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OLD STUFF: DISMANTLING A FAMILY HOME Experts suggest different routes – one can either rent the dumpsters and rifle it all in blindfolded, hire a company to do a tag sale, or one can go through every single room, drawer, shoe box, or whatever kind of receptacle that can hold ‘stuff’ and decide carefully […]
Christmas Traditions: Including the Possible Meaning of Old & New “Stuff” Read More »
2022 Surf Spots and Shops near Books on the Pond Charlestown, Rhode Island I’ve often wondered as a Northeastern skier if surfing in New England gets a similar rap. Is Rhode Island going to rank near Hawaii or Montauk, Long Island or the Jersey Shore for riding waves? After returning to skiing after a
Surf Spots and Shops in South County, Rhode Island Read More »
Charlestown is uniquely positioned to offer a good day of bird watching in South County, Rhode Island. The grass meadows and woods and the shoreline provide abundant and safe nesting places for varieties of species. Ornithologists and amateur bird watchers (a.k.a. citizen scientists) from all over New England travel here to catch seeing birds and/or
Birdwatching in South County, Rhode Island Read More »
The Scent of New Books Many people stop in and ask if we can take their old books. We wish we could (we don’t) and we are absolutely sure that someone else will enjoy them. Then there are others who don’t want to buy new books. They have enough books. They have no space for
What makes a new book so special? Read More »
As Easter approaches and the sun promises spring, I want to hold onto my happy expectation as long as possible. Admittedly this was a bizarre winter, in some way made bearable by the fact that since everyone else was hunkering down, I did not have much FMAO. This is apparently a texting acronym for a
Kingston, Rhode Island Train Station: A Good Place for Embarking Somewhere along the line I stopped writing down my resolutions. Perhaps life got too busy trying to keep them. Every New Year’s Eve, attempts at change would be written in my journal. Somewhere in June, I would flip back its pages and try and
Making Resolutions 2021 Read More »
This Advent This is my second December as a retailer and it can not be more different than 2019. Last year, Lauren Classey organized an amazing Fifth Annual Charlestown Holiday Ramble. We had a lively time wrapping books as gifts; watching the original Grinch try and steal Christmas, and eating chili outdoors around a
How Does Joy Arrive? Read More »
Forcing Gratitude never quite works as well as a state of natural grace. Thanksgiving also requires honesty regarding reconciling the fairy tale we learned in the middle grades with the actual story of our country’s beginnings with respect to the treatment of the native Americans or Indigenous Peoples. Then there is all that food; elastic
2021 Thanksgiving Reading Read More »
Is it ever time to make your classic book change? Do you have scary stories on the ready for your Halloween, past and present? On special days, those rich with cultural traditions, we often live the stories that we once read and remember. For All Hallow’s Eve, stuffed black birds with pointed beaks
Scary Stories for Halloween: Past and Present Read More »
BoP’s AUGUST READING The Second World War ended seventy-five years ago, the anniversary year of the Covid-19 pandemic. Although we postponed most of our readings and events this summer, author and historican Christian McBurney, decided, after viewing our grounds, that he could share his seventh book with fifteen of us (the number currently allowed for
Recognizing the End of World War II at BoP, 2020 Read More »