In a moment of frustration, I gleefully painted a bright red sign, which read:
PRIVATE PROPERTY
NO VISITORS
WATCH FOR DOG
I cemented it into the stone wall in front of my property. The sign worked surprisingly well, for the next day I saw Norman and Martha, two good friends from Washington, drive up. They stopped the car, exchanged a few words when they saw the sign, and then continued driving up the road. The road ends a little farther on, so I caught them on the way back, and explained my predicament.
When I bought the former mission property, it was named "All Saints." I thought of changing it to "Saint Robert's" or to "Bob's Little Acre," but I never could abide giving houses names. When I was a child, my parents named their cottage "Do Drop In." My father even painted it on the mailbox. This really didn't make any sense because they always complained when people did. Home is a good sturdy name, so that's what I call it.
Sixty or seventy years ago the Episcopal Church built missions throughout the Virginia mountains. All Saints once served about fifty families. As time passed, people died, their children moved away, and the once-active missions were gradually disposed of for lack of members. By chance, I learned of the property, made an offer, and it was mine.
The mission sits about three thousand feet above the Shenandoah valley, three and a half miles up a pitted, rock-ribbed dirt road that is cleverly maintained in this condition by the state.
The deed reads "One acre more or less." With the aid of the church, the people had constructed four buildings: a handsome stone meetinghouse, a frame church with simple Gothic windows, a stone bell tower that sat on the ground between them, and a dilapidated parsonage where a lady missionary had lived for over forty years. The meeting hall is now my private gallery, where I keep my work. The church is my home and the parsonage my studio. The bell tower is, as it was, "ringing, ever ringing."
Strangers ringing his church bell
Though my friends hesitate to acknowledge it, I was gifted at birth with a very pleasant disposition, along with a touching sympathy for the underdog. My reaction to injustice is prompt, though perhaps at times intemperate. As an illustration: When I moved here, I naturally assumed that my privacy was assured by my isolation. On the first morning I was awakened at 6:45, not by my alarm clock, but by strangers ringing my church bell. During the day I would often be called from my work by voices and flatnosed faces peering through my windows at me. While I ate breakfast one morning, a group of people pushed in my front door. When I responded with an assortment of colorful names, they became indignant. It was vexing!
One day I found a family from Dubuque, Iowa, having a picnic on my table in the yard. The parents seemed very nice, though two of their kids were irritating bubblehead. I shared their lunch, and then with superb control told them of my vexation. They replied
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