Gardening

I have never enjoyed gardening more in my life than I

do this year. Even the mosquitoes don't seem to bother me as much.

Maybe it isn't that it is growing as much as it is what is growing. For you see I am growing plants from seeds of love. These tiny seeds that I received from friends this year, seeds I planted as our friendships began and I am watching them blossom and grow everyday. When I sit quietly in my garden and weed and tend it I feel their presence with me.

These women, farmgirls, friends.

Chautauqua

Miller Bell Tower, Chautauqua Lake NY
Hall of Philosophy
Athenaeum Hotel
Reading on a typical Chautauqua porch

I had promised to post this essay I wrote many years ago . Not surprising i have found farmgirls who know of or who have been to Chautauqua. Chautauqua Institution is a wonderful place. My dad found it when I was 5. He liked it because it was close to home (200 miles) and had so much intellectual activities he could enjoy. So off we went for a short 2 week stay. Then the next year it was 3 weeks and finally we were spending our summers there for 9 glorious weeks a year. I learned many lessons there as well. I went to club and learned to sail, even got my skippers certification. Spent many hours in the craft room making boondoggle neckalces and key rings, painting pottery and making all sorts of stuff.

Unlike most famlies that summered there, we did not own property nor have the wherewithall to do so as most of the 1800's houses were well over a million dollars even back then. We did rent a room, one for me and one for my folks, in a rooming house. The bathroom was down the hall and on the main floor was a community kitchen. I loved it. Most of the hotels there offered a room and meals so as a teenager I would stay at the hotel and serve 3 meals a day to the customers. I also worked at the childrens school for several years. It was a great place for a college student to work during the summer break.

Miscellaneous Facts About Chautauqua

The Chautauqua Institution was founded in 1874 by Lewis Miller, an Akron, OH, inventor and manufacturer; and John Heyl Vincent, a Methodist minister (later bishop).

The Chautauqua Institution is a National Historic District, listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It was designated a National Historic Landmark June 30, 1989.

Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered his "I Hate War" speech from the Amphitheater platform in 1936.

Ronald Reagan addressed the Third General Chautauqua Conference on U.S.-Soviet Relations via satellite in 1987.

Carlos Roberto Reina, president of Honduras, was the first foreign sitting head of state to visit Chautauqua. He spoke during the Second Chautauqua Conference on Central America in 1995.

Thomas Edison was the son-in-law of Chautauqua cofounder Lewis Miller.

George Gershwin composed his Concerto in F in a Chautauqua practice shack in 1925.

The Athenaeum Hotel was one of the first hotels to have electric lights.

Kellogg Hall (built 1889) was moved from Bestor Plaza to its present site in 1905.