Editor’s Note: The beauty of this Piedmont morning is palpable yet serene. The air embraces a pleasant coolness, betraying summer’s arriving warmth that will sweep over us in the coming days. There are a few white puffs in the depths of brilliant and unambiguous blue above the Farm. The trees that ring the pasture shiver in a cascade of fresh dancing green. It is a triumph of nature, the regeneration nearly complete and prepared to bring us the summer of swelter. But not yet. These last days of a passing season still dance with vitality. Accordingly, the Production Meeting was captured by a general spirit of insouciance. The mood was tempered by the application of an early lunch not conducted in one of the vehicles parked near the Loading Dock. To accommodate necessity, we agreed to ignore the great events of the day and veer off the approved production plan to accommodate Marlow’s mood.

It is one we find ourselves sharing. This change of season reflects the larger movement of the heavens, gradual but inexorable. The Production meeting had been wrestling with the stories from Raccoon Ford, just down the lane, and the sundry reasons 100,000 young men clad in various colors walked these gentle lanes with malice or virtue aforethought. Our nation survived all that, not that it was certain at the time. We may be confronting something akin to that now, or not. Our Presidential duo has returned to safety within our borders. It has been a fascinating five months, hasn’t it? But Marlow’s thoughts help focus those of the Editorial Board.

– Vic

Author’s note: Buzzy’s obit caused me to pause and reflect during the past two weeks on our separate but parallel journeys during life’s last phases. I chose to see it as our trek to one final rock and roll concert. So, please bear with me for this brief and hopefully last detour from my Savannah tales thread.

– Marlow
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As our own darkness approaches, we descend slowly bit by bit into a small place where our riding and driving will cease, and we must then walk to our journey’s end. We’ll see large walls of rock strewn and verdant hills rise starkly above and around us. As we depart this dreary waystation, we’ll get an initial wisp of a feeling that will become an ever-increasing sense that we are crawling, like a wounded beast into some box canyon in those enormous hills to die.

The destination is like a personal Altamont Free Concert. No Woodstock Music Festival for us with its careful planning and funding, this will be a largely improvised affair featuring, of course, lots of Rolling Stones (some call it to this day their best live performance). It won’t even have a definite venue arranged until just days before the event’s final curtain call.

Our unseen handlers will strain as we slowly proceed up and down these mountain roads. Our spirits will lift a little. with each ridge crested accompanied by crescendoing tunes like Life in the Fast Lane only to sink again when faced with yet another uphill climb. We must not let these gray-golden days in our late Novembers diminish us with their chilled, bright, and windy weather. Sure, there will be a sharp bite and sparkle in these hills air, but they will still be impressively close, immense, clean, and vitalizing. On our final ridge climb, the trees will rise above us gaunt, stark, and almost leafless. The sky will fill with windy white rags of clouds, and thick blades of mist will wash slowly around and over our faces.

As we summit, we’ll see below our rocky beds and perhaps we’ll spy little dots below — the others — treading their way up the coiling paths towards their own Altamonts. We’ll sweat no more atop these peaks among these soaring and lordly ranges that melt away in purple mists.

In the haunting eternity of these mountain tops, we’ll sprawl out upon this new land. Our hearts will be lifted and no longer under anyone’s thumb.

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