Massachusetts Archives - Page 2 of 2

Prologue

From the windows to the wall (to wall?),

Till the sweat drops from my….

Well, that’s as far as I can get in that little ditty before things get a little too risque for a “family friendly web page”. Sure, you may argue that me naming “The Stand” as a book I’ve read over and over treads into dangerous territory. However, I kept it clean and anything that people discover from reading the book is the responsibility of Mr. King. So, read “The Stand” at your own risk, I suppose.

Lilodini, Escape Artist

Yesterday, I put “outdoor adventure” in quotes because it was “just a walk with the pup”. Oh my, a quoted phrase follow up to a formerly quoted phrase. This is gonna be good. Trust me. It was. I just hope that I can do it justice. We walked our usual route and made it about halfway. She tied herself around a light pole as she sometimes does. I tried to extract her from that predicament. This is where it goes sideways.

She somehow slipped her lead as I tried to save her. She looked at me. I looked at her. I knew I had 15 seconds, at most, until she realized and took advantage of her freedom. “Lilo”, I said as calmly and non threatening as I could manage. She cocked her head. I repeated her name. She cocked her head the other way. I risked taking a step towards her. Big mistake. The spell broke and she ran across the street, somehow managing to barely be missed by two cars, one coming in either direction.

I sighed. Having experience chasing Reese when he was a puppy, I knew this could take at least a half and hour and might even take all day.

Lilopocalypse, Destroyer of Walks

As luck would have it, a runner approached us and tried to help. At first, she seemed amenable to this kind stranger. Then, something inside her snapped. She either detected danger or wanted to test her newly found voice. She did her new barking at strangers thing that she recently discovered. He looked at me. I reassured him that she is not a threat. He trusted me initially. As the intensity of her barking increased, he reassessed the situation and his part in it and ran for it. She boxed him in a few times, perhaps as a last FU to me and my initial reassurances. Eventually, her short attention span ran out, she got bored, and allowed him to escape.

Resuming her game of chicken with a suddenly busy Main Street. Yes, I know what you’re thinking. But, I live in Orange, Massachusetts. As I’ve been telling people recently, we have Trailhead, Wal*Mart, a brewery, and now a dispensary if that’s your thing. Busy Main Street here is usually the line of busses either dropping off or picking up students from school. This was about 5:30, the usual rush hour for a city. The universe’s sense of humor continued to taunt me.

Spider-Lilo: Homecoming

I tried the old, “Fine, I guess you’re staying here and living here forever.” She smiled. I know people think that dogs can’t smile, but she did. It was one of those sardonic, taunting side smiles that Captain America always gives before saying, “I can do this all day.” As far as I knew, that’s exactly what she wanted. To become a vagrant dog wandering along Main Street in Orange, Massachusetts waiting for unsuspecting people to come along and begging for food and pets.

One of the residents came out of her house with one of those toothbrush treats. I’m sure she heard some of my colorful language and prepared to call the cops on this raving lunatic abusing (note, there was no actual abuse) his poor dog. Proving that she was just being obstinate, Lilo came right over to take the treat and then bolted when we tried to detain her. After another couple of rounds of dodging traffic (she had to have gotten a high score on Frogger), she relented and realized the we had both food and water for her. She allowed me to attach her leash and we walked home without further incident. Oh, we did see the runner from earlier waiting to cross the street, but I slowed my pace to allow him to avoid our tyranny.

The question for today: What do you display on the walls of your home — photos,
posters, artwork, nothing? How do you choose what to display? What mood are you trying to create?

Journal Part 1 – “Wall to Wall (at School)”

I have a memory wall in my classroom. I don’t remember how it started. I’m not sure how I’ve chosen everything to display. I can’t even reliably identify any particular mood that I’m trying to elicit. Is nostalgia a mood? I suppose it can be considered as such. I mean with the social media hashtagization of life, anything can be #MoodAF, right? Well, I’ll let you decide for yourself.

I have artwork from the students (both serious and funny), a Christmas card from two years ago with a poetic quote about Mathematics, a couple of programs from theater productions put on by the school, a thank you card that I received from a student this year, and a memorial card of a student who passed away last school year. See, if nostalgia is a mood, that’s the one I’m trying to elicit with the memory wall.

Journal Part 2 – “Wall to Wall (at Home)”

I actually thought long and hard about how to answer this question for my wall decorations at home. Do I talk about the room I’m currently in and where I spend most of my time? In that case, it is decorated with many pictures of the family. To be honest, that’s how most of the walls in the house is decorated. So, the mood is, again, nostalgia. There is also one of those inspirational sayings on the wall, “May our home know joy, each room hold laughter, every window open to great possibilities.” What can I say? Christine chose the decorations.

If we consider a room that has walls decorated by me, we have to look at the former playroom, then game room, and now Aiden’s bedroom. The walls contain posters from various Marvel properties, the cardboard inserts from Magic the Gathering bundles, miscellaneous treasures from Loot Crate, YuGiOh and Pokemon, and a partridge in a pear tree. As far as I know, that last one is a joke. It could be true. I haven’t looked closely at everything up there.

So, what’s this mood? Your guess is as good as anyone’s. It just sort of matches the chaos of nerditude that circulates in my brain 24/7. Comics, video games, CCG, RPG, board games, miniatures…You can get a taste of that chaos on the main page, if you like.

Epilogue

My choice in wall decorations seem to always want to bring nostalgia alive. I often say that I’m not much for nostalgia, but I’ve amended that as I’ve gotten older. I’m not one for “forced nostalgia”. I don’t like being told that I miss a certain era or brand simply because that brand wants me to spend money. Like when they tried to make Woodstock a yearly festival back in the 90s and the spirits of the old hippies haunted them until the last one ended in violence. Don’t mess with the hippies, Man. But, give me a pack of Magic the Gathering cards, an RPG source book, or emulator to play my favorite old games and you’ll keep me busy for hours on end as I reminisce with my friends via text about how great things used to be.

Prologue

I envisioned the page starting with at 20 years, 20 hikes book that I got for Christmas one year. The local trustees put it out (10 years ago now! I wonder if they’ve updated it for 30 hikes) and many of the hikes I’ve done before. I was going to do a 20 hikes, 20 years, 20 days series, but as it often does, life got in the way. I did get around to doing one of the hikes and it went exactly as I’d hoped it might. I wandered a bit trying to find the place (even though I’ve been there about a half a dozen times before) and discovered another mini adventure. I ran into another hiker randomly and discovered that he was the husband of someone I used to work with at one of my previous jobs. We ended up going up together since he pointed me to the trailhead as I didn’t bring a map. Consequently, I also got turned around coming down the mountain and took the long way around getting back to my van. All in all, it was a good trip and a great start to the page.

Journal

So, today’s the day. I’m heading out to Tully Mountain to hike it for the inaugural hike of “One Guy Outdoors”. It’s a local hike that I’ve done a few times before. I’m pretty sure it’s the hike that we did with Liam’s cub scout pack a few years ago. I know that the elementary schools sometimes take a trip to hike the mountain. So, it’s not exactly an intimidating hike. Still, it’s the perfect start for a slightly out of shape middle aged guy who definitely isn’t experiencing a crisis.

When the day of the hike came, I was quite distracted that morning. I needed to head to Wal-Mart to get a water bottle and some bug spray. I also wanted to record an introduction in case I ever get around to putting together YouTube videos for each of the hikes. I waited until everyone left the house, as it was still during the time in the summer when I was off, but they were all in school. See, that was part of the plan, too. Eventually, the page might evolve into one involving the family, similar to how the main 2 Generations Gaming page evolved from 2 Guys Gaming. However, I wanted to do a test run before even thinking about any of that.

I thought I knew where I was going, but I clearly did not. I overshot all of the trail heads by about a half a mile. As is often the case, however, true adventure can often begin with the words, “I should have taken that right turn at Albequerque.” Instead of hiking up the mountain, I found myself at a wildlife sanctuary. I decided I’d make the best of it and hike through the sanctuary. I heard water at the trailhead, which often makes for beautiful pictures and video.

Spoiler alert: I never made it to the water. I did come across a turtle during my hike and many, many ticks. Overall, the trip to the sanctuary was a failure, but not an overall disappointment. I’d like to go back with more of a plan because it was a beautiful place to visit and showed great potential for the type of adventure that I’m looking to share on this page.

After my unintentional detour, I put the mountain into Google Maps. Since there are multiple trails that wind up and down the mountain, the trails are not always well marked, and there isn’t an exact address for the peak, Google Maps had some trouble directing me where to go. As a result, after overshooting the mountain, I drove past several trails two or three times before I decided to just pull over somewhere that looked promising. It looked like a trailhead, there was another car parked there (a Subaru, so you just know it is going to be a school teacher looking for something to do outside), and what did I have to lose at this point?

I got out of the car and tried to look as “out of town” as I possibly could so that I wouldn’t look like the local dork who got lost. I was that local dork, of course, but there’s no reason this Subaru driving dude needs to know that. “Is this the entrance to Tully?” I casually ask while still doing my best “out of town” impression. “One of them.” He responds. “There’s at least one other if you want to go around to the other side.” I nod. I’m pretty sure he isn’t buying the “out of town” vibe from me, but I appreciate him playing along.

After that, I head up the mountain as quickly as possible. Not only am I embarrassed at having gotten lost on the way to a local mountain, but now I tried to cover it up by pretending to be from some place else. I need to get as far away from this guy as possible to save some face in case I ever become famous outdoors blogger and he decides to blow up my spot. Ha! I’ll show him! I’ll do it myself.

In addition to my terrible navigation skills to find the trail leading to the mountain, I missed a turn in the trail as I was climbing the mountain. Subaru Dude came to my rescue again. Pointing at the missed turn, he helpfully said, “I think this is where the trail continues.” Attempting to save face (and it was the truth), I replied, “I thought there might be something there, but I couldn’t be positive.” Then, sheepishly when I saw the yellow trail blaze, “Oh, there’s the mark.”

My ego sufficiently bruised, I figured I’d just hike up the rest of the trail with Subaru Dude. We got to talking. I discovered that he was married to one of the guidance counselors that I worked with in a previous job. We also discussed some of our other favorites in the area, many of which we shared and I will be sure to visit during my travels for future installments of the page. I’ve already been reminded of one of them during the previous week driving my oldest to a neighboring town for his most recent performance.

Subaru Dude and I parted ways at the peak. He went off to see where the trail led. I took some video from the peak, both of myself and of the scenery, before I started down the way I came. In keeping with the theme of the day, I missed a turn and ended up exiting into a parking area about a mile away from where I parked the van. I saw Subaru Dude and he seemed to think that it was my intention to exit where I did in order to travel to a local eatery for lunch. Having gotten some of my pride back in finding the parking area for my net trip, I let that delusion live.

Epilogue

I only wish that I’d been able to get more of the hikes from the book done. Oh well, the boys and my wife are out of school. I’m still teaching, but it is only for 3 or 4 hours in the morning. So there will be plenty of time to do those hikes in the coming months. I am also being reminded of much of the other outdoor entertainment located in the area. Due to my random encounter with Subaru Dude and the promise of the page to meet new people and find new places being fulfilled, I have been inspired in a big way to keep working on this page.

Stay on the lookout for my first actual round on the HCC disc golf course. I know! I’ve been attending and working there cumulatively for almost a decade. I’ve walked the course a couple of times, but I’ve never played it. I’m pretty excited to play it, but I’m also excited to give my report after. While it won’t be as much fun as this trip since I most likely won’t get lost, stinking at disc golf could offer some entertainment.

Tag: Massachusetts

Wall to Wall