and wouldn’t be served. And yet these ‘starter castles’ were popping up like bad mushrooms all over the county, using up the best nonirrigated farmland in the United States to grow lawns upon which the idiot rich could cruise their ride-along mowers.
She had just returned from the Fravel farm, where she had seen the bad news with her own eyes. Farmer Fravel had lost patience with her efforts to get one of the farm-preservation bureaus to purchase his development
rights, and had begun planting his last crop: sod. She always knew what was coming when she saw a farmer planting sod. It meant he no longer cared about his topsoil, and was ready to have it peeled off along with the grass, rolled up and carted off to apply to the half-acre home sites that had been robbed of their topsoil by a previous subdividing farmer when he had planted his final crop.
Jennifer turned her hands inward so that she could examine her fingernails. They were painted a variety of lively colors, her one bow to cosmetics. She applied not a lick of color to the Germanic bones of her face, but coloring her fingernails amused her, and added the right touch of frivolity to her day.
She was able to tolerate such frustrations as the Fravel farm project without sinking into despair or burnout because she knew how to pace herself. It was tough being a one-woman foundation, spreading her expertise and support across the heritage concerns of an entire state on an almost nonexistent budget, but she had learned that when one project went into a bad dive, it was time to take a short visit to one on the upswing.
So she put away the Fravel file (color-coded green for “farmlands”) and shuffled through the other colors, searching for a project that would lift her spirits. There’s the Rails-to-Trails group, she mused, perusing an item she had assigned to a brown folder, indicating that the project was of historical importance. She had cross-referenced it with a yellow sticker, her color for “recreation,” indicating sunshine. Rails to Trails is much more satisfying. I should call Fred Petridge at the Pennsylvania State Geologic Survey and ask where he’s gotten with the latest fund-raiser . She opened the file, slid her finger down the front page until she found Fred’s number, and dialed.
A recorded message answered, informing all callers that Fred Petridge was temporarily away from his desk.
“Fred, it’s Jenny,” she said into the phone when the God Almighty recording beep cued her response. “Give me a call. It’s about the Big Savage Mountain railroad tunnel project. Just checking up, seeing how it’s going, giving you an attaboy and any help you might need. ’Bye.”
She returned to her stack of files and again sifted through them, looking for something else to sink her teeth into. A red file caught her attention. Ah. Pursuant to Fred and the Geologic Survey, the limonite project could use a little more energy, she decided, as she came to a file marked LIMONITE
PSEUDOMORPHS. She especially liked this project because it involved a mineral that was classically used in making paints, and Jenny was an artist of some accomplishment. Even though the experts had assured her that the limonite local farmers historically had plowed up in their fields was used for iron ore rather than in making red pigment, she still held out a hope that some farmer somewhere had harvested a little of the mineral to make barn-red paint. It was disappointing that most Lancaster County farmers painted their barns white, or built them out of stone and never had need of paint except for the doors, but she had never allowed contrary dogmas to stop her before, so why start now?
She opened the file and paged through it, admiring again the photographs she had taken of the little brown cubes, which she had assiduously labeled LIMONITE (AMORPHOUS HYDROUS IRON OXIDE), PSEUDOMORPHS AFTER PYRITE. There were three of the mysterious little cubes, and they ranged in size from a
She had just returned from the Fravel farm, where she had seen the bad news with her own eyes. Farmer Fravel had lost patience with her efforts to get one of the farm-preservation bureaus to purchase his development
rights, and had begun planting his last crop: sod. She always knew what was coming when she saw a farmer planting sod. It meant he no longer cared about his topsoil, and was ready to have it peeled off along with the grass, rolled up and carted off to apply to the half-acre home sites that had been robbed of their topsoil by a previous subdividing farmer when he had planted his final crop.
Jennifer turned her hands inward so that she could examine her fingernails. They were painted a variety of lively colors, her one bow to cosmetics. She applied not a lick of color to the Germanic bones of her face, but coloring her fingernails amused her, and added the right touch of frivolity to her day.
She was able to tolerate such frustrations as the Fravel farm project without sinking into despair or burnout because she knew how to pace herself. It was tough being a one-woman foundation, spreading her expertise and support across the heritage concerns of an entire state on an almost nonexistent budget, but she had learned that when one project went into a bad dive, it was time to take a short visit to one on the upswing.
So she put away the Fravel file (color-coded green for “farmlands”) and shuffled through the other colors, searching for a project that would lift her spirits. There’s the Rails-to-Trails group, she mused, perusing an item she had assigned to a brown folder, indicating that the project was of historical importance. She had cross-referenced it with a yellow sticker, her color for “recreation,” indicating sunshine. Rails to Trails is much more satisfying. I should call Fred Petridge at the Pennsylvania State Geologic Survey and ask where he’s gotten with the latest fund-raiser . She opened the file, slid her finger down the front page until she found Fred’s number, and dialed.
A recorded message answered, informing all callers that Fred Petridge was temporarily away from his desk.
“Fred, it’s Jenny,” she said into the phone when the God Almighty recording beep cued her response. “Give me a call. It’s about the Big Savage Mountain railroad tunnel project. Just checking up, seeing how it’s going, giving you an attaboy and any help you might need. ’Bye.”
She returned to her stack of files and again sifted through them, looking for something else to sink her teeth into. A red file caught her attention. Ah. Pursuant to Fred and the Geologic Survey, the limonite project could use a little more energy, she decided, as she came to a file marked LIMONITE
PSEUDOMORPHS. She especially liked this project because it involved a mineral that was classically used in making paints, and Jenny was an artist of some accomplishment. Even though the experts had assured her that the limonite local farmers historically had plowed up in their fields was used for iron ore rather than in making red pigment, she still held out a hope that some farmer somewhere had harvested a little of the mineral to make barn-red paint. It was disappointing that most Lancaster County farmers painted their barns white, or built them out of stone and never had need of paint except for the doors, but she had never allowed contrary dogmas to stop her before, so why start now?
She opened the file and paged through it, admiring again the photographs she had taken of the little brown cubes, which she had assiduously labeled LIMONITE (AMORPHOUS HYDROUS IRON OXIDE), PSEUDOMORPHS AFTER PYRITE. There were three of the mysterious little cubes, and they ranged in size from a
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