I took this picture just a few moments ago. It’s the view from the porch of a summer cottage that’s been in our family for more than a hundred years. Our cabin, named Ogontz by my forebears generations ago, looks over Lake Otsego, a nine-mile long lake in mid-state NY that ends (or starts, depending on your point of view) at Cooperstown, NY. Long before Cooperstown was known for the Baseball Hall of Fame (which I’ve gone to a dozen times, though almost always when taking visiting guests to the museum), it was home to the stories of James Fenimore Cooper, one of the earliest America novelists. The town was named for...

Boston.com shared a number of moving photos from today’s remembrance of those who died a year ago in the bombing of the Boston Marathon. Here are a couple that made a deep impression on me. And it wasn’t only a memorial. It was also a celebration of the spirit of the folks who survived and their city as well as a sign of solidarity with those who continue to struggle to recover. I caught only bits and pieces of the day’s events on the news but was impressed by and grateful for their attention to the people involved rather than to the crime committed. By all accounts, it was a good day, but also a hard day. Tragedy often...

From where I stand, spring should soon be on the way. But given that I stand in the beautiful Twin Cities of Minnesota, spring might not actually come for another month or more. That’s because, obviously, we live in the Upper Midwest, with an emphasis on “upper.” But when I remember that there are whole countries further north of me – Canada immediately, Norway, Finland, and vast portions of Russia further away, I both keep my delayed-spring complaints in check and, frankly, give thanks I’m not living even further north. 🙂 Of course, if I did live further north, I might from time to time have a chance to...

Make that “Pictures of the Week”! Whatever claims Memorial Day may have to marking the beginning of summer, to me it doesn’t really seem to get going until the first week of July. So much of what is quintessentially summer – from picnics and fireworks to sporting competitions – seems to take place this week. So here are five pics that hardly tell the full tale of this first full week of summer — I mean, no European Cup, Olympic Trials, or Wimbledon! — but nevertheless certainly hint at all that’s been going on. I hope you are having a grand summer! July 3, 2012. Fireworks light up the sky...