Our grandchildren had noisy and excitable fun during their Jewell Hollow Labor Day weekend short sojourn. Amy, the beautiful and quick-study granddaughter marking her fourth birthday this week, caught fish in The Bay of Frink (pond). She reeled in fish-after-fish. Her father helped her cast her spinning line and worm-covered hook into the water; her catches included many Bluegill (sun fish) and two of the giant menacing large mouth bass that patrol the waters near the banks for jumping frogs and smaller fish. It was an unusual sight when Geoff held up the five pound, eighteen inch long monster bass; flash bulbs lit the scene and film recorded Geoff, screamingly-excited Amy and the huge bass. Back he went into the pond, but some of the Bluegill were enjoyed at Sunday brunch.

With an early-evening martini in my hand, I met the park ranger who had stopped his police car on the state road in front of our drive.

"An RV ran over a bear cub on the highway and we got a report it was seen around here," he said after introducing himself. If the word had been that there was an injured adult bear roaming the forest near us, we would have been alarmed, but not a cub. As the smoke of the cooking evening meal billowed up from the escape holes in the top of the Weber, we talked of attracting the injured cub, but he failed -- to my disappointment-- to appear. Our excitement for the remainder of the evening and the following two days continued to be the noisy, high-pitched high jinx of our Amy and her very tough and determined little brother, Avery.

As always when the East coast Frinks get together in the Hollow, food was plentiful and delicious. Jeanne had to commute to the city five days prior to the weekend; yet, when she returned at 7:30 Friday evening nothing could keep her from her tradition of making chocolate chip cookies for Geoff and family; only a double batch would do for the last holiday of summer. There were roast chickens and roasted loin of pork; side dishes of mushroom and onion tarts, farm fresh sweet corn and tomatoes; peach-pecan crisp and blueberry pie with whipped cream; peach muffins and sausage-potato-onion casserole for Sunday brunch. In addition to the sumptuous meals, there appeared to be constant motion to the two large tins of chocolate chip cookies.

All my life, beginning with my German grandparents and their extended families, family gatherings have been underpinned by amply, delicious food. Jeanne grew up with a large extended family of aunts, uncles and cousins in Iowa and other plains states, always with good food, drink and card games at family gatherings. A double tradition of family fellowship and good food continues during Jewell Hollow holidays. God willing, it will continue for the generation now forming and those yet to come.

No rain. No rain for over a month. The pond has stopped flowing over the spillway; it is becoming stagnant. August brought less rain than any August on record. The lack of inflow and outflow of the pond is an esthetic loss, a disappointment, nothing more. Our fear of fire is very real, but the prevention of a forest fire is out of our control. If the forest continues as dry as now, in the early days of September Virginia authorities will probably cancel the normal autumn hunting seasons. That would be an assist, but the turnings of the green hardwood leaves to bright yellows and reds will bring tens of thousands of visitors to the Skyline Drive above us; they will spill over the slopes around us. The visitors could discard live cigarettes and cause a disaster, but we cannot control that either. We shall remain diligent -- and continue looking and praying for rain relief.

Sunday
Two days ago, in the depths of the sixty day drought bedeviling the Eastern U.S., the dogs and I strolled the walk-over boulders and over the remainder of the ancient stone wall and down the path, from the cabin kitchen door to the stream. It was dry -- absolutely dry. The first time in 30 years that I have seen the back stream totally devoid of water.

I stood there, almost disbelieving my sight as I remembered the raging, white water torrent which tore and ripped through the rock-ridden channel, less than six months ago. Sometimes in late summer, I have walked to that stream to find an absence of water flow, but there were always pools of water at various levels. Alas, there was not a drop of water to be found within sight.

Yesterday I awoke and thought to myself: "What a great time to saw wood lying across and above the stream. I can saw it and walk it easily across the stream bed and chop it up later on our side of the stream."

I dressed and with steel-toed boots tightly laced, exited the cabin, fueled, greased the chain blade and filled the chain oil reservoir of the saw and advanced down the path. At the top of the bluff, across the stream bed, I expected find a few small, fallen pole-like dead trees. As I walked down the mountain a short distance, I spotted a five foot in diameter, downed tree with long cantilevered limbs; they would be easy to saw and drag away for chopping. As I approached the tree, I realized it was a locust, long uprooted and dry.

The feeling at finding the dead locust was much akin to finding a large cache of morel mushrooms: full, rich joy at finding a trove of the rarest and best. When there is fire in the wood stoves, I can walk by and know when locust is burning, it is so high in BTUs, burns so hot. The grain on locust trees is so tight that, at times when sawing, the chain will spark, as when it hits a rock. No other wood I have sawed is as tightly-grained and hard -- none of the oaks or even hickory. Burning locust in wood stoves on a cold winter evening is as if coal had mysteriously replaced the wood.

I sawed the limbs into poles and the smaller end of the trunk into carryable lengths. Jeanne knew where I was going. After a while she arrived to find out if I needed help. She carried the trunk lengths and poles down to the stream bed and over to the path on our side of the stream. Later, I threw locust pieces down the bank and Jeanne carried them to the new wood stack.

As the last piece of wood was placed on the path-side pile, it began to rain. It rained for twenty hours, ending this morning. The rain was steady, soaking, and glorious. Occasionally one of us would go out of the cabin into the rain just to determine how much the pond had risen toward the spillway. Thank God, the drought is broken and for the moment a carelessly pitched hunter's cigarette poses much less of a threat to us all: one man and wife, two good dogs and a cherished old cabin in the forest.

The last hummingbird left four days ago. He or she was a straggler from the family of six. The other family members stopped feeding at the pink feeder days before the lone remaining bird would methodically return to drink the sugar water. As the days passed after the exit of most of the hummingbird family, the feeder water receded very slowly, unlike the days of July and August when the six birds seemed to be constantly vying for one of the three holes at the base of the diamond shaped dispenser.

Then, inexplicably there was one. One tiny bird, out of sequence with its family and the need to begin the journey south. I was sad watching the solitary bird, knowing that in a sense, its train had left the station. When the sugar water was drained very near the bottom, Jeanne removed the feeder, washed it, and put it away until March. The straggler has not been seen since; hopefully it is on its way safely south.

Perhaps next spring, one or more of the family will return from Mexico or Central America and be on the lookout for one particular hummingbird feeder at one particular Jewell Hollow cabin window.

Monday
God sends us dogs. That is how I explain the existence of our warm and lively dogs. Jeanne and I had no interest in assuming the responsibility of dogs in 1990; the thought had not entered our consciousness'. Then Labor Day Monday arrived.

In June we had returned to live in Jewell Hollow. Son and daughter-in-law Geoff and Connie were living with us in the cabin. Geoff and Connie were resettling in the Washington, DC, area; he was seeking a computer programming job. The four of us lived amicably in our small cabin. We were not in the market for pets.

On Labor Day, we had a family misfortune: Connie miscarried; a disturbing event -- a deep downer for all of us. The day after Labor Day, a terrier male dog found its way to our small plot. Connie needed all possible objects for her love; she took immediately to Woodie (he came out of the woods). The younger Frinks had a dog.

The same day Woodie arrived, another dog came into our lives. Geoff had driven a mile to the nearest neighbors to determine that Woodie did not belong to nearby families. On the return trip, up the Jewell Hollow road, he encountered what appeared to be a German shepherd puppy in the road.

He stopped his car and moved the pup to the side of the road, exclaiming to it that his father would never countenance the acceptance of two dogs into the household in one day.

Later, the puppy walked into our drive as if he owned the place. Jeanne and I have an ongoing dispute over which of us came up with the name "Dude"; the little pup had such a confident swagger. It turned out the puppy was female and, therefore, her name was immediately changed to "Duda." I certainly did not wish to go from a no-dog to a two-dog household in one day.

Geoff set off for the county dog pound with Duda. The volunteers at the pound pleaded with him to not leave the attractive little puppy there, for surely they would have to kill it. Off Geoff went from the pound in search of a home for Duda; he found one. He left her with a family, friends from church. Then the father returned home. The phone rang during dinner in Jewell Hollow. Geoff was instructed to "come get this puppy;" he did.

Duda spent the night with us. The next morning, Jeanne's love for the adorable puppy had developed to the degree that it was clear that the senior Frinks possessed a puppy and that Duda had a new home.

As young as she was (the vet estimated eight weeks), Duda has never wet or messed in the cabin -- never! It was as if she knew that after having been abandoned to die in the forest by the heartless humans (or sub-humans) who dropped her off that she would be on her best possible behavior to please her new benefactors.

Duda has taken over our lives; she is intelligent, mature in the extreme and totally manageable by voice commands. No one taught her to poop far in the forest where we never venture; to return to us to ascertain our well-being on walks; to avoid temptations in the cabin garbage container. Duda knows -- so much. I envy her calm steadiness. I deeply appreciate her devotion to me.

(graphic: Vera A. Jones)

After the summer of 1990, Geoff, Connie and Woodie left Jewell Hollow to begin a normal life in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC. In the spring, while Jeanne and our friend Al (father of the movie star) were having dinner, we each heard strange noises near the cabin. We investigated and found Spot, a female Beagle, named for obvious reasons. We now had two dogs.

Spot, being a Beagle, was different: independent, as Duda was protective; uninterested in family activities, as Duda was involved. When we went for walks, Duda would stay with us; Spot, her extra-sensitive nose on the alert, would dash off on a scent and not be seen again for hours. In her later time with us, Spot became more domesticated: she would sit on the couch for hours at a time; I began to call it "Spot's Couch."

The next year, near Thanksgiving, Jeanne, Duda, and I were walking up the state road, near the next pond. We heard a dog cry. We investigated. A young, beige ball-of-fur type dog was alone in the forest. We called the dog, believing it might belong to Benny and Cornelia, who own a cabin higher up the state road in the Hollow. The tan fur ball wouldn't respond to Jeanne and me, but Duda lured him home. Telephone inquiry assured us that Benny's dog was at home, safe by the hearth. Now we had three dogs.

Attila the Hun, so named because of his high-pitched ferocious bark, became Duda's ward, inseparable buddy and traveling companion. Duda trained Attila in perfect doggy household and outdoor etiquette; no mistakes allowed. Attila often presents himself to Duda -- backs himself near Duda's head -- and the mother dog cleans her pesky surrogate son.

Spot would never play with Duda; she was too independent and Beagle-like to get involved in such frivolity. Duda would try hard to entice Spot into play, but the Beagle would have none of it. Once Attila arrived, he and Duda soon began to run and roll -- rock and roll -- play until they squeezed the energy out of one another.

One Sunday evening Spot did not return. I knew immediately she was gone; gone not to return. Spot roamed the forest by day, solitary and unafraid, but she always returned by nightfall. That Sunday was the end of Spring turkey hunting season. Charlie had heard hunters threaten to shoot Spot. She had her paths in the forest and it mattered not that at times during the year strange men sat in camouflage clothing attempting to lure crafty wild turkeys to their deaths. Spot went where Spot wished, when Spot wished to go. Our life with her was over.

When Spot failed to return that Sunday evening, now long ago, we phoned the dog pound and placed ads on the local radio station. The county pound is largely operated by volunteers who care for the hundreds of lost and abandoned dogs passing through each year. One compassionate dog pound volunteer calls us whenever a female Beagle makes its way there. Each call brings back heartbreaking memories of Spot's disappearance and rekindles the void her failure to return fired in us. Yet, we have respect for the woman -- she working against the odds to find a home for a dog soon to be destroyed.

Late last week another call from the lady at the pound was recorded on our answering machine; a female Beagle had been found, one with "lots of spots." I thought about driving the 15 miles to the pound, but what's the use? It has been many, many months since Spot's disappearance. Yet, the calls from the pound always haunt me. Could it be Spot, waiting there for me to rescue her?

This morning when I retrieved another phone message, the voice of the pound lady sounded again. My heart sank. I had to attempt, against all odds, to rescue our Spot. I called the pound and left a message.

A few moments ago, Mike, the county animal control man, returned me call: "Is she spayed?", I asked.

"No," came the reply. It was not Spot. I felt better for the attempt, but yet sad for the unseen female Beagle about to meet an untimely death.

Tuesday
A fire is burning in the lower level wood stove; not much of a fire, rolled paper and light wood. It began Saturday. It was a cold, rainy day, with the temperature in the 50s. Reluctantly, I built the first fire of the long, long winter season. The stove won't go cold again until late April, unless Jeanne and I should leave Jewell Hollow for twenty four hours and more.

No more T-shirts and shorts as the uniform of the day; now it is long pants, turtlenecks and sweaters. The openness of summer is gone. Now we are closed in, with windows closed and the doors barriers to the forest, only a few steps from our stoops. We go out, but not with the freedom of summer, without garments of warmth. We go out, but we don't sit around the Weber grill, soaking the warmth of the day and early evening.

Now we go to the out-of-doors to perform practical tasks: bringing in wood, taking and receiving mail from the state road-side corroded, sheet metal box, so rusted the large door sticks. We go out to walk with the dogs, to exercise them and watch them silently chase the random deer down the state road or into the forest. We still go out of the cabin, but we do so with purpose, not with the happy casualness of summer; I already miss it: the summer life.

Granny is here. She is soon-to-be 86 years old, able to walk only for short distances with aid of a cane or walker, but has the courage to board and depart commercial aircraft as casually as the most practiced commercial traveler. Jeanne met her at the baggage claim area of Dulles Airport yesterday afternoon; I waited in the car. Jeanne had gathered Granny's luggage before she arrived in her wheelchair. With a woman skycap doing the pushing and Jeanne carrying the luggage, they smartly exited the terminal to the waiting BMW. Slick! Eighty six years old, a bit feeble in body, but with the spirit to carry off her transfer from the flat plain of Michigan to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Slick!

I ordered my class ring; just now, thirty two years after graduation. I don't know what has come over me. I watched Paul Newman being interviewed during a television program. He had a large ring on the ring finger of his right hand. I watched from my leather chair and said to myself, "That ring is massive; a statement. I should have a class ring."

I worked my way through the University of Michigan Law School with a wife and two sons. There was no money for a class ring. I am not certain that I would have wished one then. I want one now, and I will have it. A massive black and silver-like thing, it will be, with the scales of justice emblazoned over the black onyx stone. "J.D." will stick out from one side; "63" from the other.

My Rolex watch: it had laid unused for years in my night table drawer. A cheap electronic substitute, which can operate in two time zones simultaneously and keep track of laps I don't run, serves better as a time piece. I was promised a watch for high school graduation; it somehow never materialized. The missing gift left a void.

One time, long ago, while in Paris, I bought a Swiss Rolex, the model a Rockefeller acquaintance wore. I bought it for hundreds and now it is worth thousands of dollars, or so said my Michigan jeweler. Out of the blue I began to wear the old Rolex; then I insured, certified and mailed it off to Michigan to be restored to first class condition.

I don't know what is becoming of me: If I don't soon break this new, source-unknown, jewelry fad, I shall become the fop of Jewell Hollow.

One thing is certain: at considerable cost, my Rolex will return with a new crystal and other improvements. I once thought of gifting it to my oldest son; a proper generational hand-me-down, but no. I shall wear it or sell it.

I shall inquire of the Rolex secondary market. Sale proceeds could be placed in common stocks and help (slightly) assure our continued solvency in Jewell Hollow. Or I could wear it with my newly-acquired Michigan class ring: an assertive, arrogant restatement of life. We shall see; certainly we shall see.

Possibly this epidemic of material statement resulted from the growing sense of independence rolling over me since Jeanne and I paid off, what I supposed to be, the endless mortgage on the cabin. Whatever the answer, the mystery moves ahead. ...