Category: Essays & Stories

Author’s note: This story appeared in The Adirondack Almanack’s Friday, August 13th, 2021 online edition. “While many pickled pepper’s Peter Piper may have indeed picked, I sometimes ponder: How many pickled pecks would have Piper picked if perhaps Peter were instead picking dill pickle pike.”      My first youthful...

Author’s note: I penned this story several weeks back, right after my son RJ & I came out of what (as can be seen in the photo above of RJ kayaking into camp) after a very wet start, turned out to be a great 4th of July weekend in...

A Great Pre-Cooked First Night Camp Meal ********** *Author’s Note: As we all eagerly look forward to packing our gear and heading into camp, I thought I’d share a Monroe family “1st Night in Camp” meal tradition: “Hunter’s Stew”.      I first drafted this piece shortly after my “Cliff...

(All Loon Photography Courtesy of Peggy Ivimey) *An edited version of Serenade of the Loon appeared in the Adirondack Almanack’s April 12, 2021, on-line edition. *A Brief Author’s Note: I first drafted “Serenade of the Loon” several years back. I had plans to submit it to Adirondack Life magazine,...

Author’s Note: This story was published in The Adirondack Almanack’s December 3, 2021, online edition.      It was getting late. Time measured by the near empty whiskey bottle and battalion of “dead soldier” beer bottles standing in neatly rowed formation on the floor in one corner of the cabin....

********** This was actually the last in a series of stories I submitted to Adirondack Life Magazine. They declined it. Their staff’s advice to me at that point was, “Dick, you should take all your fun tales and stick them in an album to share with your grandkids.” I...

“Beware! He’s Watching.” **********      His ears suddenly perked up. He lifted his head, put his nose to the air. He could smell it almost as soon as he heard the boat’s engine cut off.      “Humans.” His keen nose soon confirmed it.  The mixed aroma of campfire smoke,...

“Don’t heed the voice and put shovel to earth, unless mentally prepared to uncover the truth.” ********** “African-Americans made up approximately twenty five percent of the U.S. Navy during the War of 1812. In July, 1813, Commodore Isaac Chauncey reported “nearly 50 blacks” on board his flagship, the General...

A Salute To My “Heart” I brought him home as a birthday gift to my wife. It was 2009. I was facing a wall. My family and I were preparing for a “Hail Mary” trip to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center that I feared might be one way. I...

An Inauguration Day Countdown Retrospective In Haiku ********** Author’s Note It has been a gut wrenching time in American History. What happened on January 6th was a jarring real time illustration of all of the divisive chaos that hate, racism, and deceit engender. While all of America watched in...