“That’s the last of it. No worries, driving over the year-round gaps, though a few of the more rugged ones remain closed. I know exactly where the grade braking will kick in, slowing the truck automatically according to the angle of incline. Nothing Robert Frost would have had much use for, as I whiz past his historically bolstered stomping grounds, complete with boardwalks and narrative markers. As for the mountain named after him, frequented only by intrepid trail runners evidently, or people who like pushing through weeds, it looms over a troubled set of twisted oracles, road and river. Comparing maps, there is no firm conclusion regarding what connects where in this region. It’s annoying to me: the last gasp of paper topographical maps in Vermont, so enticing, yet so outdated. Equally annoying, the newer satellite imagery, with seductive glimpses into hidden properties, without explanation or fine resolution. What is that eight-sided “thing” in the middle of the woods? Why is the logical connection of two road ends, no longer visible? Who got to buy all that, in there? It’s true, a lot of money has come to Vermont. Not exactly unheard of, when you consider the old money that began to buy summer homes here, before you were born. All that aside, I appreciate that nothing much has changed at EC Brown’s Nursery, and I still have to watch my vehicle’s girth, while driving up the slim drive Friday afternoon. Daffodils blooming just below the chassis, pots of hydrangea tandem the sidewalls, hardly room to park. I’ve come to photograph things for clients, check on their inventory and, of course, see Nina. As nursery manager, she social-distances me for a nano-second, then upon seeing my normal receptivity unchanged, gives me a big hug. She’s stayed consistent all these years in ways I can relate to. And since we raised our boys together, who were best friends, we’ve continued uninterrupted with our own friendship as well as our professional relationship. We care when we see each other. But as usual, her pager rings. Her employees appear from nowhere, with pressing questions. A client of mine calls her, and she’s reminded of a pre-arranged appointment on the other side of the mountain, that I instigated. I reduce my long list of questions quickly, to two, or three. I know I can hit her up later, when she’s off duty. What’s the biggest Maple tree I can buy here? What kind of Maple, she says. And we go on for a minute or two, discussing what’s happening to the Sugar Maple supply, here in commercial retail land. It’s an ornamental market, meaning, mostly for topsiders. That means upper crust buyers, who can afford to “place” trees of size, and mega-buyers who might be titans of the tech industry or heirs to the Swiss Toblerone brand of chocolate. Where money is no object and you know what I mean because you see it everyday in towns like Stowe and Woodstock. Vermont is stratified. There are beautiful, generous people, at all levels, and I’ve worked for all of them. I’m reminded of Margaret Egerton, who needed her myrtle bed weeded, though this is often a fruitless pursuit. She must have been 90, and I loved her without reservation, just sensing so much beyond what I would ever be able to know. My oldest daughter, Freya, worked on that job. We hated it, basically, but really worked hard to improve things, as best we could. Margaret deserved the best from us, since she’d been a social worker for the Widow’s Bereavement Counseling program, and helped start the Hospice Program in Randolph. Professional gardening is like that. You meet some of the most kind, beatific, sensitive souls that walk the earth, and some of the psychopathic variety, who never even see you, or remember your name.”
