For many years I drove by a little hand painted sign stuck in a lawn that said, “Free To See.” Then one day I pulled in the drive and knocked on the door and asked the lady who answered, “Just what am I free to see?” Coincidentally, that’s how Yankee’s contributing photographer, Corey Hendrickson also […]
Painting by Viola Reil (also known as C. Play) which stands for “child’s play”
Photo Credit : Julia Shipley
For many years I drove by a little hand painted sign stuck in a lawn that said, “Free To See.”
Then one day I pulled in the drive and knocked on the door and asked the lady who answered, “Just what am I free to see?”
Coincidentally, that’s how Yankee’s contributing photographer, Corey Hendrickson also met Viola Reil. On a separate occasion, Corey happened to be driving through the area, saw her sign, trotted up the porch steps and knocked.
And these days, that’s pretty much the only way meet to Viola – in her green farmhouse, overlooking the Black River – given that she’s hasn’t left the house, except maybe to sit out on the porch a few times, since 2009.
On my first visit to Viola, some five or six years ago, she seated herself at small desk by the front door, with her notebook and pens and crocheting spread before her. “Why don’t you go take a look, dear,” she said, waving me in the direction of a narrow room off the kitchen where I was free to see the most jubilant, colorful paintings of scenes from Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom. Her cupboard gallery was brimming with images, not just on canvas and boards, but also on rocks and saw blades and big mushrooms. On the shelves and walls, loons bobbed, foxes cavorted, owls hunched in high branches, a figure in sunglasses brandished his fish, deer tiptoed, church steeples soared…and every creature and leaf seemed to have a unique life of its own.
“That’s what I do, dear. I like to read, write, paint and sew,” she said, lifting her chin with well-deserved pride.
As I sat down at her table, she reached behind her and brought out an accordion folder, “Let me see, oh here’s something,” and she passed me a leaflet sized story book, “Ribs: The Little Tramp Dog.”
Her author’s note says she wrote it for her son, Robbie and that it’s a true story. “I only tell the truth,” Viola told me, “or else I don’t have anything else to say.”
Across the five panels of Viola’s story, her husband Ray goes to the grocery store and comes home with a stray, part Beagle, part Blue Tic. The skinny dog settles in with the family, playing with the children as they build snow horses and forts. But when the weather warms, he wanders off and, “As the years pass we still wonder where Ribs went. We hope some other little boy and girl are loving him. Remember, if a little dog comes to you door, feed him and be kind. It may be, Ribs, the little tramp dog.”
Recently, when I asked Viola how she’s doing, she replied, “Well whatever it is, I’m not doing it very fast.” She reminds me, “You know dear, I’m going to be 89 on the day before Christmas.”
A couple years ago, Viola had one of her grandsons yank up and put away the “Free to See” sign after some gentlemen came to the door who made her feel uneasy. Then last year she liquidated the contents of her painted oeuvre entirely. Her store’s no more.
Still, this summer she broke out her paints and brushes to decorate a mailbox for her grandson’s new built home. More recently she’s been making squares–so far she’s crocheted 50 and thinks maybe by January she’ll have enough to start making some of those shoulder bags. Also a friend dropped off two sacks of magazines, so she’ll be working her way through those.
“I don’t know why I’m still here,” she says as if it’s some sort of mischievous behavior, “but I am!”
As I sort through the accordion file I’ve kept of the true stories Viola’s typed up and given to me over the years, I come across one, “Make Your Community Work For Older People.”
It offers half a dozen ways members of different generations could learn from each other, and concludes with an appropriate poem:
“Beware-beware! The elderly have a lot to share…Our golden years are here to stay. Let’s enjoy them day by day.”
Julia Shipley
Contributing editor Julia Shipley’s stories celebrate New Englanders’ enduring connection to place. Her long-form lyric essay, “Adam’s Mark,” was selected as one of the Boston Globes Best New England Books of 2014.