This charming little edifice is one of the nice little surprises of the path. It's a memorial to somebody. I think I would prefer this to a tombstone for my own self when the time comes.
Onto each beautiful bike path a substation must fall.
Remember what I said about some of the local maple trees rushing into their fall colors? It was true.
It was not a work day for me today but in an uncharacteristic show of effort, I went to the office anyway. Mostly I went in to fill out a time sheet and an expense report but I also checked email and phone messages. Oh, and on the way out of town, it occurred to me that I had just time enough before it was time for my son's dental appointment to stop by my favorite antique store, M. Lewis of Waterbury.
Talk about Aladdin's Cave! "M" stands for Martha and she and I had a nice chat over my purchase of the most beautiful teacup in the world back in April. She wasn't there today; the store is usually manned (resist snide comment here) by her helper. While he was wrapping up my teapot and plate (coming up in just a moment) he told me that Martha's weakness, the one that eventually led her into the antiques trade and this store, was for teacups and teapots. I sensed she was a kindred soul...
This is just one of several tea cup displays in her shop. It's like a kind of pornography for me.
My grandparents had this same bit of needlework on the wall of their dining room for as long as they had a dining room. My mother and her twin sister bought it for them when they were little girls. I am tempted each time I go in the shop to buy it. I always think, well, that's pretty good, isn't it? Is more ambition than that necessary or even desirable? Dime store profundity. Sign me up. Except now that this is out of Woolworth's and in an antique store it costs 35 dollars. I'll make do with the picture...
And, at last, today's purchases. Yes, another plate. Didn't I ask someone to stop me before I bought another plate? Of course, none of you few dear readers was around to stay my grasp. This lovely old "flow brown" platter just called to me and I answered the call. I don't know if there is such a thing as "flow brown" but the blurring of the image makes me think it isn't transfer ware or that it is some particular flowy kind of transfer ware. It has a great horking crack in it to, which accounts for it's thirty dollar price tag (undamaged it would have been a lot more). I got them to knock three dollars off the price in combo with the teapot, which also got a three dollar discount off its 20 dollar price;
et enfin, the teapot. I defy anyone to say that this is not a super cool teapot that could have been owned by Gladys Peto (see the sidebar) or Buck Rogers or someone similarly fabulous and or fictional. It is English, no doubt dating from the 20s and 30s. It is crazed and stained and has a little scrape on the lid, but the shape, oh the shape. Watch out! It may take flight at any moment.
This teapot, maybe with a better picture, is going to have to find a place in the sidebar, it is just that wonderful.
Here, by way of a postscript, is a poor little picture of the Made in Japan bookends I picked up at that other little antique shop I wrote about recently. That place is basically a junk shop without pretensions to being anything else and the prices reflect that sensibility. These were, some of you may recall, 2 dollars.
And last, but not least, this is the book I have been reading, page by page, for the last several weeks. You know how I am about Handsome Books. Isn't this a beauty? It may have more detail about Alfred than we care to know (all those "Ethels", i.e., Ethelbald, Ethelred, Ethelbert, Ethelswith, Ethelthis, Ethelthat); but it is actually very well written by a lady Oxford scholar. It is ex at least two libraries; the Craftsbury Academy Library and the Bolton Public Library. I bought it at the book sale at the Stowe Library, though I don't think it was in their collection. Another 2 dollars well spent.
