Columbia County Life

It's not hard to understand how golf gets...let's say...under your skin...into your psyche...here's why. Today I made my maiden voyage onto Meadowgreens golf course in Claverack with my favorite golf pro buddy, Lucas Cohen (Start to Finish Golf), and my favorite girl golfer and best bud, Laura Vonk. We schedule to go on a Monday so it's deserted. This is by design I believe to take the pressure off of a newbie like me. Since all this started, I've practiced at the driving range, but I have not really stepped onto the course. It's daunting. It's vast. Everything is green and looks really far away. I feel like Horton in Who-ville...me and 500 acres of grass and greens. It's ok because I have Lucas and Laura and hell, no one's watching. What I love about Lucas (including the fact that he's got the most perfect boyish smile, which he gleans as often as possible), is that he's a true professional and he brings his best each time you take a...

So this post is about the death of friends. I know, it's a horrible subject. The reality is this. Friends die. Pets die...we're in line for this same thing and time, time is swift. I want to honor the first friend that passed recently, Marybeth Gotchall. Marybeth and I met over 20 years ago. She was part of a pack of people I hung out with when I first moved to Old Chatham in 1990. We were younger, much younger. I was merely 29 years old. Though Marybeth was older by about 10 years. She was single.  I was newly divorced. We melded together with a bunch of boys who were also single. We had a blast together... this motley crew... this little rat pack. What was interesting about Marybeth was that unlike the rest of us, she had a young daughter, she had a cool cat named Bubba and her attitude toward life was very, let's say, Buddhist. It may have seemed that she just didn't give a crap about things, but that was just an illusion. She cared, but remained unattached. This...

This is a highly personal question. I know. Where do you find peace? It's something I think about. I'm experimenting here. I had an experience last night I'd like to share. Confession. I'm not a stickler for where to find peace. I don't judge. A few examples are: I find peace when I'm riding. I like to walk. I'm good at sitting in meditation. I'm at peace with my cat in my lap. I love being by the water.  A few moments of silence for me goes a long way. I find peace and fulfillment in a room full of yoga practitioners chanting OM. My heart opens, I stop thinking, I'm filled with joy. This may or may not be your experience. I'm opening the discussion widely. While in Manhattan recently, I have been back to visit several Catholic churches. I was reminded how Peace lives there. Let me back up and set this in context. I was raised in a rather strict Catholic home. My father and mother were both raised Catholic. My mother's family is Italian...

Ok, so this blog post is about golf. Wait. Before you skip ahead or turn this off I have to say this...I realized I'm not too old to learn something new. For reasons I'll discuss in later posts, I asked my friend Laura if she'd take a golf lesson with me. She said sure, and she said she could suggest a good golf pro not far from where we both live in Columbia County. His name is Lucas Cohen and he runs Start to Finish Golf in Claverack on Route 9H just before you get to the new Hannafords (we all need some landmarks). Anyway, I didn't think much about the golf thing. Actually, like most people, I thought it would be perfectly deadly, boring, ho-hum, what's all the fuss, a club, a ball...zzzzz. And Hey, I ride horses, that's about as thrilling as sports get as far as I am concerned. But I went because, well, I wanted to see what it was all about and take a turn at hitting those little balls right into their little cups. Someone should have scrawled "NEWBI...

I wrote a book. I wrote a book of stories. I wrote a book of stories about history. I wrote a book of stories about the history of Columbia County, NY. This book's stories are beautiful and bizarre. Above all, these stories are true. I want to say I loved writing this book. Let me go back to the time when I was eight years old. Without my mother's knowledge, in the summer without a lot to do, I did something indulgent. At this moment I can't remember what magazine it was, but in the magazine was a book club, and  I signed up for one of those mail order book deals. It was impulsive, I admit it, because at the time I didn't have a way to pay for the books that would soon be coming in the mail. I did it anyway because the idea of it sounded, rather, delicious. When I was a kid reading was a true joy, an amazing adventure into imagination. It was wonderfully solitary and satisfying. It was private, it was personal, it was something I could do for myself, by myself, witho...

Ok so here's a disclaimer. I'm a vegetarian trying to eat in restaurants in Chatham near where I live. I like not having to cook, especially in the summer so here's my experience. I like Destinos on Main Street in Chatham for a couple of reasons. It has an outdoor patio, which I love, even though it has a view of the busiest corner/traffic light in Chatham. In summer, who wants to sit in a stuffy dining room on a beautiful night. I also like their happy hour, and the friendly staff serving at the bar and elsewhere. There isn't a lot of attitude among the waitstaff and as a matter of fact, I find them quite attentive. If you get there early, they serve you free chips with guacamole, sour cream and my favorite, this amazing salsa. As far as I'm concerned, everyone should go there just to taste this salsa. I could be wrong, but I think the chef there must put tequila in it because I always feel pretty good eating it. Either way, it's super with big chunks of flavor...

Behind every great thing in Columbia County is an amazing person. This blog is about yoga. It's been about 4 years since I received my yoga teacher training certificate in Hudson, but that's not what this is about. Well, not exactly. I want to shine a light on the amazing Sadhana yoga studio and its owner/creator, Sondra Loring.  Let me roll back time just to set the scene. I had practiced yoga for many years in the Berkshires at Kripalu (didn't live there when it was an Ashram, but did work there directing the communications for a bit). My first really amazing teacher here in Columbia County was Keli Lelita (aka Kate Reddy) who was teaching a bunch of us first in a friend's basement (yep, pre-the yoga boom) and then in her lovely converted barn. Our little core group practiced under Kate's unbelievable direction for four full years. As life would have it, the yoga group dissolved and Kate now teaches at her place and in Hudson. this blogger stretching ...

So for anyone who knows me, the fact that I ride (horses that is) is no secret. I’ve been riding in Columbia County since I moved here full time in 1989. Yep, that long. I’ve probably sat on over 100 different horses and been in multiple barns from the Berkshires and back. I’ve spent a lot of time riding in Malden Bridge and of course, Old Chatham, the epicenter for riders now, in the past, and probably in the future. This post is about riding and the critical role of saddles. In sitting on over 100 horses ("sitting on" the colloquial term in riding for “having ridden”), I’ve also probably sat in more than 150 saddles. Most of them were pure crap, broken, second hand, or just cheap. This happens when you’re first learning, you’re under the impression that a saddle is a saddle. Kind of the “one-size fits all” theory. This couldn’t be more wrong. It would be like assuming that my shoes would fit your kid or your husband. Saddle fitting is truly an art form, and often ...

So my friend Lisa posts on her Facebook page Saturday night that she has been really sick and hasn't been out of the house in five days. I know she's on deadline to finish her book (the History of Hudson) so I call her to see what's up? She didn't want to trouble her friends, she says,  but tells me she'd really like to go the emergency room. I'm house sitting for another friend so I say, "I can be there in ten minutes." Now mind you, I hate the emergency room just as much as the next guy, but I'm foregoing personal preferences for a friend in need. I pick her up at her house just outside downtown Hudson. It's early Saturday night and lots of people are hanging out getting some night air. Lisa looks rather dreadful, her face is swollen, her eyes are puffy, but she doesn't need to hear that. I load her in the car, and she tells me she thinks she has Lyme disease. Columbia Memorial is a fairly big place. As a matter if fact I was once tre...

Living in Columbia County, New York, is a minute-to-minute, changing experience. One day life here can be simply about surviving three feet of snow that's accumulated near your front door when you only expected a dusting or a manageable inch of fluffy stuff. The next could be about saving an historic site that you've driven past a hundred and fifty times and wondered when that old house was built and who lived there. On any given day your attention might be centered on finding a restorative yoga class to rest your stressed mind, or securing the services of a caterer who can help you serve 100 people an organic brunch on a budget. Yes, it's that diverse. I've learned, no matter where you live, life is never one thing, it's everything. And that's what we have here. A growing community made up of people who are diverse, devoted, and different, because they're intentionally living here, in this unique corner of New York, Columbia County. I'm one of them....