The Countdown to His Death. Part 1

This past weekend included my 59th birthday.  It consisted a nice dinner with my dear wife and her sister on Friday. a trip to Broadway to see "Allegiance", and then an amazing lunch at Foley's, the baseball pub Mecca on West 33rd Street, including a wonderful chat with the owner of the pub, who is well known as a baseball fan and collector.  We shared stories of the New York (baseball) Giants, and favorite books about the long gone team.  Then Sunday I soloed to the Ulysses S. Grant Cottage up in the Adirondacks (the smaller version - if you know upstate New York and the Northway used to travel non-stop to Montreal, it's exit 16).

The colors on the trees were worth the trip, especially since I missed the turn to the Cottage.  But I finally found the correct entrance and then I arrived, of course, too late to see much.  I did hear, however, as I reached the cottage (panting) the song Ashokan Farewell (known from the PBS series The Civil War) and watched a Union soldier and his lady waltzing to the music.  Most folks had headed for their cars, but I strolled warm yet cool weather, looking over Civil War books and talking baseball with another history lover.  Following cruising the written history, I took the path to the expansive Lookout area....

The Path

Looking North

                                   

Looking South

General Grant asked to see this view shortly before he died, and he got the chance.  I'm fairly sure that when he looked south, he did not see the Target distribution center, though he did know about targets.

So I sat on a bench that can barely be seen in the Looking North picture, opened my notebook, and wrote two lines.  Book 2 begun.  Felt great.  Birthday good.

But I told you that to tell you about  this....