May 2
Lovers' Leap and Silas Marner
1965
I rode my bike out today. First, I got a shake at Carvel. Then, I went to K's house. She and G had left to go to Lover's Leap. When I was on my way there, a couple of guys in a convertible drove by. Oh, how cute! Blonde, tan, eeeeeeeeeee! Boy was I dirty and tired when I finally got home. I got a thorn in my foot. I hope it doesn't get infected. It's in so deep I can't get it out with tweezers. Well, I'll sign off now. G'night???
Comment 2023
Do you know how many Lovers’ Leaps there are in the US? One website claims twenty-five. Wikipedia lists forty, plus fifteen more in other countries. Six are in New England, including the one in New Milford. The folktales tend to feature a Native American maiden and a forbidden lover. Mark Twain claimed there were “"fifty Lover's Leaps along the Mississippi from whose summit disappointed Indian girls have jumped."
My favorite so far is Salto degli Sposi (Spouses' Jump). According to Wikipedia, “In 1871, a young couple of Polish artists, musician Maximilian Prihoda and painter Anna Stareat, moved in the area. For unknown reasons, one day, they spent the afternoon on the rock, where Prihoda composed his last melody and Stareat painted her last landscape, and then jumped into the gorge below.”
Whatever the story, Lovers’ Leap Park had a beautiful view of the Housatonic River and was about a twenty-minute bike ride from my house.
2023
I’ve been reading three books in rotation lately: Silas Marner, T’is, and Zorba the Greek. T’is was an impulse acquisition at the book sale. I am reading Zorba after seeing the movie for the first time a few weeks ago. (I belong to a movie watching group that specializes in films based on literature. We call it “Lit Flicks”.) Silas Marner was inflicted on me in high school and I was inspired to give it a second chance by a read of this blog. Thank you, Robin, for sticking up for old Silas; it’s a beautiful story, wonderfully written. Now I think I need to re-read Middlemarch.
Comment 2024
Now I feel guilty. I still haven’t finished T’is.