my green vermont

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Welcome to My Green Vermont

I was born in Barcelona, where I went to a school run by German nuns, studied solfeggio, and played the violin. When I was ten, my parents and I moved to Ecuador, where I had a number of exotic pets and strange adventures. Four years later, we landed in Birmingham, Alabama. None of us spoke English, and the strange adventures continued. (Many of these appear in My Green Vermont.)

Survived high school. Got B.A. in French and Biology, Ph.D. in Romance Languages (French and Spanish). Gave up the Church and the violin, got married, had two daughters, taught at a liberal arts college in Maryland. Also grew veggies, made bread, kept chickens, milked goats, and wrote for newspapers and magazines. I got bored with teaching, took up running, and went into higher ed administration. I was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), and learned to live in a totally different way.

I started My Green Vermont when we moved to that state. For ten years I lived with my spouse, three dogs, twelve hens, two goats, and assorted passing wildlife in a house on a hill, surrounded by fields and woods. In 2014, we moved to a cottage in a continuing care residential community near Lake Champlain. Gave up livestock and vegetable gardening in favor of wild birds, honeybees, a little red dog, and a gray cat.

My Green Vermont is a fertile compost pile made up of stories about the weirdness of growing up in three countries and three languages; portraits of beloved animals, both wild and domestic; and reflections on aging, being kind to the earth, and staying as calm as possible. I hope you will visit often, and add your own stories and reactions.

My Green Vermont
Latest Posts

Goats On Grass

The gate of the pen swings open. Blossom and Alsiki mince their way out on their little hooves. Around them are an overgrown lawn, scruffy woods, and fields. Blossom: Wow!

Read More »

The Guys At The Gym

The gym I go to in the little village just over the border, in New York, is clean, quiet and, on weekday mornings when I am there, mostly empty. There

Read More »

Garden Mystery

There is a mysterious plant growing in my vegetable garden. Or rather, it\’s not so much the plant, which is definitely a member of the squash family, as how it

Read More »

Early Spinach

Just in the nick of time, as the freezer stands empty except for a few jars of tomato sauce from two years ago and I am faced with the prospect

Read More »

Vegetable Morals

As you know if you\’ve been reading along, last fall I attempted to soften the severe Yankee looks of our house by making a flower bed. Our front porch rises

Read More »

Dandelion Wine, The End

Now all you have to do is wait a couple of months. Then you can either serve it directly out of the bottle, avoiding the sediment, or you can rebottle

Read More »

They\’re Back!

I\’ll do the last installment on Dandelion Wine tomorrow, but today we got “the girls” back from The Buck, and I can think of nothing else. We drove two and

Read More »

Dandelion Wine, Part Three

Strain liquid into a pan. Add two sliced lemons, two sliced oranges, and a little ginger root. Boil gently for half an hour. Cool and add half an ounce of

Read More »

My Green Vermont
Latest Posts

Goats On Grass

The gate of the pen swings open. Blossom and Alsiki mince their way out on their little hooves. Around them are an overgrown lawn, scruffy woods, and fields. Blossom: Wow!

Read More »

The Guys At The Gym

The gym I go to in the little village just over the border, in New York, is clean, quiet and, on weekday mornings when I am there, mostly empty. There

Read More »

Garden Mystery

There is a mysterious plant growing in my vegetable garden. Or rather, it\’s not so much the plant, which is definitely a member of the squash family, as how it

Read More »

Early Spinach

Just in the nick of time, as the freezer stands empty except for a few jars of tomato sauce from two years ago and I am faced with the prospect

Read More »

Vegetable Morals

As you know if you\’ve been reading along, last fall I attempted to soften the severe Yankee looks of our house by making a flower bed. Our front porch rises

Read More »

Dandelion Wine, The End

Now all you have to do is wait a couple of months. Then you can either serve it directly out of the bottle, avoiding the sediment, or you can rebottle

Read More »

They\’re Back!

I\’ll do the last installment on Dandelion Wine tomorrow, but today we got “the girls” back from The Buck, and I can think of nothing else. We drove two and

Read More »

Dandelion Wine, Part Three

Strain liquid into a pan. Add two sliced lemons, two sliced oranges, and a little ginger root. Boil gently for half an hour. Cool and add half an ounce of

Read More »