A gray, wet Tuesday morning, rain pelting down, backyard brook up a little and running muddy as the dogs crunch dry nuggets from rusty, cast-iron Wagner skillets on the concrete floor just inside the cook-shed stoop. It’s looking more and more like this morning we’ll just walk the brook a short distance once they’re through […]

To me, I see this as a dredging chore. That is, write in detail about a skill I honed years ago, have not used in many moons but am confident I could quickly remaster if, on a whim, I decided to dig out equipment and head to my old lower-Deerfield River flyfishing haunts. The dredging […]

I guess it was the two galvanized tubs hanging among cobwebs high along the carriage-shed’s north wall that stirred uplifting memories on a gray, still Tuesday morning — air heavy, storm brewing — on my way out back to the kennel. The smaller, round tub is familiar to one at my previous South Deerfield home […]

Yes, it came out of the blue a couple of weeks ago by email from someone I did not know. No, her question was not unique. In fact, it seems I am asked the same question on every visit to my longtime vet’s office, and often in the public square: Are you finding a lot […]