Alexandersmap

    Month: August 2018

    • Northeastern Forests

      Northeastern Forests

      I recently finished reading The Hidden Life of Trees, a profoundly interesting book that taught me something new about the forests and the tress around me than I’d ever thought possible.  The relationship of trees to the fungal network they’re connected to, the way the support each other with sugar through that network.  How they migrate over the years.  Incredible book.

      Of course, it got me thinking about the forests around me.  I’ve long appreciated the forests of the Northeast United States and Eastern Canada.  Driving north through Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Western Massachusetts you ride through miles and miles of forest.  Upstate New York, for all it’s farmland, is still, or rather once again heavily wooded.  Even Connecticut and Rhode Island have heavy percentages of their land wooded.

      Encroaching developments eat into this magnificent green blanket, and the trees that once stood where developments are going up end up as firewood, lumber, bark mulch or paper products.  A little piece of me dies when I see lots being cleared.  I’m not opposed to development, I just greatly prefer the woods.

      I was talking to a friend of mine about a place where we once camped on New Year’s Eve.  We drove deep into the woods as far as his car could go in the deep snow and hiked in to a favorite spot of his.  We lit a bonfire and drank beer and listened to the coyotes in the still night.  I woke up in the middle of the night to embers melting into the plastic outer shell of my sleeping bag as my buddy stoked the fire up and howled at the coyotes.  We still laugh about that night almost 30 years later.  He mentioned to me that it’s now a development with hundreds of houses.

      I imagine that’s how the Native Americans felt when they watched the deep forests that generations walked through were felled for ship masts and houses.  Roads were cut in, and the sprawl began, rapidly displacing those who came before.  Through it the trees survived to fight another day.  Where once a farmer’s field lay claim to the land a forest has reclaimed it.  Most of the forests I drive through as I travel New England are new growth – reclaiming the land over the last century or so.  There’s a measure of hope in that, balanced with caution.

    • Bloody Brook

      There’s a tiny brook that flows from Searles Pond near Holy Family Hospital and feeds into the Spicket River just before it in turn feeds the Merrimack River in Lawrence.  It’s name betrays a violent history, long before Lawrence and Methuen become heavily developed urban environments.  Google has led me a couple of times to a very useful site that details the history of Methuen and some of the surrounding area that once was part of Methuen.  You can Magenweb here.

      The name Bloody Brook was said by George Frederick, late town treasurer and authority on Indian lore, to come from a terrific battle between the Agawams and the Tarrantines in the days before the English settlement. As near as white men could tell after they came, about September 1615 the Tarrantine Indians of Maine had a poor harvest so they invaded the Merrimack Valley to raid the fields,and naturally the local Indians resisted as best they could. It is said that clubs and stone axes, rather than arrows, were found in this area, indicating the closeness of combat. 

      The Tarrantines were part of the larger Mi’kmaq tribe of coastal Native Americans who lived from Maine to Newfoundland.  For them to make the long trip down to what is now Methuen to raid the fields of the Agawam speaks to their desperation.  There is another famous Bloody Brook that points towards the better-known history of conflict between the white settlers and Native American population.We hear a lot about the encroachment of European settlers in the area and the conflicts that arose with the Native American population as a result.  The conflict between tribes is a lesser known, but no less violent history of the land we live on today.  Names like this dot the map, just waiting for someone to remember the ghosts who once inhabited this land.

       

    • Straightening the Spicket

      Straightening the Spicket

      The Spicket River flows from New Hampshire into the Merrimack River in Lawrence, Massachusetts.  The river has changed over the years, particularly during the explosive development of Lawrence and Methuen in the Industrial Revolution.  By the late 1880’s the City of Lawrence had enough of the typhoid breeding ground that the river had become and decided to straighten the river.  Looking at the first map from the 1850’s followed by a Google map from 2018 you see just how much they changed the Spicket River in the Lawrence stretch.

      Unfortunately, they didn’t dig the channel deep enough and the river bed can’t handle the floodwater that were once absorbed by the natural flow of the meandering river that once flowed through the city.      Heavy rains combined with spring melt-off creates a flood plain that makes some areas of the city impassible.  Perhaps no place carries this burden more than Central Catholic High School, which sits right where the the flood plain once acted as a sponge for the river.  The city doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to correct the situation, so every few years there’s a lake where the CCHS parking lot once was.  The price of progress, or the price of poor engineering?

    • Good As It’s Been To Me: The Genius of the Avett Brothers in Four Songs

      Good As It’s Been To Me: The Genius of the Avett Brothers in Four Songs

      The Avett Brothers’s music is a lot like a tidal river; always shifting, complex and different.  Like many people I started listening as they hit a national audience with the I and Love and You album, then the Avett Brothers Live, Vol. 3 album and concert video, and finally when I got to see them live, where I learned just how electrifying they are with a crowd.

      I know what you’re saying, you’ve heard one or two of their hit songs, probably I and Love and You and Ain’t No Man, and maybe they’re okay but not your style.  Maybe you view banjo as a little too Americana for your tastes.  Well, if that’s the case then you’re missing out on some great music.  Like the songs themselves there are many layers to the Avett Brothers.  The songs are intricate creations built like melodic Penrose Stairs; uniquely complex but also highly listenable gems.  Scott and Seth – to me – are like Lennon-McCartney or John-Taupin in the way they feed off each other to build a memorable song.  Bold comparison?  Perhaps, but I believe their life’s work will stand up well against other legendary writing duos.  So here are four songs that illustrate the incredible range and complexity of the Avett Brothers:

      The Once and Future Carpenter  The Avetts craft songs that take you on a journey, and this song exemplifies that.  The central message is living your life following your own true north, so you don’t regret it on your death bed.  Old souls these Avett Brothers.  This kind of deep thinking about our mortality is usually reserved for the end of an artist’s career, not the middle of it.

      Forever I will move like the world that turns beneath me
      And when I lose my direction I’ll look up to the sky
      And when the black dress drags upon the ground
      I’ll be ready to surrender, and remember
      We’re all in this together
      If I live the life I’m given, I won’t be scared to die

      Pretty Girl from Chile  To really know the complexity of an Avett Brother’s song, look no further than this one.  The studio version is a roller coaster ride of deep climbs and plummets, hard turns and a racing heart.  A live performance adds a triple shot of espresso with a Red Bull chaser.  These are great musicians, and it takes a song like this to really hammer that point home.  From the moment Scott grabs your full attention with his piercing, evangelistic voice they’ve got you:

      I’m no more than a friend girl
      I can see that you need more
      My boots are on my feet now
      My bag is by the door

      This song has everything – starting with Scott’s powerful lead vocal and rapid fire lyrics to quick instrument changes that weave us between bluegrass, flamenco and alternative rock in the same song.  Seth is the engine behind this song with incredible range in his guitar playing and harmonies with Scott woven throughout the song.

      Laundry Room  There were big hits on the I and Love and You album.  The title track for sure, and Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise and Kick Drum Heart rightfully got a lot of airplay.  Great songs every one, but to me Laundry Room is the emotional core of this album.  The song that sneaks up on you, gives you a bear hug and won’t let go.

      Stop your parents’ car
      I just saw a shooting star
      We can wish upon it
      We won’t share the wish we made
      But I can’t keep no secrets
      I wish that you would always stay

      Lovely song that stays with you when you’ve let it into your heart.  The live versions I’ve seen just completely grab the audience and take them for a ride.  And every listen does just that.

      I am a breathing time machine.  I’ll take you all for a ride.

      No Hard Feelings  A masterpiece of looking at our own mortality and the dynamics of love and loss.  This song may ultimately be the signature song for the band, like Stairway to Heaven is for Led Zeppelin.  Neither band is a one hit wonder by any stretch, but respectively these songs demonstrate a pinnacle of creative writing for each band.  The Avett Brothers may yet top No Hard Feelings, but it feels like a song with the staying power and genius of Stairway to Heaven.  Look, I know the band isn’t at that Led Zep megastar level yet, and perhaps they never will be, but the point is they’re brilliant musicians and this song will be a highlight of their career catalog.

      When my body won’t hold me anymore 
      And it finally lets me free 
      Where will I go? 

      Sure, there are a lot of great bands out there making great music.  This one is my favorite of the last decade.  I could have picked four different songs with the same emotional impact.  There’s just so much to this band to love.  The harmonies between the two brothers is exceptional, and there’s a tightness to the band molded out of years of touring.  I’m looking forward to seeing where they take us next.