Excerpted from “November” in the Floyd County Almanac (unpublished first draft.) …A seriousness settles upon us by mid-November, mornings not light enough to cross the creek to tend the cussed birds until after seven. The board-bridge across Goose Creek is treacherous, enameled with a coating of ice droplets, tossed up by the riffles we will hear … Read more
While man and raven endure a gray, unpleasant day here in Floyd County, our friends and relatives and their’s, on up the coast Jersey and New York, will experience a day that, unfortunately, will only be “unprecedented” by comparison to the past. Evidence is mounting that these once-in-a-1000-years storms will show up on the radar … Read more
It is the last day of October. The winds of superstorm Sandy will deal us only a glancing blow. At first light, inland morning gales smell of sea salt, strong and steady out of the Northeast. Shards of it break into the southern mountains, whistling through trees on ridges, we hunker below on Goose Creek, … Read more
By the turn of the 20th century, Goose Creek was home to an established community of hardscrabble farmers, our level five acres being one of very few tillable plots in this deep cold valley. Watermelons were grown on nearby land so steep [Johnathan Lemuel Boone 200 acres from which our 80 were divided]Â that the ripening … Read more
[Part four of five]Â There was at best a primitive road through the creek bed beyond the three bridges, and the same along the source headwaters of Goose Creek at the time of the Civil War. Consequently, given its isolation and difficulty of access, deserters from both armies are said to have hidden from bounty hunters … Read more
