Dr Uyterhoeven Has Left the Building

 I snapped this picture the day that we left the cabin, but never really had the opportunity to post anything about it because we were stranded without wifi for the first month of our time here in Sicily (and then it slipped my mind). I left my old cane hanging from the apple tree in front of the cabin, knowing that my son, who moved into the cabin, would get the reference.

One of the iconic images from Brooks Hansen's brilliant novel The Chess Garden (one of my all-time favorite books), is Dr. Gustav Uyterhoeven's cane left hanging from a tree in the Chess Garden behind their house in Dayton, Ohio when he has left to visit the Antipodes (South Africa, where he passes away). This is the framing story for the series of letters that he writes home of his adventures. Unlike Dr. Uyterhoeven, I do plan to make it home safe and sound. However, I think it will inspire me to write my soon-to-be grandson a series of Uyterhoeven-worthy letters from my own personal Antipodes.