More work today! Yay, progress. Also, I'm still working on the story, but here is the photo!

 

The Electric Chair (Draft) -- I really need to post this today even though it will be extensively revised and a photo added

By Gina Giuliano (2026)

My mother has been gradually shedding possessions since 2022, when my father died. Recently she moved from an apartment to assisted living. One beloved item that remains in her apartment is the electric chair. This sturdy chair was an important piece of furniture when she was a child, growing up at the Axinn Farm in West Shokan. Mimmie, my grandmother was always interested in True Crime. The biggest story in the 1930s was the kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh's baby. A man named Bruno Hauptmann was arrested and put on trial for the horrible crime. Mimmie never skipped listeneing to the case on the radio, and so my mother and her slightly younger brother Bud heard the details as well. In the evening they would act out the trial. Eventually, he was convicted and sentenced to die by electrocution. In the living room of their house at the Axinn Farm was a solid wooden chair, painted green in Mimmie fashion. My mother and Uncle Buddy would take turns sitting in the wooden chair, tying each other to it with a rope, dramatically pretending to be executed, while the jailer would pantomime pulling a big lever that sent juice through the body. The unfortunate imitation Hauptmann would jerk and flail while tied to the chair, eventually slumping forward, limp. Several years later my grandparents moved from that house where these antics took place and the electric chair was stored in my grandfather's sister’s barn. It stayed there over 60 years, long after my great aunt sold the little bungalow and barn, and incredibly, no-one disturbed it. One day many years later, Uncle Bud explored the old dilapidated barn and was surprised and delighted to discover the electric chair. Remarkably, it was not at all damaged by the leaking roof. On my mother's birthday, Uncle Bud visited her. He went inside and said, “I have something in my truck for you.” She followed him outside, wondering what it could be. He opened the back of his truck cap and there it was: the electric chair!

 When I was growing up in West Shokan, we got one television station: CBS from Hartford CT. It took a major roof antenna to bring it in. I was not a television addict, but did watch shows that my father chose, such as the news, 60 Minutes and All in the Family, on our B&W set in the living room. This led to a lifelong preference for the network, and shows like Murder She Wrote and Everybody Loves Raymond remain my all-time favorites.

We don't have cable TV. Instead we have online subscriptions and a digital antenna. I canceled my Paramount+ subscription the day after seeing Tony Docoupil's introduction as he prepared to take over the evening news. The gradual yet rapid transformation of the network into state propaganda is alarming to say the least. Farewell CBS. You will have to boot-lick the unethical fascist grifters without me. Next target for my advocacy will be your advertisers.

 End of semester is so challenging! Before more time passes, I want to note that last week, I had a dream that had Mimmie in it. It was brief. She was peeking around a door that looked like the ones we had in our white house in West Shokan. She looked as she always did. I had this dream the night of 4/12, so Daddy's birthday was the next day, but he wasn't in it. This year is the 30th anniversary of Mimmie's death (April 5). It was good to see her, even if just a glimpse.

 I intended to post yesterday and note two things, but this is a busy week and time evaporated. First, yesterday was the fifth anniversary of Uncle Bud's death. How can that be? Next, it was the 21st anniversary of the founding of Gully Brook Press.

Last night I had another dream with my father in it. He was driving. My mother was in the passenger's seat. I was in the back seat. He was talking and looked to be about 80-85. At first we were driving on a road that traveled through a corn field, and then we were on 28A in West Shokan. We were late for dinner, and my father was quite annoyed by this. He narrowly avoided a head on collision, which did not disturb him at all, but really upset my mother. I was going through a roll of money, pulling out bills to make the ticket price ($15 each).

On New Year's Eve, I learned that my lifelong "best" friend's father died the night before. He was 98, and had been failing for a few months. I'd known him since I was five, having met my friend in Kindergarten. Yesterday I messaged my friend's sister, since we are also friends, due to my long history with their family. She said that she and my friend are really struggling. I get it. Of course their dad has only been gone a short time, but after nearly a year, I am still struggling on a daily basis. I wish I had some brilliant words of wisdom for them, but I don't. I know he wasn't well, couldn't get out of bed or do what he wanted, lived a good long life, as had my father, and unlike my father, this man had lost his wife nine years ago, but those statements don't matter. Life is hard. Happy New Year.

I had the 16th anniversary of this blog last week.

So far this March really is coming in like a lion. Why is it when we are getting a nor'easter or have lost electricity, all the a-holes (many of whom have retired south with their public sector pensions that us northern tax payers funded) chime in on social media to gloat about the weather in Florida.

I have never seen a northerner make a snarky comment when they have a hurricane and their houses have been destroyed. I feel like writing this when I see their insensitive remarks, with a parting shot of "good riddance to you, please don't come back even for a visit" but of course I never would.

Uncle Buddy died! :-( Here is his obituary.

I had a memory today of Mimmie and her old house on Whispell Road. I have never written about it before. Upstairs there was a small bedroom where we slept when I stayed overnight. The toilet (there was no bathroom) was in the downstairs bedroom where Grandpa and eventually Uncle Bud slept. Mimmie had a chamberpot upstairs for us to use (for pee only, LOL) during the night. I wonder how many people my age have had this experience? I think I had this memory today because the bathroom in my old house is three flights down from my office and the bedroom. I was thinking how handy that chamberpot would be!

Forgot to put up our Halloween picture! First time we've done costumes in years!

Here is the first story. Here is the second.

This is what publicity has done to the swimming holes in the Catskills. Being named "the Best" is not an honor, it is a nightmare. How can these people be such disrespectful slobs? Are they so ignorant they can't understand "leave nothing but your footprints, take nothing but pictures"  ?

I wrote to Governor Cuomo expressing my concerns, and received the following response yesterday from DEC:

 Besides the things they outline, I think the State needs to conduct a public education campaign to shame the tourists who have no clue how to behave in a beautiful and sacred natural place. Step up enforcement too! Fine them!

And Travel & Leisure (& upstate.com) should have to pay for the clean up, enforcement, and public education campaign.

L-R: Martin Eckert, Marty Giuliano, Elwyn Davis

 

The Diary of Elwyn Davis is finished! (*Pretty much.) I just ordered 1974-1975, the last volume. This is the cover, from an April 28, 1960 Onteora Record story, "Census Taker On the Job!"

Some more ephemera, from the 1990s. Had many good times here, when Main Street was admittedly blighted, but nothing like 2015.

^I do have some future tasks planned, but the big lift is over

Bob was organizing a cabinet in the utility room and came across a treasure: A sweater that my mother knitted almost 45 years ago for our dog Pud. Here I am with Pud in about 1972 at a Bennett school fashion show, modeling a dress my mother made while Pud wears the sweater. After Pud died in 1986, the sweater was passed along to Penny Poodily and when she died in 1999, I must have stuck it in the cabinet. Rosie is my first dog since then who is small enough to wear it. It's still in like new condition and it fits her perfectly!

 "It's to hot to wear this sweater"

Here is my sister's latest post, about what has also been consuming me: kindles and Elwyn's diary.

I am tired from the weekend, which was long and lovely. We are having a gorgeous fall and I'd like to spend more of it at home. But, "if wishes were horses, beggars would ride," I suppose!

It was a beautiful setting for a wedding reception.

I have not had a burning desire to write very much here. I think during the first half of the summer it was enough of a challenge to keep up with my work, even the much lighter workload of summer session. Now that my life has returned to something resembling normal (and Bob finished his vacation), I spent the first two days of this week power-working -- and got completely caught up! Yesterday I worked on my plants. The beans are coming, the cukes are in blossom, the flowers look OK overall. Sadly, the tomatoes are pathetic. My inattention, and the rainy spell in June have taken a toll. I hoped the intense heat & humidity would help, but it didn't. So I fussed with them yesterday, but I am not optimistic that this will be "a good year for tomatoes" (as Mimmie would say).

Weekend visitors in Samsonville, should be fun. Harry is doing well. It's already a harmonious group.

It's hard to believe it has been twenty years since she died. I wish I could have a cup of tea, piece of danish (heated up in the toaster oven, of course) and a visit with her, but my memories will have to do. Miss you, Mimmie!

Yesterday after church, we went to the Blue Hill Cafe for brunch, with my parents, sister, and brother-in-law. It is quite a drive over Peekamoose Mountain from West Shokan to Claryville (~25 miles), and we went a different way to get home, past Frost Valley, came out in Big Indian (~20 miles), then took old Route 28 and headed back to West Shokan (~18 miles). It's beautiful and much of it is remote (quite an understatement in both cases). It almost goes without saying that I am not a stranger to the woods and rural areas, but these roads travel through areas that are breathtaking -- almost harsh, raw, even brutal. And, there are signs of Irene's devastation, especially on the Shandaken end. I remarked, it's comforting to know that there are still not-so-distant places that are mostly untouched by suburban sprawl.

 West Shokan to Claryville

Claryville to Big Indian

  This part, Big Indian to West Shokan, near 28, is much more traveled

 Deer are hardly a rare sight, but it almost seemed as if you could reach out and pet her

Buttermilk Falls (on Peekamoose) -- way more spectacular in person

Added: here's a feel-good short film that gives me hope for places that have been touched by people.

Just in time for my mother's 80th birthday, I switched my Mimmie book from blurb, which was costly and slow, to amazon. Besides the speed and expense, I lost the template when my machine crased last year, so it was easier to re-create it on amazon. Finally, blurb only offered apple for e-versions, and  I wanted kindle.