The Thinking Point
This is a collage of family photos which I have entitled "The Thinking Point"-- to represent an actual promonotory of ledge looking westward to the Berkshire hills where generations of both sides of my family once perched. Our grandfather had cleared a trail lined with wild blueberry, teaberry and mountain laurel amongst the giant pines. He managed to do this in secrecy until my brother's 8th birthday. On that auspicious day, with an air of conspiracy, he announced that we were to embark upon a "scavenger hunt". We were each handed a burlap sack and a scroll of birch bark tied with twine upon which he had etched a list of items: blue jay feather, mica, pine cone, hickory nut, dryad saddle, red eft, indian pipe, milkweed (with monarch caterpiller)... the Red Eft and Caterpillar had to be seen by at least one other person and were not to be placed in the sack. Only later did I learn that the word scavenger applies to...
