Carol Blogs

BEING A NEW ENGLANDER

AFTERNOON TEA

My mom was from New York and my Dad was from Western Mass. They met on a singles vacation at a dude ranch in the mid 1940’s.
They had a six month long distance courtship that involved weekend train rides and many letters.
They have both passed away and to honor their 50 year marriage I publicly read their love letters while wearing my moms wedding dress.
The letters were daily updates of building their life together.
As they were looking for an apartment my mom found a perfect apartment in the Upper East Side for $90.00 a month, and my dad found one in Springfield MA. for $45.00 a month.
So they began their life together in New England instead of NY, simple as the affordability of housing.
Several years later my younger brother and I came along.
We spent every weekend in either New York, skiing, or at the beach in Rhode Island…. The car was always packed.
They rented summer homes in Rhode Island and by the time I was 9 years old we owned a second home on the beach.
I remember one very upsetting teenage day sitting on the beach alone at sunset telling myself that the ocean will always be my grounding point, and it is.
A daily 10 minute visit to the ocean brings sanity back to my world.
The pull is even stronger for my brother who became a Lobsterman.
I could move from Rhode Island but I could not move to a place with out extreme New England season changes and the OCEAN.