Ah, Vermont

I went to college in Vermont and lived there for a time after. It's a special state -- they made Howard Dean! And also crazy, crazy Bernie Sanders. And lots of other crazy folks, all of whom tend to congregate in downtown Burlington, as my sister is discovering. I used to walk to work past a couple of homeless guys that drank out of the classic homeless vessel: a bottle wrapped up in a brown paper bag. They said good morning to me every morning and I even went over and sat with them a couple of times on their stoop. They offered me some hooch, which I politely declined. But that's VT -- swell and friendly winos!

VT is also the home of the helpful older lesbian. My sister has met a nice couple at her place. I counted many as friends while living there. There was one who owned an old corgi named Dixie and paid me to hang out in her cool mountaintop home with Dixie, her kitty, and her large rifle while she was in Provincetown. She used to leave me Erica Jong books and a copy of the "Good Vibrations" catalog as reading material. There was another woman whose first name was Clove and whose last name meant garlic. She always stuck up for me when I got blamed for leaving black fingerprints all over the photocopier at work. And she remarked as a rather rotund woman walked by our office one day, "I've fucked bigger than that."