Townsend, MA

Ten and I decided to take what should have been a relatively short, scenic drive up to our fave pot shop in Gardner yesterday. Normally this takes, at most, 90 minutes. Yesterday – Saturday morning – it took THREE bloody hours! There were two car accidents and some road work which mystifyingly slowed traffic to a crawl. Grumble, grumble, grumble.

The day was absolutely gorgeous though. I coulda grabbed some sweet autumn foliage shots withOUT leaving the car (coz we spent so much time at a dead stop) except, here in Massachusetts, according to Fall Foliage live online status reporter, we’re too damn early for the really hot action.  Still and all, we had  a day surrounded by fab, awesome green, leafy trees. Yeah, there was the occasional, odd spot of red and yellow – no brill oranges though.


While we were that far north and west of the city we decided to visit the village of wonderful childhood memories – Townsend. Apart from a strip mall on the outskirts, the place is just as I remember it. OK the haberdashery’s now a convenience store but the bandstand, where bands actually played every weekend in the summer still sits on the town common. St. John’s catholic church, where we went every Sunday, is still there and, just a few houses up Highland Street, across from the cemetery, is that home of sweet, happy recollections.

It’s grey now, not white, but otherwise the same. The door to the attic was in my bedroom which I’d fully anticipated being scary as fuck (I was an imaginative and chickenhearted eight year old – HEY, still am ‘cept for the being eight part) but NO, it wasn't scay at all The attic had two levels – the first was my play room. Up the steps from there? Dunno. Prolly storage…and ghosts. I didn’t go up there…much.

My bedroom also had this odd, very low closet. What’s this for, I asked.  Turns out our house was a stop – a safe house – on the underground railroad. WOW! I never wanted to leave this place, this safe house.

Grandma and Grandpa would drive down from Hoosick Falls for an afternoon visit. The Buechlers  often motored up from Duxbury. In winter, our combined clans would go sledding on the hills behind our house. They brought a toboggan which, to me, was exotic, cosmopolitan and so very cool. My Uncle Matt and Aunt Dot even drove all the way up from New Haven once.

a smidgen of showy color

the cemetary where I uded to ice skate

This was an actual home, not just a stopping point. Shoulda been anyway.

Celeste was born here.

Daddy had a teaching gig at Fitchburg State College (now University) BUT, mega sadly, it wasn’t a tenured gig. So we moved on. We were there for just one year but it was a VERY good, happy year.

I’m sure Ten and I will visit the Gardner pot shop again – maybe when the trees are showing off their jazzy-seaon finery more. Hopefully next time we won’t be stuck in insane traffic for three hours so that I’ll be less tippy and have energy to walk around Townsend more. NOT that there’s much town to meander BUT still. Mebbe we’ll head up to the old burial ground and do some rubbings, eh?