The Woods - a summer day circa 1950

All photos taken by Charlie Wood, Tom and Skips father,

and scanned and provided by Tom Wood.

Skip and Tom Wood, Duxbury

Tom wakes to the call of a gull through the open window. Well after dawn the sun streams into the room. Without lifting his head from the pillow, he opens his eyes to see his younger brother, Skip. Skip smiles, his eyes wide open. He has been awake for a while, waiting for Tom to stir.

“What are you gonna do?” Skip asks.

“I don’t know. You?”

“ I haven’t decided. Freddy said he might go down to the Bluefish and jump off the bridge. He has to help his dad for a while, but maybe go swimming before lunch. Think the tide will be high enough?”

Tom rolls onto his back and stares at the ceiling, painted tongue and groove. High tide comes about an hour later every day, chasing the moon’s cycles from full, to waning, to new, to waxing, and back to full. The water at the bridge was a little too shallow yesterday morning but the six-inch difference that a day brings might be enough.

“I don’t know,” Tom says, “Probably.”

“Excellent,” he hears Skip say, “Excellent.”

Tom rolls to look out the window. Past the shrubs and between the trees, and into the bay Tom sees Mr. Ellison headed out on his boat, Squanto. Tom would love to have a boat. Maybe someday.

Out of Tom’s view, Grandpa Nowell bends over a tomato plant. He inspects the leaf, looks to a few other plants along the row and, satisfied, moves on. Grandpa and Grandma Nowell, James and Annie, have seen a lot. He made a name for himself in the stock market only to lose nearly everything in the Crash of ’29. Twenty years later he’s recovered from the loses enough to enjoy a comfortable retirement in Duxbury. Now, summers are filled with gardens and family. For the grandparents, having the boys at the house for a month is a blessing.

James Nowell, Powder Point, Duxbury

James look up beyond the tomatoes to the rows of squash, eggplant, pumpkins and cucumbers. They are all coming in nicely and he’ll have plenty to share with neighbors who joke that they have to start locking their doors to keep him from dropping off more produce. He looks to the lettuce, spinach, carrots and onions, toward the herbs: dill, parsley and marjoram.

It is going to be a hot day but the breeze off the water is cool and his wide-brimmed hat keeps the sun off his face. As he turns to the house, he sees Annie tending to her flower garden closer to the house and the Roses of Sharon growing on the trellis. How she cuts them to bloom as they do, he’ll never know. If she has a secret to long-lasting and full flowers she is not likely to share it. He might know a thing or two about vegetables, but with flowers, that is Annie’s domain.

Pruning sheers in one hand, a wicker basket in the crook of her elbow, Annie deadheads the asters and daisies that have past bloom. With practiced speed and care she snips each flower just above the next row of healthy leaves, dropping the now-faded blossom into the basket. She’s heard that deadheading keeps the colors bright and prevents cross pollination. Whatever the reason, she deadheads and the blooms keep coming.

Carefully she steps into the flower bed, leaning in to prune, trim and pull any weed that might have the audacity to grow where it should not. When the basket is full she’ll empty it into the wheelbarrow at the edge of the lawn where it sits, already half full from the morning’s work.

A screen door slams and Annie looks up to see the boys, Skipper and Tom heading down the walk. Skipper is waiving his arms, animating his story and Tom is laughing as they approach her.

“Good morning, Grandma”

“Good morning boys. Did you have a good breakfast?”

“Really good.” Tom says. Skip pats his stomach in agreement.

“That’s wonderful.” She says.

“Katie said we should go pick some stones from the garden to help Grandpa.”

She and the boys turn to James who weeds between two rows of squash.

“My guess is he’s found a rock or two for you to move.”

The boys head toward their grandfather who’s now standing, stretching his back, one hand on his hip, the other steadying himself with a hoe. As the boys approach he extends a hand along a few rows of potatoes and tomatoes and then points to the far corner of the garden. Though out of earshot Annie knows what he is saying. That a few rocks have worked their way up to the surface, field stones he calls them, and it would be so helpful if the boys could lug them over to the corner of the garden where there’s already a pile. Sure enough, the boys head down a nearby row, pick up a couple fist-sized cobbles and walk toward the pile. Annie sees James watching them approvingly. He turns to Annie and she nods. They are good boys.

Annie watches James as he watches the boys. Once in a while he’ll point to this or that. One of the boys will stop, turn, and then head down another row to gather another stone. James is a good man, she thinks. Handsome. Always in his white, collared shirt and tan summer pants, even for the messiest work in the garden. Tall and thin. Bespeckled beneath his hat. Annie smiles, then wipes her hands on her dress before returning to her garden.

After an hour Annie glances at her watch and turns to the vegetable garden. James and the boys are at the far end still picking stones.

“Grandpa,” she calls, “don’t you think the boys might be able to leave a few stone for tomorrow?”

The boys stop, look toward her and then toward their grandfather. James pulls something from his pants pocket. “Hard work and honest pay” he’s saying to the boys. Plus, she thinks, they need lunch money. A moment later the boys race past her.

“See you, Grandma!”

“Have fun boys.” And then “Don’t forget that your parents will be here when you get home.” But her words are lost as the boys round the house, or so she thinks until she hears Tom.

“Thanks Grandma”

Skip grabs his bike and heads over to Freddy Sykes house as fast as he can. Skip never seems to slow down. “See you for lunch!” he says as he races out the driveway.

Tom watches him go and then mounts his own bike and pedals the mile or so up Powder Point Avenue, over the Bluefish River, past the pharmacy, and down the hill to the harbor where the yacht club has its meetinghouse and where members join for sailing regattas, or to get a ride on the Garvey, the launch, to their moored boats. Tom scans the assembled fleet. If he could have any boat, he wonders, which would it be? It’s a beautiful day and there are a couple dozen of people on the docks, inspecting and loading boats, rigging catboats. The yacht club commodore, dressed in uniform, stands at the stern of the committee boat gauging the wind. He consults a chart of the bay evaluating where to set the marks. A small fleet of catboats assemble at one end of the dock, their captains and crew comparing notes and gossiping before the race starts.

Duxbury Yacht Club, Snug Harbor

Aside from being a boat launch the docks are also where the yacht club has their swim lessons, three floats forming an enclosed area to keep swimmers separated from spinning propellers. The swimming instructor, one of the older kids home from college, uses a paddle to check the depth of the water beneath the diving board. She pulls up the paddle, its tip caked with mud.

“No headfirst diving.” She announces to a group of boys, who issue a collective “Awww”.

“Let’s do some laps.” She says, pointing.

The boys run to the far end of the dock, jumping over life jackets, picnic baskets, and dogs while, as politely as boys will be, walking around the older folks.

Noon finds Tom and Skip at the pharmacy sitting on diner stools, their elbows on the countertop. Tom’s nearly through with his BLT and sips his strawberry milkshake, poking at the bottom of his glass with his straw. Skip is halfway through his sandwich and regales Tom with a story of his most incredible cannonball that he just took off the Bluefish River Bridge. “Freddy said it was the biggest splash he’s seen!” Tom’s mother once called Skip a whirling dervish and though Tom was not sure what a dervish is, ‘whirling’ definitely describes the way Skip waves his arms around as he tells his story.

Lunch complete the boys climb back on their bikes and head in different directions. Skip heads back toward the beach to find Freddy while Tom heads to the tennis courts to watch his older brother, Jim, whose playing in a tournament. Maybe he’ll hit a few balls on his own if a court is free. After tennis he rides back past the pharmacy, over the Bluefish River and back up Powder Point Avenue to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. Tom wheels his bike into the driveway, stops, and leans it against the garage. As if called by a dinner bell, Skip is right behind him leaning his bike against Tom’s. The boys round the house to the backyard and find their father in the garden with Grandpa.

“Golly” Charlie says, “the zucchini are enormous!”

“Well, the boys moved some rocks around and did a little weeding. That was a big help.”

A screen door opens and closes and Tom sees his mother coming toward him with a basket.

“Hello boys,” She says. “Would you mind taking this down to the shore? Your Uncle Dick and cousin Dicky will be here shortly.”

“Are we having a cookout on the beach?” Tom asks

“We are. Burgers and hot dogs. Over the fire.”

Behind him Tom hears Skip. “Excellent.”

Yes, Tom thinks, Excellent.

Richard Clark off Powder Point