Farewell, Fall! ...or Guerillas in the Mist

Winter doesn't care about our calendars. She has already flounced in and sat down, disdainfully waving off December 21 and declaring "I just happened to be in the neighborhood, so I thought I'd drop by." It's been quite brisk in the mornings when I leave the house, and the Farmers' Almanac is predicting "colder-than-normal temperatures" for my little God's half-acre.

It was 16º when I drove away from home this morning. The air felt cold & harsh; Sarah Palin weather.

I am grateful for a home with heat, a car with heated seats, and an indoor job. It's also a beautiful, clear-skyed sunny day, even if it is cold.

Before autumn gave way to winter, I was out early one morning when a lingering layer of fog gave an ethereal look to Richmond. I took a few pictures on Monument Avenue before heading to the office, and I'll share a couple of them here. The first is of the Matthew Fontaine Maury Monument, erected in 1929. This monument is unusual in that Maury is depicted seated, and is not the dominant feature. F. William Sievers, a Richmond sculptor, felt that a man's ideas are bigger than he is; a large globe behind Maury is surrounded by farmers & sailors in a storm. The globe itself is detailed with wind currents that were mapped by Maury, the Pathfinder of the Seas. These images are appropriate to Maury's analysis of weather systems to improve the lives of sailors & farmers. The base of the monument is surrounded by reverse intaglio images of fresh & saltwater fish. It is a lovely and atypical memorial sculpture along Richmond's famous avenue.

Of course, I also had to see how General Lee & Traveller were handling the fog. They were in the thick of it on their forty-foot granite pedestal. Traveller was the most famous of Lee's horses, and Lee remarked in Lexington, following the Civil War, that his horse was "presenting the appearance of a plucked chicken" because souvenir seekers yanked his tail nearly bald. Traveller walked in Lee's funeral procession with his saddle & bridle draped in black crepe, and died the following year from tetanus. The Lee Monument was unveiled in 1890, and stood alone in the middle of nowhere for eleven years until development of Monument Avenue caught up.

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Four years ago I would have been home drinking & feeling sorry for myself. Each year in sobriety has been better & better. I had a full day, and was tired by the time my head hit the pillow.

I was out of the house before the sun woke up, and went to my usual 6:45 meeting at Holy Comforter Episcopal. Then Robespierre & I met at Lakeside Presbyterian because we thought they'd be eating breakfast. When we walked in they were having a meeting, so we turned tail and met friends for breakfast at Aunt Sarah's (a pancake house, not a relative). After that, Sherry & I went back to Lakeside for a 10am meeting. From there, I dashed over to Ginter Park Baptist for a Thanksgiving dinner/midday meeting. Then I bought a plant for my friend Brenda, and went by her place for a visit. From there, to Robert's so I could meet his mother who was in town for Thanksgiving. I ended the day at my neighbor Karen's for our own Thanksgiving dinner, and she made enough food for an army. Just when I thought I would pop after dinner, she announced that she had made a sweet potato pie (her first), so what could I do?

I woke up in the night with a food hangover. I felt a bit miserable until I considered that it was a hangover borne of food & fellowship, not loneliness & alcohol. I met some new friends, and spent time with some dear old ones. All in all, a wonderful Thanksgiving that left me feeling very thankful, indeed.

Autumn Night at Ashland Presbyterian Church

Pass the Fancy Feast Casserole, Please!

I hope everyone has a wonderful, relaxing, fun, bountiful, serene, memorable, star-studded, exhilarating, calorie-laden, fulfilling, nap-inducing, splendidly Happy Thanksgiving featuring all of the food that you like.


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American Suburban

Cast an eyeball at that crazy kitchen countertop. Doesn't it send you into orbit? Isn't it the most? Well, it probably was in 1960. This chrome-banded countertop was paired with the de rigueur pine cabinets in a house I saw Sunday afternoon. Morris & I enjoyed another afternoon of free entertainment exploring some of the open houses in town, and I wanted to share a few Sunday photos.

I also want to say Happy Anniversary to my pal Scott in Texas! He will quietly celebrate 7 years of sobriety today, and start working on his eighth year of living in gratitude & wonder. He's an artist with considerable talent, and you can see some of his work by clicking here. Thanks for being there, Scott!

Sunday was a beautiful autumn day, and I took the picture below outside the library that's around the corner from my home. A cold front came through with high winds Tuesday night, so a lot of the colorful leaves have been stripped off the trees, so I'm glad that Morris & I took advantage of the lovely day Sunday. We looked through ten homes in four hours!

Before we get to the few pictures I took while fake-househunting, let me tell you about Weird Pizza Night. On Mondays, I usually go to a meeting that I helped Jiffy start in Carytown, which is a stretch about a mile long of shops & restaurants in town. After the meeting, the two of us went to Mary Angela's, a casual little place that serves some of the best pizza in Richmond.

We were seated in a booth toward the back of the restaurant, and we noticed that we kept getting occasional but pervasive whiffs of something quite unpleasant - not a good thing in a dining establishment. It was the unmistakeable smell of good old-fashioned B.O.

And it was really, really strong. My first reaction was that of most people: OMG, is it ME? But Jiffy assured me that it wasn't, because she had just sat in a small meeting room with me for an hour. Through careful analysis, we came to the uneasy realization that it was one of the two servers. Ew! More evidence proved that it was both of the servers on duty that night. Ewwwww!

We were so happy when our pungent pizza arrived to fragrance our table. The pie had been baked on the surface of the sun, whisked to our table, and I (unaware) immediately scorched the roof of my mouth on the first bite. I hate burning my mouth, but in this case it did distract me somewhat from the wafting body odor of passing waitresses. Jiffy found another distraction...

I had noticed that whomever was seated in the booth behind us seemed restless. There was a rhythmic jostling I could feel at my back, because all the booths were attached, tabletops & seats, in a long line down the wall. I could also detect a heated discussion from the next booth, although I could only hear one side of the conversation. Soon, Jiffy was looking over my shoulder with a curious expression.

There seemed to be a pesky bit of crust stuck in my mouth, and as I worried it with my tongue, Jiffy whispered that the lone diner behind us was having an argument with her magazine. The page featured a full-face shot of some blond celebrity, and our neighbor was jabbing at the photo vehemently - that was the movement I sensed. It was a two-way conversation in our neighbor's head, however, because there would be pauses in her discourse as she listened to her glossy adversary.

By now I came to the sad conclusion that this was no wayward pizza crust in my mouth. The roof of my mouth was sloughing off and tickling my tongue. This made me as nauseated as the circulating body odor. We asked for a box for the remaining pizza, and made our way to the cash register. I fought Jiffy for the check & won, and she asked how much she should leave for the tip. "Three dollars and a bar of soap," I said, sotto voce.

But not softly enough. The woman at the register looked at our ticket to see who had served us. I felt bad initially, but decided that a manager would want to know about a situation like that before they start losing business. I'd rather put up with a burned mouth or a nutty patron at the adjacent table than a server with horrible body odor. And you know how it is if you've ever found a tick crawling on you? You itch all over. I kept having a sense-memory of body odor even when I got out into the fresh air.

Okay, the picture up there is of the Murder House that Morris & I toured Sunday. I don't think anything bad really happened in this particular house, but when a house is devoid of furniture, you seem to notice every stain in the carpet. This home is in an established, upscale neighborhood, and was surely a showplace of modern living...in 1960, the last time the house saw improvements. There were four bedrooms, two with horribly stained & burnt carpeting, all for less than $400k. Plus, the mod kitchen with original fixtures & appliances. The little Air-Wick in the sunroom was no match for the strong mold scent that fogged the windows.

This has been my week for strange smells.

Also, you cannot imagine from the picture how steep that driveway is. I thought I was going to have to crawl up it on my hands and knees. It must have been a barrel of laughs last winter when sheets of ice & snow lingered for weeks on end. The entire lot was on a hillside, and I expected to see Heidi & Peter herding goats through the yard.

Here's a view of the split-foyer staircase from the living room of the Murder House. The killer must have really gone to town in here, because the carpet had to be replaced.

Next up are two bathrooms in a fabulous 1960 oversized brick tri-level. This place was top-notch all the way, with big rooms and custom details. Each bathroom had deluxe built-in features.

I love the tissue dispenser in the next one. The sink appears to be an original American-Standard Dresslyn Lavatory. All of the American-Standard bathroom sinks from the era have a "-lyn" suffix; Dresslyn, Gracelyn, Circlyn, Ovalyn, Spacelyn, Lauralyn, Ledgelyn. Toilets were named Carlyle, Luxor, Cadet, Glenwall and Norwall. Have you named your sink & toilet?

The next picture from the same tri-level shows the master bath, which was small but efficient. I nearly fainted with excitement when I opened a hatch near the floor and discovered a bathroom scale. The whirl-out toothbrush holder in the wall took me near the edge, too. I don't know whether the corner sink has a Lyn name, but I'm sure it didn't come with the undersink cabinet.

Morris & I had a grand day out. We saw some very interesting homes, ranging from 1939 to brand new. I love seeing the way households have changed through the years. For example, in the early to mid-part of the last century, homes were usually compartmentalized, with specific functions for each room. Later homes had more of an open flow, sometimes to the extreme when we got into the Great Room era where everything happened in one big, happy room and you wouldn't have been surprised to see a urinal hanging off the wall beside the fireplace.

We'll close the shop today with a picture from my mom's kitchen. Here's my dad's glowing birthday cake, so bright it took two of us to blow out the candles. In the background is Mom's stove, one of the appliances she mentions waxing as part of her housecleaning regimen. American Suburban, circa 1965.

Scenes from Hither & Yon

It's November already! The month of giving thanks and incinerating turkeys. The 11th month, when at some point we say "Oh, Crap! It's almost Christmas!" I'm trying to coordinate an office move, so I haven't been writing much on here lately. I've had a few photo-snapping adventures, though, and I wanted to post some pictures today.

The top picture was taken at an open house one Sunday. I'd noticed that an old house on Riverside Drive was up for sale, so I called Jean and we took a tour. This picture was taken in a sunroom off the master bedroom, and I liked the view of the trees. Three walls of windows looked out toward similar views, and it would be the perfect room for curling up with a good book. I got a bunch of other cool shots at the house that I may post later.

This past Saturday I was invited to a pig roast on the Northern Neck, about two hours from Richmond on a peninsula between the Potomac & Rappahannock Rivers on Chesapeake Bay. Morris & I traveled together. Outside Irvington we spotted this giant corkscrew at the entrance to White Fences Vineyard. When I was drinking, gin was my preferred poison, but I would make do with wine on Sundays if my bottle was empty. It would have taken a bottle this big to handle my alcohol addiction!

Morris & I stopped by the Tides Inn to walk around the grounds & poke through the gift shop. The picture below shows a sailboat on Carter's Creek taken from the lawn at the inn. It was a brisk & sunny fall day, and we were looking forward to the pig roast.

As we drove up Route 200, through the pleasant town of Kilmarnock and toward the bridge over the Rappahannock, we saw an old church on a small hill in the country. Morattico Baptist Church was founded in 1778, and the current church was erected in 1856. There were many interesting markers in the surrounding graveyard.

In short time we were at Cheryl & Jan's campground. The pig was on the roaster, being tended by their neighbor, Phil, who knows all about smoking a pig. We spent the day there, enjoying the company of friends and campground neighbors. I was impressed with the casual atmosphere and genuine friendliness of the folks who stopped by. The campground is a seasonal resort where people set up permanent campsites, so all the residents zip around on golf carts and wave, or stop to chat. Everyone had a splendid time, and the food was wonderful. Not a good event for vegetarians, however.

A couple weeks prior, when Jean & I went to the open house on Riverside Drive, we drove along the James River...
...and then continued on through old Bon Air, which was a Victorian-era resort outside Richmond. Now, Bon Air is a Richmond suburb, but many old homes still reflect a time when this area offered a respite from the sooty summer air of the 19th Century industrial city. One item you may find interesting: Polk Street in Bon Air was named after a local pharmacist who founded a pet care product company as the result of creating treatments for his favorite hunting dog. His dog's name was Sergeant.

The remaining pictures are just random shots taken around town and beyond. It's fun to get out of the house with my camera to see what I can find. The weather has been comfortable, after a summer of wilting heat, and I enjoy exploring.

Some of you may remember the pictures I posted from Goochland's Field Day of the Past back in September. One of the event organizers saw the photos on this blog, and asked whether I would be interested in photographing their event next year. He said they liked my pictures better then the ones they got from the company they hired. Isn't that a hoot? All I've got is a cheap point-n-shoot digital camera and an untrained eye.

The 3rd Generation Barber & Beauty Salon on East Grace Street.

A window display right next door to the 3rd Generation Barber & Beauty Salon.

A Richmond landmark, still working faithfully since the 1960's.

The Scott House bathed in the early morning sunlight one Sunday on my way to Perly's for breakfast.

A lakeside stroll in Forest Hill Park.

Oregon Hill, with downtown beyond. Oregon Hill sits on a bluff overlooking the James River, off-camera to the right.

The last picture was taken in Amsterdam last December. It reminds me that days are getting shorter. I rather like the feeling of cozy warmth when I'm indoors with hot coffee and a book, in the glow of lamplight as the autumn night presses against the windows.

A Box of Freedom

Richmond from the James River Canal
"Honey, I'm Home!
...Honey?"

But the house is empty. Your wife and your kids are gone. And they are never coming back.

Before we delve into the mystery of the missing family, we'll look at some pictures from a recent canal boat ride that Sherry, Ember, Morris & I enjoyed one Sunday.

I bought tickets awhile back, but it was so freakishly hot this summer that we waited until the danger of spontaneous combustion had passed. I had to trick Sherry into going by avoiding mention of words like "educational" and "historical information." As far as she knew, it was simply a pretty boat ride.


The canal ride is a pleasant, short excursion along the lower remnants of the James River and Kanawha Canal, which was a grand scheme of George Washington's back when he was hiking over hill & dale surveying the countryside as a young man. It was conceived as a means of transporting goods & passengers by water between the coast and the remote western settled regions, over the Eastern Continental Divide to link up with the Ohio River. That never happened. Along came the railroad, which was a much more productive system.



This is some sort of rolling bascule bridge. The thing up in the air that looks like an upside-down kitchen grater is a counterweight that lifts the bridge span so that ships can pass.

A very active railroad trestle runs along the canal. Large warehouses & manufacturing plants were built conveniently close to the old canal docks. Now, vegetation claims the banks, and you can see turtles lazing in the sun. Ember saw a dead squirrel floating in the canal. I didn't see it, but she does a good imitation of it, and that's better than seeing the real thing as far as I'm concerned.

There are lots of former tobacco factories lining the canal. Most have been turned into upscale residential spaces. It's a dot com world out there.

Isn't this a superb photo of Ember, Morris, and Sherry? You can see Sherry clutching a bottle. She still has a severe drinking problem. Wherever she goes, she is accompanied by great sloshing noises. I don't know that I've ever seen her with less than three types of beverage; iced tea, water, and something she calls "diet." We can go into a restaurant, and when asked what she would like to drink, Sherry simply says "Diet" and the correct beverage appears. On the other hand, I can ask for water and get a barrage of questions: bottled? imported? with lemon? lime? strawberry? carbonated? supplemented? distilled? holy?

As our guide Cotton pointed out, here you see the history of Richmond's transportation. The picture was taken from a boat, next we have a railway, topped by a modern highway, with the skyway of air travel overlooking it all.

Now, what of the man who returned home from work to find his family gone?

Along Richmond's Canal Walk there is a metal representation of the three foot by two & a half foot wooden crate used by Henry "Box" Brown to ship himself out of slavery in 1849. One aspect of the complex system of American slavery was the hiring-out of slave labor, particularly in industrial areas. Owners would lease their slaves to work in private industries and, during the Civil War, to military departments.

Henry Brown was born on a plantation outside Richmond, but when his master died he was moved to Richmond by the master's son to work in his tobacco factory. Slaves out on-hire usually arranged for their own dwellings and other needs, and gave most of their wages to their owners. Henry met another slave, a woman named Nancy, and married her. They had three children together and lived in a small house. However, marriages between slaves were not recognized by the legal system, and Nancy & the children were sold by her owner. Henry was told about this while he was at work one day. He saw his family for the last time as they were leaving with other slaves who had been sold down South.

Having had his family torn from him by slavery, be was determined to escape its bonds, and he devised a plan to ship himself as dry goods to Philadelphia. With the aid of a free black man and a white shop owner, he had himself sealed in a small wooden crate and escaped to freedom.

You can read more about Henry by clicking here.

A Streetcar Ran Through It

Eighteen years ago today, my partner & friend Michael died. He was kind & compassionate, funny & fun-loving, and he had a generosity of spirit that inspires me to this day. Michael had an interest in the well-being of others, and was always there to lend a hand whenever he could help a friend. He knew that life was a precious gift, and he squeezed as much out of his time with us as he could before he succumbed at the age of 32 to the disease of AIDS. He taught me a lot about grace & humility in midst of dreadful times. I can still hear his joyful laugh in my mind, and it makes me smile. God bless you, Michael!

On today's tour, we'll make a short visit to a couple of Richmond's Northside district neighborhoods. We hope that this sign portends a change of fortune for Brookland Park.
Have you ever wondered what your neighborhood or town looked like before your dwelling was there? Probably not. I'm subject to convoluted & meandering thoughts; it seems to run in the family. I could be having a normal conversation with my Grandma and she'd come out with a non-sequitor like "Have you ever wondered why God put your nose above your mouth?"

I was astounded as a little boy to learn that our house, our neighborhood, had once been farmland. Like most egocentric children, it was hard to grasp a world prior to my arrival. To prove his point, my dad gestured to an almost imperceptible ridge in our lawn that ran from the street to the backyard. "That used to be a farm road that ran between the strawberry fields," he explained.

On May 4, 1888, Richmond became the first city in America to roll out an entire system of electric streetcars. This innovation led to the development of new neighborhoods to the west, south, and north of the city boundaries. Streetcars, now gone & mostly forgotten, changed the Richmond landscape forever.

A streetcar crosses the Fifth Street Viaduct
This past Sunday, when the predicted rain did not materialize, I scooped Morris up and we headed to the Brookland Park & Highland Park Plaza areas of Northside. Morris & I share an interest in local history & architecture, and I knew he would be a good guide. The neighborhoods in this quadrant were developed in the late 19th & early 20th centuries, with streetcar routes making downtown Richmond easily accessible for workers. A tall viaduct over the steep ravine of Bacon's Quarter Branch connected this previously inaccessible area to the greater city. This plateau now called Northside, though dotted with an estate or farmstead throughout, was mostly wooded and remote before the advent of the streetcar line.

These new suburban communities were for white middle-class residents only. Regulations prohibited "sale or lease to a colored person under any circumstance." Our history of uneasy race relations did not end with the Civil War. I find it curious that whites whose families had previously housed slaves in their attics & outbuildings came to a point where having black neighbors caused them to shudder. What did they fear? Equality? It is a continuing problem.

Still, it must have been a fine place to grow up. There were vacant lots for play, as well as designated parks and athletic fields. People kept chickens in backyards. Trees lined the streets. Retail blocks dotted the side streets within neighborhoods, with small grocery stores, barbers, and candy shops. A larger commercial center at Brookland Park Boulevard & North Avenue offered more services, such as a theater, churches, and a host of various shops; the streetcar ran through this retail area.

Brookland Park Boulevard commercial area

A well-maintained home in Brookland Park

The Highland Park Market on Milton Street was thriving in 1929; today, not so much.

The next few pictures show what has become of the Milton Street block of neighborhood retail establishments. In 1929, in addition to the Highland Park Market, the city directory also listed the Milton Street Confectionery, Highland Park Cleaning, Milton Street Barber Shop. By 1946, this block nestled amongst the homes of Highland Park Plaza featured six shops. Take a look at what we have today...



907 Milton Street, formerly the Sanitary Grocery in 1929


After indulging ourselves with lunch at Roy's Big Burger, Morris & I headed back to Brookland Park to gander at a home on Edgewood Avenue. We had spotted an Open House sign earlier, and we got back to Brookland Park shortly thereafter to see the house. The home had been newly updated, and still retained the fine original wood floors and trimwork. The neighborhood is finally balancing itself to become a home for people of all colors to live side by side.

Gracious spaces in a renovated Brookland Park home

Edgewood Avenue
I know I will go back soon to explore more streets in the Richmond's Northside. It offers a rich & varied architectural landscape. Beginning as a white-only suburb, then swinging to a predominately black population in the mid-60's, this area's demographics continue to evolve. I hope that these neighborhoods, as well as the rest of Virginia and America, become places where we take a greater interest in the color of our neighbors' houses, and pay less attention to the color of our neighbor's skin.