Last summer I noticed that my cats prefer the flower garden to the vegetable patch. The former’s superior canopy and fortress-like qualities, as well as the feline sense of style, spur the attraction. However, the “keeks” seem also to share a deep sympathy with flowers—“uber” as well as “unten”. I think it’s in their eyes. […]

Published in the 1997 edition of ‘The Bardian’ In May 24, 1996, the day before Bard College’s one hundred thirty-sixth commencement, Bard trustee George Ball, who is chairman, president, and chief executive officer of the giant seed producer W. Atlee Burpee & Co., and poet Robert Kelly, who is Asher B. Edelman Professor of English […]

2006 saw the quiet passing away of two little-known figures of amazing accomplishment. In music, Bobby Doyle and in journalism, Oriana Fallaci. Doyle was a Texas-based composer, jazz pianist and one of the most versatile R & B singers who ever lived. David Letterman asked Kenny Rogers, then at the height of his fame in […]

Three days with no water and electricity—odd how little it bothered me. In fact, it was both amusing and instructive. A psychosomatic spot quiz. The irritation lasted only a few minutes. My dad’s motto, “Expect the worst, and when the good comes, it feels better”, has become meaningful with age. However, I experience a profound sense of detachment at both ends.

Of course, the dogs and cats noticed nothing, which dawned…

“First the house, then the garden . . .” seems to be an inescapable truth of home ownership. Some folks pretend that the garden holds greater sway, pride of place or center stage. However, wake them at 3 A.M. with the question which is more important. They’ll confess their sins. When the kitchen, toilet, easy […]

My latest godson recently visited me. One morning while making home versions of McMuffins—little turkey sausages between oat-floured English muffins, with smoked Gouda slices added to one, alfalfa sprouts to another, little 4-year old Henry looked over to me from his chair-chair and asked, “Uncle George, where are the strawberries?” “I have some nice ones,” […]

Claude Hope was my professional mentor. He was pressed into this service while in his 50s by my father with whom he had worked for many years. Claude was one of the founders of the PanAmerican Seed Company, after working in Costa Rica for already nearly two decades. B. Y. Morrison had sent him down […]

I’ll never forget the colleague, a lady plant breeder, who, while inspecting row after row of late season petunia trials for signs of botrytis resistance, looked up from her stud records and sighed, “I just love being pregnant – if I could, I’d be pregnant all the time”. She revealed on another occasion – I […]

Mediterranean societies view trees as rare and prized possessions. As a result they are seldom found in towns and cities except as monuments or landmarks. Orchards and forests are cultivated away from cities and vice versa. Cemeteries are cleared, as are most sacred places. By contrast, trees thrive in Northern Europe even in the densest […]

Named after ‘Impression Rising Sun’, a painting by Monet, impressionism revolutionized painting to an extent he neither anticipated nor welcomed. “I am in it (the movement) but I seldom see my colleagues . . . the little chapel has become a school that opens its doors to any hack.” A truly inspired and extremely rare […]