Yesterday was a long day, but it was a good one. I enjoyed it, even if I’m still feeling a little worn out this morning. I think I’m just running on fumes after such a busy week. Thankfully, it’s Friday, and the weekend is almost here. I’m looking forward to having a little time to rest and recharge.
I hope everyone has a great Friday and a wonderful weekend!
Today is going to be a long and busy day, but thankfully, I’ll be doing the parts of my job that I love most. I’ll be playing host to a special guest, which includes taking him out for a nice dinner tonight. I’ll also be spending part of the day teaching and giving a tour.
It’s going to be one of those days when I’ll be going from one thing to the next with hardly a moment to catch my breath, but I’m actually looking forward to it. As much as I complain about being busy, I really do love what I do, especially when I get to interact with people, share history, and show a little Southern hospitality.
By the time I get home tonight, I expect I’ll be exhausted, but hopefully, it will be the good kind of exhaustion that comes from a long, productive, and enjoyable day. Sometimes, being busy isn’t such a bad thing, especially when you’re doing something you love.
There’s not much to say today. I slept a little later than usual this morning because I woke up with a headache. Thankfully, it’s feeling better as I sit here writing this.
Today is actually the only day this week when I don’t have any classes, tours, or meetings on my schedule. After the hectic pace of the past week and a half, that’s a welcome change. In fact, the only thing on my calendar today is a reminder that I have the afternoon off since I’ll be working on Saturday.
I have a few errands to run after I leave work, but once those are done, I plan to head home and get some much-needed rest. With everything going on this week, I’m going to enjoy a little peace and quiet while I can. I’m sure Isabella will have her own ideas about how I should spend my afternoon, but hopefully, those plans will include a nap.
Sometimes, a quiet day with nothing particularly exciting to report is exactly what we need. I hope y’all have a wonderful Wednesday!
Eleven years ago this past Wednesday, I packed up my life in Alabama and moved to Vermont. I had no way of knowing just how much my life would change over the next eleven years. I knew I was beginning a new chapter, but I certainly couldn’t have imagined everything that chapter would contain.
I still remember how Vermont felt when I first arrived. The crisp autumn air, the mountains, the beautiful scenery, and the sense of possibility were almost intoxicating. After spending most of my life in Alabama, where I often felt constrained by other people’s expectations of who I should be, Vermont offered something I hadn’t fully realized I was missing: the freedom to simply be myself.
For the first time in a very long time, I felt like I could breathe.
I haven’t stopped loving Alabama. It will always be part of who I am. My Southern accent certainly hasn’t gone anywhere, and neither have my memories of growing up there. I still love Southern food, Southern hospitality, and many of the traditions that shaped my childhood. In fact, that Southern hospitality I was raised with has become an essential part of how I approach my professional life. I’ve developed a reputation for being welcoming, helpful, and willing to go the extra mile for visitors, students, and colleagues. Making people feel welcome and comfortable comes naturally to me because it’s simply how I was raised. It’s something I’m proud to have carried from Alabama to Vermont.
The two states may seem worlds apart politically and culturally, but they share more than people might think. Both have strong rural traditions, a connection to the land, and communities where people look out for one another. The difference, at least in my experience, has been the freedom I’ve found here to live my life without constantly worrying about whether I’m meeting someone else’s expectations.
Of course, moving to Vermont didn’t magically make everything better. In fact, some of the most difficult years of my life came after I moved here.
Not long after arriving, I lost one of my closest friends. His death devastated me, and the grief sent me into a depression that lasted for years. I had moved to Vermont hoping for a fresh start, only to find myself struggling just to get through each day. There were times when I wondered whether I would ever feel like myself again.
Therapy, unfortunately, didn’t help me the way I had hoped. If anything, it sometimes seemed to make matters worse. What did help was my friendship with Susan. She listened when I needed to talk, offered encouragement when I couldn’t find any for myself, and showed me a kindness and patience that I will never forget. I don’t know what I would have done without her during those years.
Depression also took a tremendous toll on my physical health. I gained a considerable amount of weight. Then came the diagnosis of type 2 diabetes.
I still remember crying when my doctor called to tell me. I was devastated. Diabetes was something I had feared, and hearing that I had developed it felt like one more thing going wrong in a life that already seemed to have more than its share of difficulties.
Looking back, though, that diagnosis became a turning point.
I was fortunate to find a wonderful primary care doctor shortly after moving to Vermont, and he has been with me ever since. He has encouraged me, worked with me through different treatments, and never made me feel as though my health problems defined who I was. With his help, my diabetes gradually came under control. Eventually, I was able to manage it through diet, and my weight began to come down.
The changes didn’t happen overnight. There were setbacks, frustrations, and times when progress seemed painfully slow. Along the way, I was also diagnosed with sleep apnea and began sleeping with a CPAP machine. My migraines, which had sometimes left me in nearly constant and debilitating pain, required their own long journey of finding treatments that worked.
Today, my life looks remarkably different.
I’ve lost a significant amount of weight and gone through more clothing sizes than I care to count. Sometimes I look in the mirror and still have trouble recognizing the person looking back at me. I can wear clothes now that I never would have imagined fitting into a few years ago.
But the most important changes aren’t the ones I can see in the mirror.
My diabetes is well controlled. I no longer need my CPAP. My migraines haven’t disappeared, and I still have some truly miserable ones, but they are no longer the nearly constant presence they once were. I have more energy, I feel better physically, and I can do things that would have been much more difficult just a few years ago.
Not every health problem has improved. The years of excess weight took a serious toll on my liver, and I was eventually diagnosed with cirrhosis. That’s something I’ll have to live with and carefully monitor for the rest of my life. My hope is that, with continued care, the disease will progress slowly enough that a liver transplant will remain a distant possibility rather than an immediate concern.
I’ve learned that improving your health doesn’t necessarily mean undoing every bit of damage that’s already been done. Sometimes it means doing everything you can to make the years ahead better than the ones behind you.
And that’s exactly what I’m trying to do.
Yet, when I think about how much my life has changed since moving to Vermont, my health is only part of the story.
One of the greatest surprises has been my career. When I moved here, I never dreamed that I would eventually have what I consider my dream job. I had always loved history, teaching, and museums, but I never expected to find a position that would allow me to combine all three.
My work has given me opportunities I couldn’t have imagined eleven years ago. I’ve worked with fascinating historical objects, helped preserve people’s stories, developed exhibitions and educational programs, and introduced countless students and visitors to history in ways that go far beyond what they might find in a textbook.
I’ve also had the opportunity to teach, something that has always been close to my heart. There is a special satisfaction in watching students make connections between the past and the present, especially when an object helps them understand something that previously seemed distant or abstract.
Looking back, I realize that my Southern upbringing and my love of history have come together in ways I never anticipated. The hospitality I learned growing up in Alabama has become just as valuable to my work as the historical knowledge I acquired through years of education and teaching. Helping people feel welcome to explore, ask questions, and discover something new is one of the most important things I contribute professionally.
Over the years, my responsibilities have grown, and I’ve found myself taking on new challenges that have pushed me professionally and personally. My current role is one I could never have imagined holding when I first arrived in Vermont. There are days when work is exhausting, frustrating, and overwhelming, but I still consider myself incredibly fortunate to do what I do.
How many people get to say they found a job they never knew they wanted, only to discover it was exactly where they belonged?
I’ve changed in other ways, too. I’ve become more confident, more willing to speak up for myself, and more comfortable in my own skin. I’ve learned that I can be a Southern gentleman, a gay man, a Christian, a historian, and a Vermonter without any of those identities having to cancel out the others. They are all parts of who I am.
My faith has changed over these eleven years as well. Grief challenged it in ways I never expected, and there were times when I questioned things I had believed for most of my life. Yet those struggles also helped me develop a deeper understanding of faith, one rooted less in rules and expectations and more in love, compassion, and acceptance.
I’ve also continued writing this blog, sharing my thoughts, memories, frustrations, hopes, and occasional embarrassments with all of you. In many ways, writing has helped me understand my own journey. Sometimes I don’t realize how much I’ve changed until I look back at something I wrote years ago.
And, of course, I can’t talk about my life in Vermont without mentioning Isabella. That little black cat came into my life in 2016 and has been my constant companion ever since. She has brought me an enormous amount of comfort, affection, and amusement, even if she does occasionally seem to believe that my sole purpose in life is to serve her every whim. She’s been with me through some of my darkest days, and I can’t imagine my life without her.
Not everything about these eleven years has been serious, though.
I still laugh when I remember those first days in Vermont, when I was unpacking boxes and sleeping on an air mattress because my bed hadn’t arrived yet. Apparently, my curiosity about the local gay population was stronger than my desire to finish unpacking, because I opened Grindr to see who was around.
My bed hadn’t arrived, but a man did.
We hooked up, and the amusing thing is that I still see him occasionally, sometimes by chance and sometimes by design. I suppose that’s one way to make yourself feel welcome in a new state. 😂
My romantic life hasn’t exactly turned out the way I hoped it might. I still haven’t found that special someone with whom to share my life. I’d be lying if I said that didn’t sometimes make me sad. But I haven’t given up hope. Eleven years ago, I couldn’t have imagined much of the life I have today, so who’s to say what might happen tomorrow?
I’ve made wonderful friends here, lost some friendships to time and distance, and learned that relationships don’t always remain what we expect them to be. I’ve experienced kindness, disappointment, laughter, loneliness, and moments of unexpected happiness. In other words, I’ve lived.
When I think about the man who arrived in Vermont eleven years ago, I wish I could tell him a few things. I’d tell him that the years ahead wouldn’t always be easy. That he would experience heartbreak and grief, struggle with his health, and sometimes wonder whether he’d made the right decisions.
But I’d also tell him that he would find a career he loved, build a life of his own, discover strengths he didn’t know he possessed, and gradually become more comfortable with the person he had always been.
Most importantly, I’d tell him that he would find a place where he belonged.
Vermont isn’t perfect. No place is. There are things I miss about Alabama, and there are certainly things about Vermont that can drive me crazy. Eleven winters have done little to convince me that bitter cold is one of life’s great pleasures. But somewhere along the way, Vermont stopped being the place I had moved to and became home.
Perhaps that’s the biggest change of all.
Eleven years ago, I came here hoping for a better life. I didn’t find a life without hardship, disappointment, or loss. What I found was the opportunity to build a life that felt more genuinely my own.
And as I look toward the years ahead, I realize that I’m not finished changing, growing, or discovering what life has in store for me.
For the first time in a long time, that thought fills me with more hope than fear.
One of my first conscious thoughts when I woke up this morning was:
🎶 Sweet dreams are made of these
Who am I to disagree? 🎶
Yes, this is another recounting of one of my dreams. This is the second morning in a row that I’ve awakened in the middle of a lovely dream. Y’all are probably getting tired of me talking about dreams, but it’s only recently that I’ve started remembering them, and some are just too good not to share.
I won’t really talk about the dream I woke up from yesterday because it was based on a real memory, and honestly, it never got to anything particularly exciting. This morning’s dream, however, was a little more interesting.
It began with someone asking me a question I often get when people find out I’m originally from Alabama: “What do you think of Vermont winters?” It’s always some variation of that question. My answer is usually something along the lines of “I love them” or “I don’t mind them,” followed by “I hate the heat in the South.”
In the dream, someone either asked me about skiing, or I volunteered that I wished I enjoyed skiing but had never learned how. I mentioned that I’d once tried to learn to water ski but had never been successful.
That’s when things got interesting.
The dream began with an actual childhood memory that gradually transformed into something entirely different.
When I was growing up, my family had a camp on the Alabama River. We’d take our camper down there and spend our days fishing, swimming, and generally enjoying ourselves. It was a wonderful place to spend a summer weekend.
When I was a teenager, I tried to learn to water ski. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the upper-body strength to pull myself up out of the water. I remember getting into position behind the boat, holding onto the rope, and waiting for Daddy to take off. When he did, my skis went one way, and I went another. To make matters worse, I had trouble letting go of the rope and ended up being dragged underwater. Daddy stopped the boat, and I finally surfaced.
That’s where the actual memory ends and the dream takes over.
Apparently, in the dream, I was having some difficulty after surfacing, and my older brother’s friend jumped into the water and helped pull me back into the boat. Now, I don’t actually have an older brother, so that’s your first indication that my sleeping mind had decided to rewrite history.
And what a rewrite it was!
My imaginary brother’s friend was gorgeous, especially to a gay teenager who was still trying to come to terms with his feelings for other guys. Needless to say, I developed an immediate case of hero worship. I spent the rest of our time at the river getting to know him and following him around like a lovesick puppy.
When we returned home, I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
Then, one day, a letter arrived in the mail. It was from him! He wanted to know how I was doing, how the beginning of the school year was going, and all sorts of other ordinary things that suddenly seemed extraordinary because he was the one asking.
He and my brother were in college, which would have made him about nineteen, although in the dream he seemed only a couple of years older than I was.
I wrote back, and before long, we became pen pals. Remember, when I was a teenager, there was no texting, email, or instant messaging. If you wanted to communicate with someone who lived somewhere else, you wrote a letter, put a stamp on it, and waited for the mailman. There was something wonderful about getting a letter from someone special, even if waiting for the next one could seem like an eternity.
The following summer, we all returned to our camp on the river, and my brother brought his friend along. This time, he seemed to spend more time with me than with my brother. At night, he slept on the top bunk while I slept on the bottom, and my brother slept on the couch that pulled out into a bed.
After that summer, the letters continued, but now he occasionally called me on the telephone, too. I can only imagine how excited my teenage self must have been every time the phone rang and it was him.
Another summer passed, and once again, my brother brought his friend to the river.
One afternoon, while Daddy and my brother were fishing, he asked if I wanted to go for a walk. Of course I did!
We followed one of the animal trails, probably a cow path, that wound through the woods along the river. We walked deeper into the trees, laughing and joking as we went. At some point, we stopped, and I found myself looking into his eyes. By then, I’d grown enough that we were about the same height.
And before I could think better of it, I kissed him.
It was just a quick kiss on the lips, but the moment I realized what I’d done, I jerked away and immediately began apologizing. I was terrified. I’d ruined everything! This wonderful friendship, which had come to mean so much to me, was surely over. I was probably on the verge of tears.
But instead of pulling away, he reached for me, drew me close, and kissed me back.
What had begun as a brief, impulsive kiss became something altogether more wonderful.
And then Isabella woke me up because it was time for her breakfast.
I got out of bed, fed her, and crawled back under the covers. As I lay there thinking about the dream, I drifted back to sleep.
And would you believe it? The dream picked up right where it had left off!
We were still standing in the woods, kissing. His strong, muscular body was pressed against my scrawny, awkward teenage frame, and for the first time, I knew that the feelings I’d been carrying around for so long were returned. We could feel each other’s erections through our shorts. It was the sort of moment a young gay boy could only dream about, especially growing up in Alabama when I did.
Then the dream jumped ahead another year.
It was summer again, and I was eighteen, preparing to begin college in the fall. By this point, our relationship had blossomed into a full-fledged romance. Whenever we managed to get a moment alone, we couldn’t seem to keep our hands off each other.
One afternoon, we took another walk through the woods, following the river farther than we’d ever gone before. Eventually, we reached the end of a narrow strip of land, something like a little peninsula, separating the main river from a quiet lagoon. The water there was deep enough for swimming but sheltered from the stronger current of the river.
He began taking off his clothes.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“We’re going skinny-dipping,” he replied, as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
Well, who was I to disagree?
We undressed and slipped into the water. Unlike the main river, where the water could be surprisingly cool, the water in this little lagoon was wonderfully warm. We swam together for a while, enjoying the privacy of our secluded little paradise.
Then he pulled me close and kissed me.
There we were, naked in the warm waters of the Alabama River, our bodies pressed together, with nothing between us and no one around to interrupt us. The kiss deepened, there was nothing between our erection this time, and it was becoming increasingly obvious that neither of us was particularly interested in swimming anymore.
And just as the dream was getting even better…
My alarm went off.
I opened my eyes, realized it was time to get up and write my blog post, and immediately thought:
🎶 … dreams are made of these
Who am I to disagree? 🎶
Nearly halfway there. I’ll be glad when I can finally call this workweek finished. There’s nothing particularly bad about this week; it’s just been busy and tiring, and I’m already looking forward to the weekend.
I really did not want to get out of bed this morning, and thankfully, Isabella let me sleep in a little later than usual. Eventually, though, I had to drag myself out of bed and get the day started.
It’s mornings like this when standing in front of the coffee maker feels like an exercise in patience. You’re barely awake, staring at it and wondering how something that normally takes less than a minute can possibly take this long. Surely, coffee should understand that some mornings are emergencies and brew accordingly.
Eventually, though, it finishes, and I have that glorious first cup of coffee in my hand. Suddenly, getting through the rest of the morning seems at least a little more possible.
Now I just need the rest of the workweek to hurry along as quickly as I wish the coffee maker would.
Yesterday, I read a tweet or an Instagram post—I can’t remember which—that said the worst part of a weekend is that it eventually comes to an end. Well, mine has come to an end, and I am definitely not ready for it.
The next two weeks are probably going to feel like a marathon at work. There isn’t a single day when I don’t have at least one or two classes, tours, programs, or some combination of the three. On top of that, my schedule is going to be a little strange. I have nighttime and weekend events coming up, so my usual Monday-through-Friday, 8-to-4 routine will be anything but routine for the next couple of weeks.
I know I’ll get through it all. I always do. Right now, though, looking at everything ahead of me feels a little daunting. I’m trying not to think about the entire two weeks at once and instead just take it one day—and one class, tour, or program—at a time.
But first, I have to get through this morning.
At the moment, I’d much rather still be asleep. The weekend simply wasn’t long enough, and Monday morning arrived far too quickly. Unfortunately, the alarm clock, my calendar, and Isabella don’t seem particularly interested in my opinion on the matter. Of the three, Isabella may be the least willing to negotiate.
So, here we go. Let the marathon begin.
I got to sleep late this morning—or at least what counts as sleeping late for me. I fed Isabella and went back to bed, and somehow managed to sleep until 5:30. I almost never get to sleep that late, and I probably could have slept even longer if Isabella hadn’t decided enough was enough. She has her schedule, after all, and apparently me sleeping late is not part of it. Eventually, I gave in to her persistence and got out of bed.
The only reason I could allow myself the luxury of going back to sleep in the first place is that I’m going into work late this morning. Before heading to the museum, I have to stop by my doctor’s office to have blood drawn for some routine tests. Unfortunately, that means I’m fasting, so I’m really missing my morning cup of coffee. Water just doesn’t quite have the same effect first thing in the morning.
Once I finally get to work, I’ll probably make myself a cup of tea and have a late breakfast. By then, I suspect I’ll be more than ready for both.
At least it’s Friday, and I’m definitely looking forward to the weekend. The weather is supposed to be beautiful, with sunny days that should make the fall colors look even more spectacular. This is one of the most beautiful times of year in Vermont, when the mountains and hillsides turn brilliant shades of red, orange, and gold.
After a busy few weeks, a quiet weekend with some sunshine and beautiful fall scenery sounds pretty wonderful to me. I hope everyone has a great Friday and an equally wonderful weekend!
I know I’m being a little boring this week, but honestly, it’s just been one of those uneventful weeks. There hasn’t been much going on outside of the usual routine of work, home, sleep, and doing it all over again the next day. Sometimes, though, an uneventful week isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
At least it’s Thursday, which means the weekend is finally within sight. I don’t have any plans, and for once, I’m perfectly happy about that. After the past few weeks being fairly busy, a weekend with nowhere I have to be and nothing I have to do sounds pretty wonderful.
I’m looking forward to sleeping in a little, relaxing at home, and simply taking the weekend as it comes. Maybe I’ll find something productive to do, or maybe I won’t. Sometimes rest and relaxation are productive enough.
Just one more day to get through after today. I think I can manage that.
Happy Thursday, everyone!
I stayed home yesterday with a migraine, and unfortunately, it’s still not completely gone this morning. I’m feeling better than I did yesterday, but I’m definitely not back to 100 percent. If I didn’t have so much to do, I could very easily convince myself to stay home again today.
Unfortunately, I have several upcoming classes to prepare for, and there’s only so much I can put off before the work starts piling up. Sometimes, even when you know another day of rest would probably do you good, responsibilities have other ideas. So, unless this migraine decides to take a turn for the worse, I’ll be heading into work and doing my best to get through everything that needs to be done.
At least Isabella was kind enough to let me sleep in a little this morning. I’m not sure whether that was an act of feline generosity or simply an oversight on her part, but I’ll take it. Now I’m awake—or at least some approximation of awake—with a cup of coffee in hand, trying to convince myself that I’m ready to face the day.
Hopefully, the coffee will work its magic, the lingering migraine will continue to fade, and I can have a productive day without overdoing it. Right now, though, I’d much rather crawl back into bed.
But the day awaits, so I suppose it’s time to get moving.
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Joe
