Throwback Thursday

When I was a young woman, I used to love to read the column from the Philmont correspondent in the chatham courier newspaper. I loved the Courier anyway. It was a great litle weekly with insider info and just enough snarkiness to be entertaining. There were local gossip columns, penned by A Red Headed Secretary and The Man in the Black Hat. And there was the news from Philmont.

If I remember rightly, Mr. Kimball was our intrepid correspondent, and the news was more likely to be about what his neighbors had to say, or why his bathrobe was so wonderfully comfortable that he refused to buy any other brand, than about events at the town meeting. But thanks to Mr. Kimball I felt like I knew Philmont.

He painted a portrait of a quiet hamlet filled with local characters who somehow managed to get along, at least well enough to avoid a small town Cold War.
I thought it sounded wonderful.

I finally got there today. It is a lot like I expected it to be; rows of small Victorians lining the winding road, a tiny business district, then more houses until the yard d's grow bigger and bigger, finally becoming fields and farms.

It still seems somewhat undiscovered,  but it has a what so many of us long for. There is a lake, sweeping views of the mountains, and most importantly, a sleepy charm that invites you to relax and stop rushing by.

Mr. Kimball is probably long gone, but his Philmont is still here.