You and I have had memorable days. I remember the day I cut off my right shinbone with an ax. I remember posing for Andy Wyeth, and I remember playing for a dance at Rockland High School the same December day I rolled over in my Model T Ford.
I remember the first time I used a telephone, and I remember the day I went to Waldoboro so Sam Pennington could show me the internet. I remember feeling sorry for myself on my 21st and 40th birthdays. I remember the day Roosevelt died and the organ music that pre-empted my “Tom Mix” radio program, and I remember two of my more recent weddings.
Of course there are those other never-to-be-forgotten days that you and I will prudently keep to ourselves.
Although Saturday started out like any day here at the farm, it ended up with an unforgettable surprise and we should talk about it.
At 8 a.m., there were six guests wolfing fresh blueberry cake and eggs made to order at Marsha’s bed-and-breakfast table. George, John, Denise and Ann are regulars who come to the St. George book sale every year. An astrophysicist, also named John, and Beth Ann were here for Paul Dalrymple’s Antarctican Society reunion.
John said that Admiral Byrd’s grandson spoke, and there is talk of retrieving a plane the admiral left behind on one of his expeditions.
From this it is obvious that my neighbor, Dr. Dalrymple, is a unique person, and for that alone he warrants space here: A week ago I found myself seated next to him at the monthly St. George Grange supper, where we had a nice conversation over Sally’s beans and Carol’s homemade bread. Because of the din in the hall, neither one of us heard a word the other one said.
Earlier this summer, Dr. Dalrymple, who is 92 or so and runs around with a fathom of pot warp holding up his pants, told me he wore the rope because he got tired of taking off his suspenders to get through security at airports. I don’t know about you, but I have a great deal of admiration for anyone who can outwit Cerberus.
Our six guests weren’t out of the house before two of Marsha’s old friends dropped by and invited us to help them squander their children’s inheritance down on the Continent.
I was trying to assimilate this good news while cleaning up the breakfast dishes and washing the sheets from five beds when two new friends from Weeks Mills drove in the yard. They claim to be addicted to my TV show, they are my doctor’s parents, and they wanted to see our Grange Hall. One program shows a foolish old man on the Grange porch roof, putting a 20-foot wooden sign on the front of the Grange Hall. One slip and he would have broken his neck.
They’d no sooner left when two young women came by. I recently saw an article one of them wrote about Andy Wyeth. When I sent her a piece I wrote about Andy the day he died, she asked if she could visit.
In my essay, which you can read online, I mentioned that in 1951, Andy arranged to boat across the river and have me pick him up down at Lou’s shore in my ’32 Ford. We drove up to our church, where I stood on the belfry steps while he did sketches for a painting called “Toll Rope.”
I explained that he had left me out of the final draft, but that 50 or so years later he had written beside that picture, in a book of his prints, that I had posed for the picture, and that I had been left out of the final draft. Andy said the sketches were lost.
Reading this, one of these wonderful women dug around until she found those sketches and brought me a copy of one that shows me on the steps. The original is in a museum in Detroit.
In comparing the sketch with the final painting, one sees that the rope that gives the painting its name comes through the middle of my face. I hope that is why I was left out.
The picture is copyrighted, and my friend said that although I can hang it on the wall, I can’t post a picture of it on the internet.
Saturday was an unforgettable day. It is not often that someone gives you a picture Andy Wyeth did of you, even if it is only a copy. The last time I saw the original to that sketch was in 1951. When we finished up, I remember thinking that the guy in the drawing didn’t look like me.
Unfortunately, photographs do.
The humble Farmer can be seen on Community Television in and near Portland and visited at his website:
www.thehumblefarmer.com/MainePrivateRadio.html
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