I had hitchhiked out there with Jane. We had started in Reykjavik, looking for work, but we were told there were no jobs to be found at all. The herring had gone and Iceland was in a depression as a result. My only contact, Peter Knuttson, a Brit who lived marginally in Reykjavik and somehow […]
Returning after so long, I found that life on the farm had changed dramatically and yet it is the same. Imba and Steini no longer keep cows (I discovered this is true of many farms) but they still have sheep and also she has many more horses than before. She has always loved the horses. […]
On June 15, 2010, at 6 a.m., our Boeing 757 touched down on a long runway and taxied toward what I could see was an elegant new airport. Same place, different building. I had, of course, expected the airport to be modern and updated. And I expected the rocks would still be there but they […]
For the next few blogs, I’ll be writing about Iceland, which is, to me, the most fascinating country on earth. I hope you will agree. In June of 1969, when I was twenty years old, I traveled to Iceland and found work on a farm called Frodastadir (Froe-tha-stah-theer) herding sheep on horseback, milking cows, shoveling […]
I’m home from Iceland, about which I will tell more in the next column. But having traveled so far, I planned a quiet Fourth. On Saturday night, friends came over in the afternoon and stayed for supper, leaving around dusk. I had forgotten about the fireworks, but soon after they left, I heard the booms […]
My cousin George Odell moved to Jamaica in 1973 to teach math and came home four years later with his bride, Hazel, a tiny girl with a big smile, skin the color of coffee beans, and a melodic laugh. Her Jamaican accent was hard to decode–but her Jamaican recipes were not. Since Hazel’s arrival, our […]
Last year was one of the worst years for hay that I can remember. Aside from the need for sun to dry the hay before baling, these fields are wet anyway, so if it rains too much, the fields are too wet to bear the weight of a tractor. So the farmers wait for that […]
It seems as if we are constantly being reminded of how dangerous this world is, what with bomb scares and airport scanners that render us all guilty until proven innocent. This results in a climate of fear which I find tragic. I feel I live in place far away from the life depicted on television […]
In June, I am heading to Iceland, a long awaited return to a country that I love. I spent part of one year living there in 1969 while trying to figure out what life was all about. College was making me restless, a bit bored. I wanted to experience something more so I went to […]
Spring came in a rush, a tumble of images. A month ago, I saw a bear amble across the back field. It might have been my imagination but he appeared to be sleepwalking, loping along almost in a daze. It was hardly spring, still cold, grass not yet green. But time enough for the bears […]
In the ring at Clark’s Trading Post, a six-foot seven-inch, 440-pound black bear named Pemi stands up like a man and tosses a basketball through a hoop. Pemi’s mate, Echo, a 340-pound female, has just finished her act, riding around the ring on a Segway, raising the flag, and dancing. With them is a pixie-like […]
I didn’t come out of the oven here, as the old folks like to say. I’m originally from New Jersey. Growing up, visiting my New England relatives, I vowed to one day make this place my home. And, after college, I did, pushing off from the shores of the Old Country, arriving here eager to […]
