My trip up to Vermont/New Hampshire was wonderful but I managed to get out BEFORE the expected Northeaster arrives.
I got to visit with my old friend and neighbor Bob Belenky who now lives in a quaker retirement home in Hanover New Hampshire and got to take a lovely (off leash) walk Jerry and Bob’s dog Millie. Bob’s retirement home has a “walking group” of seniors with dogs who meet the same time every day and we chatted as Jerry raced around in the snow with the other dogs. I was a drop worried at first (about having Jerry off leash) but he simply stayed with the other dogs and had a great time.
I also got to visit with my old friend Will Hunter who used to be a brilliant young lawyer/politician and now runs a program that he self-funds that provides housing and counselling for many who would otherwise be homeless and clearly at risk of falling through the cracks.
It was cold but honestly, I once again loved the feel and the beauty of the region. I am glad I got to live in Vermont for 10 years when I was younger..
I got out of Hanover on Wednesday morning just as the temperature was getting ready to drop below zero again and ahead of an anticipated northeaster. It is potentially a big storm. I had considered taking a ferry over to Martha’s Vineyard, but discretion got the better of that plan. I intended to get out of the Northeast before the storm.
My old friend Bruce Young (notice how almost everyone I am visiting is an “old” friend) agreed to meet me in Fort Lee New Jersey which is just over the George Washington Bridge but allowed me to break the longer drive from VT to Baltimore into two short and easy drives. Bruce and I tried a major case together in New York 26 years ago and we’ve stayed in touch but have not seen each other since then. The case was one of the rare ones where the family could afford to do it right and hired me as the lead trial counsel and Bruce as my co-counsel to serve both as local counsel and appellate counsel which allowed us to repeatedly take the trial judge up on interlocutory appeals every time he did something wrong. After a while the judge got used to the fact that we knew the law and were going to get his hand slapped when he was wrong, and we started getting better rulings. We also had the privilege of working on that case with one of the leading child sexual abuse experts in the country and a very sad difficult case turned out well.
But anyway – back to the trip (my last big road trip). So I am in Fort Lee, New Jersey this morning after having a truly lovely dinner at a local Italian Restaurant and reunion with Bruce. Today Jerry and I will be driving down to Maryland where I will be getting to visit with my nephew Noam and my other great nephew Judah and sit out what ever storm part of the snowstorm hits DC. I have reached out to a few other friends and may have some surprise reunions to report (I hope)
On Monday if the roads are clear I will head down to Chapel Hill North Carolina and then perhaps to Savannah, Georgia and then back to Florida. ALL IS GOOD..