew! They’d survived what must have been an exhausting first night of flight. We saw the young ones flying short distances a couple of times. And soon afterwards, the whole family was gone.
My husband’s daad took this photo of owl parent and baby, in May 2004.
When the natural shelf for the nest collapsed the next year, my husband and daughter worked together to build an owl box, seen above and below, and attached it to the tree. When the owls failed to return to the box in its initial placement, my husband positioned it much higher up on the limb, as seen below. Over the years, we often hear the distinctive cries of barred owls in our neighborhood: Hoo hoo hoo hoo! Who Cooks for You? But never again have they nested in one of our trees.
We were eating Easter dinner on the back porch on a quiet, perfectly still afternoon in April 2011 when we heard a thunderous crash. We rushed to the front yard to discover, with dismay, that half of the owl tree had fallen heavily to the ground. Sadly, we had no choice but to have the remaining, unstable portion removed. Like the owl family, the owl tree left us suddenly and too soon.
Our daughter with a cicada friend, May 2004.
The spring of the owls coincided with peak season for the seventeen-year cicadas. Our maples, we discovered, are choice cicada territory. Our yard was abuzz with the lumbering, clumsy creatures, and the maple trunks were studded with a multitude of tan exoskeletons. Our daughter, ever a fan of nature in all her odd manifestations, found the cicadas charming. The owls evidently shared her appreciation, or at least they recognized in the slow-moving insects an easy food source for themselves and their young.
For the past ten years or so, only the two maples closest to the house have remained. Their long branches created the leafy frame through which I will always imagine our home. On snowy, moonlit nights, the shadows cast by the trees were magical.
As of this month, the maple frame is lopsided. In mid-July, we experienced the start of the series of unfortunate weather events that would lead to the fall and removal of one of the long-lived pair. The last surviving maple, we’re told, has exceeded its life span. Likely, it’s not long for this world. Much as when a well-loved family member lives to a ripe old age, we’ll try to be grateful for the many good years we shared.
With my daughter, in front of the house, December 1999
It was the day after Thanksgiving in 1999 when we first saw the house that would become our home. We’d moved to Northern Virginia from New Jersey the year before, and we were renting a small townhouse near my husband’s office. Our daughter was eleven months old. We’d gotten the hang of packing her into her car seat and settling her in her stroller, and she was typically a happy short-distance traveler. Our primary weekend activity had become house hunting. House looking, really, because we weren’t yet prepared to buy. It was free, entertaining, it got us out of our increasingly cramped space, and it was a good way to get to know the area. Most homes were well beyond our means, but we looked at everything we found vaguely appealing; we wanted to get a feel for the wide scope of the market. At an open house that fall we met a realtor with whom we felt an immediate rapport. We appreciated her humorous quips, made all the more amusing when delivered in her posh British accent. She won me over completely when she referred to our daughter as that “ex-quisite child.” (Dawn Jones is savvy.) She was determined to take us under her wing. We told her we weren’t sure how serious we were about buying. Nevertheless, she persisted.
Buying a home was a very big deal for us. We were used to university housing and eccentric rental spaces. As a grad student, I lucked into a cushy house-sitting job on lovely Battle Road for a Princeton professor. I even managed to get my husband-to-be a similar gig in another beautiful home right across the street. We relished being mortgage-free high-end real estate dwellers. And then we began our married life at the other end of the spectrum, in Princeton’s bare bones and now-demolished Butler Apartments, built in the 1940s as temporary quarters for returning GIs. We’d never had a place that we could truly call our own.
We’d seen several homes with Dawn when I found an online listing that seemed promising, if oddly worded and rather puzzling. The internet was fairly new back then, and I was proud of myself for using it to browse local real estate listings. The photo showed what appeared to be a sizable white house, far bigger than we expected to afford. But surprisingly, it was in our price range. The description read as follows: This is a lovely home that can also be remodeled. The garage can be fixed. Painting done, finish the basement with bedroom and full buth (sic), price would be $150,000 more. It had been on the market for months. Worth a look, we thought, but there must be something seriously wrong with the place.
The photo from the real estate listing, 1999.
We anticipated disappointment as we went to meet Dawn at the address. We expected to find a dilapidated shell, an extreme fixer-upper in need of a daunting amount of work. What we saw was a plain, unassuming American Foursquare farmhouse with a central block and two symmetrical wings. Aluminum siding on the outside. Inside decor featured mid-1970s stalwarts like orange shag carpeting in every upstairs bedroom and faux French provincial white and gold detailing in the bathrooms. In the kitchen, there was a sort of fake shake roof thing that extended the full length of two walls. The former owner had been a heavy smoker, and the copious wallpaper, thick carpeting, heavy draperies and all the woodwork were yellowed with nicotine. Structurally, the house appeared to be sound. It was spacious, and we loved the floor plan, with a central hall surrounded by four large rooms on each level. In short, it seemed to be a good, solid house with unfortunate surface treatments. Familiar territory, for me, from my childhood home in Atlanta. We could make this old house our own.
Our house in December 1999. Our daughter, in her stroller, wearing a red knit cap, is on the front walkway.
And then, there were the trees.
The photo from the real estate listing showed parts of two big trees that appeared to frame the house. Turns out they were silver maples, much like those outside my grandparents’ farmhouse, the beloved central focus of my childhood. Lots of people dislike these trees. They grow quickly but tend to shed their bulky limbs regularly. Their knobby roots, spreading far and wide, are the enemy of a pristine lawn. But I was delighted to see that a semi-circle of six grand old maples sheltered the front yard. As I wrote in a post from 2012, those trees spoke to me. They said, “You’re home!”
The house dates from 1920, and the trees are of the same vintage. Not long after we moved in, church friends helped me contact a woman whose family had built the house. In her 90s at the time, and living in southern Virginia, she spoke with great fondness about her childhood home. Back then, it was on two hundred acres, on which they raised wheat. When I mentioned how much I loved the big maples, she told me that as a very little girl, she had helped her parents plant them “from switches!”
Since settling in, in January of 2000, we’ve described our home as the old white farmhouse with the old trees in front.
That description is less accurate as of this summer. Due to recent weather events, only one maple remains.
My mother with my daughter, at age 2 1/2, in Atlanta.
To all the women who do the loving work of mothering, whether to your own child or children, and/or to other family members and friends, human and non, thank you! Our troubled world needs your care, courage and kindness. May you feel cherished and appreciated on this day and every day!
I thought I knew all my mother’s stories about her childhood and youth. Most I’ve heard multiple times, which is to be expected. My daughter would likely say she’s all too familiar with anecdotes from my past. (Except for one, which she heard for the first time recently, and it truly surprised her. But that’s for another day.)
Mama at about ten, ca. 1945.
A while ago Mama’s memory was jolted by a segment in one of her frequently watched History Channel shows. The topic was Robert Wadlow, the world’s tallest man. At his death at the young age of twenty-two, his height was 8 feet 11.1 inches.
Did she ever tell me that she met him when she was a little girl?
What? You met the world’s tallest man? No! How could you have never told me that?
My mother’s first grade school picture, ca. 1941.
She wasn’t sure. It must have slipped her mind, until just then.
As she remembered, her father’s brother Ben had taken her to a favorite restaurant on Main Street in her home town of Lebanon, Kentucky. This popular meeting spot, memorably called Humpkey’s, featured in many of Mama’s recollections. Open from early till late, it had a soda fountain, candy and ice cream sales in the front, and café tables in the back. Everyone, young and old, socialized, snacked and lunched at Humpkey’s. I have a vague vision of going there with my grandfather when I was very young. Apparently Mama’s uncle had heard that the world’s tallest man would be stopping by, and he took little Betty Ann, then no more than four years old. She couldn’t recall her parents, or any of her four siblings, all much older, being there.
But now she was starting to wonder if any of that had actually happened. Had she just made it up?
Main Street Lebanon, 1983.
It was thanks to my late cousin Maryella, who lived her entire life in central Kentucky, that I was able to confirm my mother’s recollection. Until her untimely and unexpected death, Maryella maintained a Facebook archive of old newspaper clippings on Marion County events. Searching her site, I found an article from the local paper, dated May 8, 1939, on Wadlow’s visit to the town. He was twenty-one at the time. For the past year, he’d been traveling the country as a representative of the St. Louis-based International Shoe Company, which supplied his size 37 shoes free of charge. Lerman Brothers Department Store on Main Street had invited him to make an appearance in Lebanon.
Main Street Lebanon, December 1984.
Robert Pershing Wadlow was born in 1918 in Alton, Illinois, a small town near St. Louis. His great height was caused by hyperplasia of the pituitary gland, resulting in excessive production of human growth hormone. At eight years old, he was already six feet two inches tall. At thirteen, he became the world’s tallest Boy Scout, at seven feet four inches. As the eldest of five children, Robert was a caring and considerate big brother. Growing up in Alton, he was a familiar figure in the community, accepted and well-liked. To his peers in school (where he was a good student), church and scouts, he’d always been just Robert, who happened to be very tall. But of course, he attracted attention everywhere he went. In 1936 he traveled with the Ringling Brothers Circus. He didn’t think of himself as a showman, certainly not a side show act. In his appearances in the center ring, he wore a suit and tie, not the flashy top hat and tails that circus bigwigs would have preferred. He saw his towering height not as a handicap, but as a feature that made him unique. Throughout his life, he was known for his kindness, humility, gentleness and quiet dignity.
Main Street Lebanon, November 1983.
According to The Lebanon Enterprise article, a sizable crowd had gathered that day in May to await the celebrity’s appearance. After arriving in the specially modified family car with his father, Robert climbed atop a flat-bed truck parked on the street as a viewing platform. His father addressed the group and spoke of his son’s rapid development from an eight-pound baby born to parents of typical height. Robert made a short endorsement for the International Shoe Company, but spent most of his time seated in a chair chatting amiably with curious townspeople. His demeanor was described as pleasant, humble and at ease. After a while, a few of the town’s tallest young men were invited to climb up and compare their stature with Robert’s.
Santa’s sleigh passes Lerman’s Store on Main Street in the Christmas Parade, 1983.
These details of Wadlow’s visit were news to my mother. But the final paragraph in the article noted that “following his engagement, the party had lunch at Humkey’s (sic) Confectionery and then left for Campbellsville.”
“You did see him, after all!,” I said to my mother. “And of course, it happened at Humpkey’s.”
Main Street Lebanon, December 1984.
Robert Wadlow died just a little over a year after his appearance in Lebanon. As he aged, his quickly growing body was under ever greater strain. He wore braces on his legs and used a cane to walk, but he never resorted to the use of a wheelchair. During a public appearance in Michigan, an ill-fitting brace rubbed a blister on his ankle. Because he had little sensation in his lower legs and feet, Robert didn’t notice the injury until it had become infected. Despite emergency surgery and a blood transfusion, the infection worsened, and Robert died in his sleep on July 15, 1940. Penicillin, which might have solved the problem, wasn’t in regular use until later that decade. His final words were “The doctor says I won’t get home for the celebration,” a reference to his grandparents’ upcoming fiftieth anniversary party.
The life of the world’s tallest man was unfortunately short, but his legacy is long. When I mentioned his name to my husband, he recognized it instantly. Not much of a reader growing up, he ordered a kids’ Guinness Book of World Records every year, if he could, through Scholastic Books at school. He remembered reading about Wadlow, and he knew his record had never been broken. “Wow! Nana met Robert Wadlow! Amazing!,” he exclaimed. My daughter’s fiancé, also a World Records enthusiast, was equally impressed.
Wadlow’s record will likely remain unsurpassed. His condition, known as pituitary gigantism, was accurately diagnosed during his childhood. It’s now typically treated successfully with surgery, but during his lifetime, that was deemed much too risky.
Robert Wadlow will be remembered as one who persisted through hardship, in ways that most of us can barely conceive. Daily, he navigated an environment built, from his point of view, on a cramped and unaccommodating scale. Think of an American Girl doll being trapped in a Barbie-sized world.
Because of his large size, Wadlow had no choice but to be visible. Far more visible, at all times, than most of us would choose. The typical celebrity has the option of dressing in forgettable attire and a baseball cap in order to slouch about unnoticed. Wadlow was never afforded that luxury. While his fellow citizens of Alton apparently took his outsized presence in stride, he could expect stares of amazement everywhere else. His attendance with his YMCA group at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1933 at age fifteen, for example, was caught on film. He must have tired of the never-ending stream of photo-seeking strangers. He must have groaned inwardly at hearing the same old jokes about his height. But those who knew him, as well as those who met him briefly, were impressed by his positive, matter-of-fact attitude, his patience with onlookers, and his complete absence of self-pity. He was not known to have complained about his condition or about being pestered by goggle-eyed crowds.
We all face challenges, but few of us are forced to deal with them in quite such a public manner. When I get the urge to whine about my problems, I’ll think of that tallest-ever man, a perpetually young man. Robert Wadlow persevered through unusual difficulties, all the while extending grace to those around him.
In memory of my mother-in-law Doretta, who passed away at the beginning of March, I reprint this post from October 2012. See previous post for more about my husband’s lovely mother.
I have the perfect mother-in-law. The only down side to this is that I’m unable to participate in the swapping of mother-in-law horror stories. I’ve heard many such accounts, and other than gasps of incredulity, I have nothing to add. I’ve listened in amazement to tales of the mother-in-law who “helps” with the new baby by bellowing orders, complaints, and increasingly outlandish requests from a command center on the family room sofa. I’ve heard about the M.I.L. who, determined to ensure that her son’s house run on her rules or not at all, regards each visit as an opportunity for a hostile takeover. I’ve listened to anecdotes about the M.I.L. whose sensitive temperament is constantly wounded by imagined slights tossed off by a cruel daughter-in-law. And I’ve heard everything in between.
With my mother in law, there is no drama. She is sweet, good, and uncomplicated. She is kind, thoughtful and intelligent. During visits to our home, she asks how she may help. She is not overbearing. She does not insist, but she never offers out of empty politesse. It has taken me a while, but I’ve learned to accept her assistance. I come from what may be a predominately Southern tradition of automatically refusing the first few offers of guests’ help, thereby forcing them to insist or be considered rude. Now, when Grandma* asks if I need help with dinner, I tend to say Yes, please! She is a calm, easy presence, and it’s a pleasure to share the house, and the chores, with her.
Like everyone in H’s family, his mother welcomed me warmly at our first meeting, now over twenty years ago. She has never implied (as some mothers of sons are known to do), that no living woman could be a worthy companion of the god-like boy-child she birthed. She has a deservedly high opinion of H, and she has always treated me as his equal.
H’s mother is a loving grandmother to our daughter and to her other four grandchildren. Gentle and fun, she laughs easily, and she remembers what it was like to be a child. I’ve heard about grandparents who cannot be trusted with their own grandchildren. This was never an issue with either set of my daughter’s grandparents, thankfully. When D was nearly three, my husband and I, along with my parents, took a trip to France, leaving our daughter in the care of Grandma and Grandpa. We missed our baby girl, but we had no worries about her welfare, either emotional or physical, during those ten days. We knew she was in devoted and capable hands.
Grandma’s attitude is generally one of meekness, and some might take her for a pushover. This, however, is not the case. When she feels strongly that righteousness is on her side, she is tough, patient and determined to persevere. One year, when H’s windsurfing board went missing in Cape Cod, she summoned Grandpa to accompany her on a walk. With slow, thorough deliberation, she surveyed the property carefully, until she discovered H’s board leaning up against the wall of another cottage way across the green. Thanks to her gracious yet firm intervention, H’s board was soon being carried back to its rightful place by those who, no doubt, had removed it.
The photo above shows our daughter with Grandma at Cape Cod. In D’s younger years, she always urged H and me to go out for date night during our vacation, so she could enjoy a full evening of food and fun with Grandma and Grandpa.
Grandma is always ready for a game with a grandchild, whether it’s air hockey, Chinese Checkers, Candyland or Chutes & Ladders.
Grandpa is a lucky man, and he knows it. He has Grandma by his side, no matter what. During their long marriage they’ve had their share of hell and high water, in addition to many joys. They are a formidable team, and together, with their strong faith in God’s love and grace, they know they can weather any storm. Grandma has a gift for finding and sharing that kernel of sweetness within the tough husk of the bad.
Thank you, Grandma, for enriching the lives of all those you touch. Happy Birthday, and many more to follow!
*When I speak to my mother-in-law, I call her by her first name, which is an unusual, pretty name. But here, I will refer to her as Grandma. When I wrote about H’s father, her husband, I referred to him as Grandpa (June 2012), so I’ll be consistent.
At one of her favorite spots, with a book at the picnic table outside her family’s Cape Cod rental cottage
My dear mother-in-law Doretta passed away in the early hours of March 4th. Since her beloved husband Jim left this world in October of 2022, she’d been lonely. She didn’t complain. But when asked, or when his name was mentioned, she’d always say, “I just miss him so much.” She carried on, despite her sadness and the growing physical challenges of Parkinsons’ and Addison’s Disease.
I had the pleasure of seeing her most Wednesday nights for the past several years. During the height of the pandemic, she joined my mother and me and other friends for an online Bible study through our church here in Virginia. As her mobility decreased, attending her local Rochester church, and getting out at all, became increasingly difficult. Our mid-week virtual gathering had become one of her few fellowship opportunities, and she appreciated the warm welcome our group extended to her. With my husband’s and his sister’s help, she learned to use Zoom on her iPad in order to join us. This was quite the feat, considering Jim had always been the one to deal with any and all tech matters. During the sessions we’d often hear Barney the cockatiel chirping away happily in the background. Barney, like Doretta, had been bereft after Jim’s passing. An odd, cantankerous bird, he was prone to hissing with apparent vehemence at everyone who was not his best pal Jim. Over the past two years, he warmed up to Doretta, and the two became good company. It was her nightly ritual to sit with him in the family room, watching TV or reading. She found that he got particularly chirpy during the musical performances on old Lawrence Welk re-runs.
At about age three, in her hometown of Jamestown, NY
Doretta was determined not to relocate from her house, which she and Jim had built as newlyweds in 1965. Thanks to the help of my sister-in-law Julie, who lives locally, several regular care-givers, many walkers and two stair lifts, one to the basement and another to the second floor, she had been able to remain in the home she loved so much. When my husband returned there the morning after his mom’s passing, on the table beside her favorite chair, he found her Bible, some recent books from our Zoom studies, and a manual on coping with Parkinsons’. He saw them as a testament to her quiet, patient perseverance. Throughout adversity, her faith was strong. Life tossed many hardships her way, but she pushed through, with a kind, encouraging word for others. She was a light bearer in our often dark world. It feels odd not seeing Doretta’s Zoom square on Wednesday nights, not to see her sweet smiling face, not to hear Barney’s tweets. I like to think of her in that heavenly cloud of witnesses, reunited joyfully with her darling Jim.
As my husband made plans for maple sugaring, he learned to keep a close eye on the weather, and to be prepared to act. We’d always thought of February as the prime maple sugar month. But H learned last year that it’s the temperature, not the specific time of year, that determines the best sugaring conditions. The perfect fluctuation of temperatures, in fact, is necessary. Cold nights, when the thermometer dips below freezing, and warming, sunny days, are what gets the sap really flowing. During the second week of January, when temperatures ranged from the twenties to the forties, H tapped several sugar maples in my mother’s yard. Soon, the white pails were filling with sap. He checked them each night, emptying the liquid into a larger bucket for storage in our basement fridge.
He began the long boiling process on a weekend when he had few other projects. Every gallon of sap requires about an hour of boiling time. He’d collected about twelve gallons, and he boiled six gallons at a time. To avoid turning our kitchen into an ultra-high-humidity zone during six hours of boiling, H began the process outside on the grill. Once the amount of liquid had been reduced by about 80%, he finished the process inside. The longer the liquid is boiled, the more viscous it becomes. During this final phase, our house was filled with the heavenly scent of sugar-rich steam.
The reason that most maple sugar comes from northern locales is that the sugar content of maples is higher there. Sugar maples in northern states and Canada typically have a sap to syrup ratio of about 40-1, so that forty gallons of sap yields one gallon of syrup. Farther south, as here in Virginia, that ratio is about 70 – 1.
After the boiling process is finished, the syrup is filtered to remove any impurities.
A bit of early-season syrup, light in color.
My husband found that the sap from the earliest part of the season produced syrup that was light in color. Longer boiling does not affect the color, (unless reduced to the point of burning, of course). In taste, this early harvest was subtle. It was sugary, with only slight hints of maple flavor.
The late-season sap resulted in syrup that was a dark mahogany color. The flavor was bright and robust. It was pure maple essence. It takes more sap, and more boiling time for maple sugaring here in Virginia than in western New York, but the end result, we know now, is equally tasty. Mid-Atlantic maples can produce a liquid gold as fine as their Yankee cousins.
Hours spent around the big pot of bubbling sap, inhaling the sweetness of the steam, are apt to inspire contemplation. “Amazing, isn’t it, that we can extract this liquid from trees in our own yard and turn it into this great-tasting stuff,” my husband remarked. “And it’s even more amazing that the sap is there in the first place. There’s enough to nourish the tree, and plenty left over for us. If God were to boast about his wonders, this should be included.”
I agreed, and the biblical conversation between God and Job immediately came to mind:
Who created a channel for the torrents of rain? Who laid out the path for the lightning?
Who makes the rain fall on barren land, in a desert where no one lives?
Who sends rain to satisfy the parched ground and make the tender grass spring up?
Does the rain have a father? Who gives birth to the dew?
Who is the mother of the ice? Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens? (Job 38: 25- 29, New Living Translation)
God directs Job’s attention to his supreme authority over the skies, the seas, over light and darkness, and to the unique characteristics of his many, fantastically varied creatures, including lions and goats, the wild donkey, the ox, the horse and the eagle. The miracle of maple syrup could well be included among these marvels, it seems to me. Perhaps in words like these:
Who commands and compels the life-blood of the trees of the forest? Who sets the sweet sap rising and flowing in the maples? Who sends it forth to nurture and bless the woodpecker and the shepherd?
So yes, every taste of our homemade maple syrup is yet another reminder of the bounty of God’s gifts. It’s best enjoyed, in our opinion, over buckwheat pancakes made from the Cartwright family recipe. Our syrup may be from Southern trees, but my husband’s sugar-making experience is rooted in the wilds of upstate New York. The seeds were planted long ago during his first family visit to the remote Maple Tree Inn. One of life’s sweet pleasures still flourishes, across the miles and years. Grandpa Stan would be proud.
My husband taps a maple tree in my mother’s front yard here in Virginia.
Among my husband’s most cherished childhood memories are family outings to a remote location in western New York to feast on pancakes and locally made maple syrup. His grandfather Stan was a man of big, enthusiastic appetites, and he was a huge fan of maple syrup. He began the tradition of a mid-winter journey from Rochester, sixty-five miles south to Cartwright’s Maple Tree Inn. Stan’s appreciation for maple syrup lives on in my husband. Last year, he decided to tap some of our Virginia maples and see what might result. His efforts were rewarded, and he repeated the process again this year, with certain modifications. His local syrup making will be the subject of my next post. But first, back to the sugar shack that started it all.
North to the Sugar Shack (first posted February 22, 2013)
The snowy landscape behind Cartwright’s, February 2013.
Last weekend, we drove to upstate New York for pancakes. Not just for pancakes. Pancakes and maple syrup. We met H’s family at Cartwright’s Maple Tree Inn, a glorified sugar shack located, really, in the middle of nowhere. Its actual address is County Road 15A, Angelica, NY (2 miles from Short Tract), which, in the language of our GPS system, is “not on any digitized road.” Despite its truly out-of-the-way location in the midst of snow-covered fields, it’s a popular spot, with big crowds on weekends. It’s only open during the maple sugar season, which typically runs from mid-February through March or mid-April, depending on the weather. H’s family has been trekking out to Cartwright’s for decades, and now it’s among our winter traditions, even though our drive is far longer. Of course, we don’t return directly to Virginia, but spend the weekend visiting H’s family in Rochester.
Our daughter in front of the Maple Tree Inn, 2013.
The Cartwrights began producing maple syrup on their farm in the 1850s. The Maple Tree Inn dates from 1963, when the family decided to build a restaurant specializing in Grandma’s buckwheat pancakes served with their own maple syrup. In the adjacent shop, the syrup, maple butter and maple sugar cakes became available directly to the public. The somewhat ramshackle building has been expanded over the years and is now fairly large. It will win no awards for architectural style, but that’s not the point. In the chain-store sameness that dominates so much of our country today, the Maple Tree Inn offers a unique, quirky, authentic experience. It’s living history, and it’s worth a visit.
Before I met my husband, I had never tasted true maple syrup. The first time we ate together at PJ’s Pancake House in Princeton, I was surprised to see him pull a small container of pure maple syrup from his pocket. At the time, PJ’s didn’t serve the real stuff, although that has since changed. I didn’t understand what the big deal was. Growing up, when Daddy made pancakes on Saturday mornings, we used the typical supermarket syrup–Log Cabin, Aunt Jemima–whatever. H was no food snob, so I found his insistence on unadulterated maple syrup mystifying. That is, until that day at PJ’s, when I tasted the liquid from that little jar. H was right. There is no topping the perfection of the stuff that comes straight from the tree.
Visitors to the Maple Tree Inn are welcome to descend into the building’s lower level to learn how the sap is boiled down, in huge wood-fired evaporators, to its golden maple essence. Several years ago, a Cartwright grandson, no more than twelve or so, gave us a comprehensive tour that began in the frozen fields where we could examine the taps on the trees and see the liquid running into the buckets. This is not an option at IHOP.
These days, the rarified nuances of maple syrup, like those of chocolate, coffee and small-batch bourbons, are earnestly discussed at considerable length, using wine-lingo terms such as terroir. H doesn’t do this, although he can and does enjoy discerning, in blind taste tests, the variations between light, medium, and dark amber syrups. My palette will never attain such a degree of sophistication, but I can say this: a little true maple syrup makes life sweeter.
After a walk to explore the area around Cartwright’s, Kiko kept vigil in the car during our meal. Animal advocates need not be alarmed–he had his sheepskin bed and blanket if he needed to hunker down for warmth. Before this trip, in case it was particularly cold, we bought him a red plaid fleece coat. The temperature wasn’t low enough to warrant it, and he appeared perfectly comfortable, peering out from the front seat, when we returned. For his wait, he was rewarded with an extra sausage patty that H’s grandmother had carefully saved for him.
Kiko and I explored the area around Cartwright’s.
Kiko and D atop a tall snowpile on an earlier visit to Cartwright’s, in 2009. Kiko looks almost exactly the same as he did four years ago, when he was two. D, on the other hand, has changed.
Next up: my husband’s foray into maple syrup making in Virginia.
A blog about motherhood, marriage and life: the joys and frustrations, beauty and absurdity, blessings and pain. It's about looking back, looking ahead, and walking the dog.
