The Story Behind the Picture: Old First Church, Bennington, VT

Our grandson and his girlfriend announced their engagement. We couldn’t have been more thrilled. Then they announced their engagement party which would precede the wedding by about two years.

Kids today.

The party would be held at the Albany Pump Station (Brewery & Restaurant).

In New York.

State.

Almost an entire eastern seaboard from Orlando, Florida.

We as a country had just come out of the pandemic (or, I should say, the part where we were all wearing masks in airports, airplanes, restaurants, and—let’s face it—(some of us) as we drove alone in our cars). My husband elected not to fly so soon after all the hubbub. I wanted to go and was happy to go alone, but I called my daughter Jessica and asked if she’d like to tag along with me. “Trip’s on me,” I told her.

She, of course, said yes. Tickets were purchased, hotel room was reserved as was the rental car. In mid-March 2022 we boarded a plane headed from the Orlando Sanford airport to Albany, New York. We wore clothes fit for spring in Florida, but packed clothes fit for spring in New York. More or less. Mostly . . . less.

Jessica and I soon discovered that we had not truly packed for Upstate New York in-the-middle-of-March weather. But since most of what we were going to do was inside, we thought we’d be fine.

There was, however, the plan to go hiking in the Catskills the day after the party. (I’ll share photos of that later.) The weatherman promised nothing much more than about 15-20 degrees, but our weather apps also showed lots of sunshine.

The evening after our hike and a drive back to Albany in a snow shower, we gathered at the home of a family member. We enjoyed pizza and a game of Left-Center-Right as we sat around a dining room table that stretched from one end of the room to the other. At some point the conversation shifted to the next day, a day that would end with us boarding another plane, headed home. “What will you do all day tomorrow?” someone asked.

Jessica quickly piped in that we had to find something to do because hiking had been so much fun. Even in the cold. In fact, that whole day had been a blast! We’d gone from Albany to the Catskills to Woodstock where Jessica had a scoop of (can you believe it?) “the best ice cream I’ve ever had.” Then there was the mention that we were only an hour from the Vermont border. “With all your travels,” someone asked me, “have you ever been to Vermont?”

I admitted that I had not. “Let’s go to Vermont,” I said to Jessica. Or maybe she said it to me. At any rate, we decided to visit the Green Mountain State.

The next morning, we packed everything we’d brought and exited the hotel, wheeling our luggage beside us. When we turned the corner of the hotel that led to where we’d parked the rented Jeep, we were met by a blast of cold air like nothing I’ve experienced since those three February days I spent in Chicago. Jessica and I both gritted our teeth, uttered a growl, threw the luggage into the back of the car, and then got into the front as quickly as possible. “Coffee,” Jessica declared.

“Heat,” I added, then worked the controls.

We took care of both and headed northeast toward Vermont. Within an hour, we crossed the state line, then crested a hill, rounded a corner and gasped. What stood before us looked like a postcard. An old church—white clapboard with an impressive steeple topped by a bell tower—stood proud against the bright blue, cloudless sky and nestled atop a thin blanket of fresh snow. We had seen patches of the white stuff along the road, but this . . . this was a shroud. To the left of the church and behind a white picket fence, gravestones rose and tilted against time. This was my kind of place!

We immediately pulled into the semi-circular drive along the front of the church and got out. In spite of the threat of frostbite, we took a few photos of the grand structure (originally built, we learned, in 1762, rebuilt in 1805, and then restored in 1935 when the Vermont Legislature honored it by designating it as “Vermont’s Colonial Shrine). All the while, our teeth chattered in the whistle of wind. We gawked at the colonial-style homes that graced up and down the road before returning to the warmth of the car. Simply . . . historically . . . beautiful.

Later, while talking with a shop owner in downtown Bennington, we learned that Robert Frost was buried behind the church. “Did you see Robert Frost’s grave?” she asked oh-so-matter-of-factly. A few minutes later, Jessica and I got back in the car and headed back up the hill to the church to scout out the grave of the great poet. By now the snow looked more like a ratty old sheet, but that didn’t stop us from seeing the beauty in it all. Or Jessica from geochaching.

Well, find the grave we did but not before I slipped on a nearby patch of ice. I managed to catch myself, fortunately. Otherwise, my family would have been able to say “she died right next to the grave of Robert Frost. Fitting, don’t you think?”

I snapped a few pictures, read the poems on plaques, and then hurried back to the warmth of the car.

The temperature that day never rose even to double digits. Jessica and I were so cold we couldn’t find the words to describe just how cold we were. But we laughed a lot, we ate good pizza in a small pizzeria, we made purchases in the most charming shops, we saw monuments and covered bridges, and—for the first time in her life—my daughter saw snow. We’d seen it fall the day before, but, that day in Vermont, she made a snowball. First time.

For me, beyond the joy of a day spent with my child, I also had the experience of standing in the middle of a postcard in a New England state. And even though surrounded by dead trees with limbs that stretched like an old woman’s fingers within a chill I could not define, an enormous sense of peace coursed warmly through me. Perhaps it was the diamond glints along the snow (so pretty!). Perhaps it was the commanding presence of the church—the way it rose proudly and with such surety—or perhaps it was because I’d enjoyed a delightful day with my daughter. Hard to say.

But there it was, and there I was, and there she was . . . warm inside a rented Jeep, in front of the Old First Church.