In the photograph the tractor is near the middle just above the band of sun lit grass. In the alpine-glow mowing continues until the last light of evening.
City government doesn't make allowances or subsididies to a small farm within the city. A failed city farm has to abide by the city's laws. The grass has to be cut before July 1st.
Never appreciated the neighbor's barn as much as I do now knowing either next year or the following year our back yard country view could be lost to development. Thankfully the property has not been sold yet.
The farm was once an orchard, then horse and sheep ranch, Christmas tree farm, cow pasture, and wood lot. A number of neighbors would like to own a part of it to preserve the country life here. Not feasible to the owner! To come out of the deal economically, the owner needs cash payment in total. Banks would not carry loans to multiple parties so the land cannot be broken up into too many parts. Another question is would the place still have a farm referral after the failure of the wood lot due to the loss of diseased, climate change stressed fur timber. City taxes and regulations are set to aid developers at the expense of small farms within the city limits.
Then I became aware of an article about my swashbuckler great uncle. I do not mind that it is a compilation of specially selecting stories to characterize him as a "Charming Gangster". The author, a New York best seller novelist qualified his article by saying these are stories circulating. Stories could be tall tales. Being his admirer, I know much more about his generous deeds. Yes, I know I am biased and he may well have been shady. I am not heavily into defending him.
What was upsetting to me is to learn a theory about the family surname was spun to make my great uncle seem worse than he was. Furthermore there was no drastic change of our name. Apparently the author spoke to one of my cousins who unknowingly passed my theory on as very likely. Since I circulated my wrong ideas to relatives in 2012, new information puts considerable doubt on my past theory. Our name did not have any more of a change than different spellings translated to different languages. Weidler to Widler!
So in a later blog, maybe this Fall after my painting spree, I plan to write a blog about how my theory spread outside the family and was applied to the wrong family member. Maybe I will succeed at tracing the trail of how my utterance became twisted into a supposed fact.
The process of spin in retelling stories is important in our age of fake news. This little incident of past history where nobody is nolonger emotionally invested, could be more readily absorbed.
2 comments:
When the first Trueaxes came to America in 1624, they spelled it this way du Trieux. As I traced the lineage, I saw it change time and again in censuses to the point today that a person would have no idea who was an ancestor and who was not-- or maybe all were with changing e or a and mostly nobody still had the i. I don't know if people did it deliberately but it's common enough and with no real ulterior motive that i can discern.
Too bad on your land that the owner doesn't want to see it preserved for nature. Too bad cities don't give benefits to those who do that as wild places are needed so much.
North Albany does have a wetlands and two parks. Preserving our favorite paradise as is would mean serious upkeep to prevent a fire hazard. I hope the city will be generous and not fine for these unmowed grasses. Certainly they are not equiped to mow it as they do small lots.
Interesting change in your family name. The French would not pronounce the "X". But in translation by the non French speakers that changed.
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