icon: entering northfield
A few posts ago I said I'd write a little thing for my userpics. Oh, I found it: http://nickelchief.livejournal.com/2013/01/12/
In that post I said I'd had to kill off two of them to downsize to 15, the limit for the free account. Woodstock went first. This one right here was the next and last to go:
Actually I'm not sure if it was this exact image, but it was the same road sign.
In 2003 I moved from The Bronx to Northfield, MA while K. was duper-pregnant with Fiona, known then as "Rocco." It was a big deal. We were leaving the rental world and crossing over into home ownership. Exchanging busfumes for woodsmoke, culture for agri-, Spuyten Duyvil for Satan's Kingdom, Comptoir Des Cotonniers for "Baskets, Baskets, Baskets and More."
To mark this new era in userpic form, I drove the no minutes to the border with New Hampshire, a yam's throw from our house, and snapped a few pictures of this sign. I guess I could have chosen one of the "Bienvenue a Massachusetts!" signs but they looked a little banged up. The town line sign was grinning madly and ready for his close-up, though, so I picked that one. Also, I wanted to try to keep feeling as though I'd been welcomed. I was, but a little reinforcement didn't hurt during that tender time.
The town line and state line signs are just a few feet from this place (photos taken eight years later, that's Genevieve at four and Fiona at eight). The "Northfield Drive-In" is actually in Winchester, NH, but nobody knows that, so don't tell.
I saw a fresh new hope in that sign. As a userpic it was meant to be used for droll reports on the hardy locals and their homespun wisdom, or for posting the minutes I'd loyally transcribe in my role as Secretary of the Friends of the Committee to Denounce Monotheism and Potholes, or for fancifully framed photos of cattle. I didn't come up with many of those, and the icon languished, rarely used, usually passed over in favor of the heavier, darker ones indicating that I'd just about had it with life in my charming small town.
I still like living here. I still like my house. But Northfield hasn't defined very much about my life since 2003, and it was easy to toss the icon. Now if that sign had read "Entering Parenthood" then I wouldn't really have needed any others.
In that post I said I'd had to kill off two of them to downsize to 15, the limit for the free account. Woodstock went first. This one right here was the next and last to go:
Actually I'm not sure if it was this exact image, but it was the same road sign.
In 2003 I moved from The Bronx to Northfield, MA while K. was duper-pregnant with Fiona, known then as "Rocco." It was a big deal. We were leaving the rental world and crossing over into home ownership. Exchanging busfumes for woodsmoke, culture for agri-, Spuyten Duyvil for Satan's Kingdom, Comptoir Des Cotonniers for "Baskets, Baskets, Baskets and More."
To mark this new era in userpic form, I drove the no minutes to the border with New Hampshire, a yam's throw from our house, and snapped a few pictures of this sign. I guess I could have chosen one of the "Bienvenue a Massachusetts!" signs but they looked a little banged up. The town line sign was grinning madly and ready for his close-up, though, so I picked that one. Also, I wanted to try to keep feeling as though I'd been welcomed. I was, but a little reinforcement didn't hurt during that tender time.
The town line and state line signs are just a few feet from this place (photos taken eight years later, that's Genevieve at four and Fiona at eight). The "Northfield Drive-In" is actually in Winchester, NH, but nobody knows that, so don't tell.
I saw a fresh new hope in that sign. As a userpic it was meant to be used for droll reports on the hardy locals and their homespun wisdom, or for posting the minutes I'd loyally transcribe in my role as Secretary of the Friends of the Committee to Denounce Monotheism and Potholes, or for fancifully framed photos of cattle. I didn't come up with many of those, and the icon languished, rarely used, usually passed over in favor of the heavier, darker ones indicating that I'd just about had it with life in my charming small town.
I still like living here. I still like my house. But Northfield hasn't defined very much about my life since 2003, and it was easy to toss the icon. Now if that sign had read "Entering Parenthood" then I wouldn't really have needed any others.