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
Green Pants
Among the pleasures I have given up lately, along with coffee, hot peppers, and red wine, (yes, this is going to be a whiny post), is shopping for clothes. It
Morning Pages
Julia Cameron, in The Artist’s Way, says that every morning as soon as you wake up you should write three pages longhand, without stopping, paying no attention to grammar, spelling,
My Mother’s Lover
He first saw her on stage as she read stanzas of a poem by Federico García Lorca about the death of a bullfighter. Interspersed with the poetry were sections of
Save the Dandelions!
Their English name comes from Middle French dent de lion–lion’s tooth–because the ends of their petals look like they have been nibbled by a vegetarian lion. But in contemporary French
How to Make an Old Dog Happy
My little red dog, Bisou, is twelve. I don’t want to even think how old that is in human years. For the first half of her life, my main challenge
Prayers and Fasting for Ukraine
I used to be a prayer athlete. As a girl, my days were punctuated by prayers. I prayed when I got up, before I went to bed, before meals, and
My Disobedient Saint
Saint Eulalia, virgin and martyr, was a thirteen-year-old girl who, in 303 CE, ran away from her wealthy parents’ house in the outskirts of Barcelona and presented herself at the
A Rose-Free Valentine’s Day
Over the last half-century I have received dozens of Valentine’s Day roses from my best-beloved. Year after year they would appear at the breakfast table, and I would smile and
My Green Vermont
Latest Posts
Green Pants
Among the pleasures I have given up lately, along with coffee, hot peppers, and red wine, (yes, this is going to be a whiny post), is shopping for clothes. It
Morning Pages
Julia Cameron, in The Artist’s Way, says that every morning as soon as you wake up you should write three pages longhand, without stopping, paying no attention to grammar, spelling,
My Mother’s Lover
He first saw her on stage as she read stanzas of a poem by Federico García Lorca about the death of a bullfighter. Interspersed with the poetry were sections of
Save the Dandelions!
Their English name comes from Middle French dent de lion–lion’s tooth–because the ends of their petals look like they have been nibbled by a vegetarian lion. But in contemporary French
How to Make an Old Dog Happy
My little red dog, Bisou, is twelve. I don’t want to even think how old that is in human years. For the first half of her life, my main challenge
Prayers and Fasting for Ukraine
I used to be a prayer athlete. As a girl, my days were punctuated by prayers. I prayed when I got up, before I went to bed, before meals, and
My Disobedient Saint
Saint Eulalia, virgin and martyr, was a thirteen-year-old girl who, in 303 CE, ran away from her wealthy parents’ house in the outskirts of Barcelona and presented herself at the
A Rose-Free Valentine’s Day
Over the last half-century I have received dozens of Valentine’s Day roses from my best-beloved. Year after year they would appear at the breakfast table, and I would smile and