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
Reading…Reading…
Reading is my vice. If I’m not writing or drawing or making smoothies for lunch or walking Bisou, I’m reclining on cushions, reading. I’m not proud of this. Even though
Miss Daisy at the Wheel
I was seven before I could tie my shoes, twelve before I learned to tell time, and almost twenty when I got my driver’s license. I can’t account for the
Wings
The guardian angels have flown off, who used to sit on our right shoulder or walk invisibly a step ahead, keeping us from falling into ditches and temptation. They have
Bedtime Rituals
Sometimes, when I can’t go to sleep at night, I repeat the prayer that my mother taught me when I could barely talk, “Guardian Angel, sweet companion, don’t forsake me….”
Pause
In our family it was almost considered a sign of intelligence: the lightning-quick flare of temper, the instant reaction to a perceived slight or irritation, followed by a gush of
On Bliss
Ever since he said it, I have been annoyed by Joseph Campbell’s advice to “follow your bliss.” Perhaps it’s envy of those whose good fairies whispered at their cradle, “Little
Rethinking Showers
Good grooming, advises Amy Vanderbilt in the 1967 edition of her book of etiquette, which I received as a wedding present, means “a daily, and often twice daily, shower or
My Mother, on Beauty
When my mother turned seventy, she said, “The trick at my age is not to try to look forty. The trick is to be the best-looking seventy-year-old in the room.”
My Green Vermont
Latest Posts
Reading…Reading…
Reading is my vice. If I’m not writing or drawing or making smoothies for lunch or walking Bisou, I’m reclining on cushions, reading. I’m not proud of this. Even though
Miss Daisy at the Wheel
I was seven before I could tie my shoes, twelve before I learned to tell time, and almost twenty when I got my driver’s license. I can’t account for the
Wings
The guardian angels have flown off, who used to sit on our right shoulder or walk invisibly a step ahead, keeping us from falling into ditches and temptation. They have
Bedtime Rituals
Sometimes, when I can’t go to sleep at night, I repeat the prayer that my mother taught me when I could barely talk, “Guardian Angel, sweet companion, don’t forsake me….”
Pause
In our family it was almost considered a sign of intelligence: the lightning-quick flare of temper, the instant reaction to a perceived slight or irritation, followed by a gush of
On Bliss
Ever since he said it, I have been annoyed by Joseph Campbell’s advice to “follow your bliss.” Perhaps it’s envy of those whose good fairies whispered at their cradle, “Little
Rethinking Showers
Good grooming, advises Amy Vanderbilt in the 1967 edition of her book of etiquette, which I received as a wedding present, means “a daily, and often twice daily, shower or
My Mother, on Beauty
When my mother turned seventy, she said, “The trick at my age is not to try to look forty. The trick is to be the best-looking seventy-year-old in the room.”