February 28, 2018

Dear Daddy —

Christian works to reveal o9ne of many wrecks buried under fallen trees and overgrowth–the 1971 Malibu.

It’s going to take years to reclaim the property around this house! Unless I come into a huge, lump sum of money all of a sudden. The back property has as many fallen and broken trees as it has healthy ones. The property around the house is littered with clumps of briars and honeysuckle, with tree stumps or metal debris at their core, making them tricky to take down. You started it years ago, by placing outside the few pieces of equipment too big, too heavy, or in too-bad shape to go inside. 

For years, you at least kept the briars and vines trimmed away from these. You gave up sometime after your 70^th birthday. Then you “hired” some person who said he would take down trees and haul away brush. He cut dozens of trees off at 30 inches, left their stumps, and dumped the trimmings all over the yard—fostering the growth of more brambles. And you had an absolute allergy to ever cutting down any tree, even if it was growing up amidst the branches of another one. We have a lot of work to do. 

This week I had the door put back up between the kitchen and the family room. Yes, the same door, doorjambs and hinges you had used all those years ago. I used a new doorknob from the shelf of door hardware in the metal building. You bought a lot of door hardware! The old doorknob, one with a keyed lock, is here in a box. Probably its original box, if I know you. But it’s in such bad shape that I didn’t want to try and use it. Plus, “it’s here,” only means that I’ve seen it in the last three years. It would probably take me hours to find it. I’m still going through the contents of the living room and the metal building to find tools and building supplies. 

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February 21^st, 2018

Dear Daddy —

Trees. Not spectacular, but we have a lot of them.

This morning I walked the back property. This house sits on 13 acres of mostly wooded land. When you bought the land, it was just a field with maybe a dozen trees. The Simpson family had used it for farming, and it had presumably been kept clear for decades. Since then, trees have grown up everywhere. I was reading up on tree growth after my walk. In 40 – 45 years, 192 trees in excess of 85 feet can be found per acre of wooded land. I wonder how many we have? None of them look that tall. 

A few years before you died, I arranged to have the trees harvested on your land in North Carolina. That’s a forest that’s been a forest a long time—probably your whole life. Our land there used to house a sawmill. The logging trails are still there. We were paid about $2200 per acre for the harvested wood. This lot may not be worth harvesting, to a lumber company, but I think I’ll find out. The money is less of a goal than having a more manageable woods back there. As it is, we have an okay walking trail all around the perimeter, but I’d love to be able to have a nature trail, and perhaps have the clearance sufficient to allow horseback riding. Right now, a walker has to dodge a few vines and low-hanging branches. 

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The dishwasher that waited 50 years to run. Note the disposal that was mounted to the sink all those years ago, only to die a stupid death.

February 14^th, 2018

Dear Daddy —

It’s been two weeks since I’ve written. This past weekend, we held Farpoint, a science fiction convention that Renee and I founded 25 years ago. You attended it once, when it was held on your 74^th birthday in 1996. Michael Ansara joined us for your birthday dinner, and was eager to meet you. As I recall, you spent most of the evening discussing either physics or politics with Yoji Kondo. 

Farpoint always dominates a lot of my time, even though I no longer own it, am no longer in charge of it, and this year declined to accept a job on its committee. People still expect me to be a part of it, and people come to me with their problems to be solved. I’ve learned to accept that, but to try and help on my terms. I feel myself slowing down, after nearly forty years of working at a whirlwind pace. With all that’s left to do in front of me, I have no desire to burn out. I want to be here for my children and be here to see my grandchildren.

Speaking of grandchildren, the ones I gave you are amazing. Ethan is working two jobs and running his website, with a new blog (in your day it was called a “column”) being published every day. He was in charge of hospitality this past weekend, and even some of our hardest-to-please attendees complimented him. He’s hard-working, literate, and, above all, kind. Christian made the Dean’s List at Towson his first semester, also on top of a job, and is carrying 19 credits this Spring. He’s also rehearsing Othello 20 hours a week. He’s determined to complete his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting, somehow also get a degree in Astrophysics, and minor in Deaf Studies. I joke that he’ll be the deaf community’s Neil Degrasse Tyson.

Last night I completed a significant task in the house—at long last, Mother has a working dishwasher and a working garbage disposal!

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