A Month in Connecticut

Today marks—hard to believe!—a month that I’ve been living with my brother in Cornwall, Connecticut.  The October trees have flamed and thinned and I’ve raked the lawn into wheelbarrows full of brown leaves to cart into the back field; the crisp scent of autumn fills the air; at night Orion heels over the silhouetted evergreens and the wavy belt of the Milky Way stands crystal clear, splitting the sky over the roof of the house.  My childhood home has been a beautiful place to camp for a while.

Ben has been an excellent host, putting up with me for a month.  He’s been cooking delicious dinners, and in return I’ve tried to be a helpful boarder, buying groceries and doing bits of needed maintenance like cutting down some thorn bushes that had grown up against the house.  We’ve settled into a comfortable, perhaps too comfortable, routine: with both of us on vacation, as it were, the days blur one into another.  In the mornings over coffee, the TV news reminds me that I’m really back in the United States of Absurdia.  In the afternoons I walk the country roads or we trek through the woods together.  Evenings we’ve been advancing through the fun Marvel superhero series on Netflix that I never saw: “Jessica Jones,” “Daredevil”...

In terms of my purposes for being here, I have good news, bad news, and expensive news, as follows: 

• Helping Ben find a job: victory!  With my assistance he landed a part-time waiter gig at a local retreat center, though it doesn’t start for another three weeks.  I’m still looking to find him something else with which to supplement it, as that alone won’t meet his bills.
• Selling land: fail!  I have some land here for sale, and was hoping to unload it this year, but unfortunately Cornwall has fallen into an epochal buyers’ market, with dozens of properties listed.  Not sure why.  But after meeting with my real estate agent I see no likelihood of selling my piece for what it’s worth anytime soon.
• A cheap road-trip month: Whoops.  One goal of spending a month here was to ease my travel budget, but wouldn’t you know it: my Miata’s clutch finally failed for good and needed to be replaced!  An $1100 bill.  Still, better to have it happen here than when I cross the country in winter...

The main thing my brother and I share in common is a love of music, and Ben, who plays a mean blues guitar, has introduced me to the Northwest Connecticut music scene.  Each Thursday he plays at a friendly open-mic night in the town of Norfolk, often with his friend Jason, and I’ve gone along as a percussionist.  Of course, I don’t have any drums here, but in true percussionist fashion I made do with a metal popcorn tin (it had a great sound, though up on stage the lid did tend to pop off mid-song).  There’s a good music community here with a lot of skilled performers; the open-mic evenings tend to end with a fun general jam session, and overall it’s made me miss my drumming roots.

Ben and I onstage at the Infinity Music Hall in Norfolk, CT

When our turn was done I took photos of the other performers, where I really missed my defunct Canon T6i: my iPad camera just doesn’t do too well in low light.  Still, it was worth capturing the bevy of eclectic New England characters strutting their respective stuff.

    Ben and his friend Jason