Codger’s column: His crisis crew
Codger credits his crew — Crone, Cur II, Cricket and Crock — for keeping him on course through the combined cataclysms of COVID-19 and Trumpism. These entwined plagues are not anywhere near over yet,...
View ArticleCodger’s column: A mere 50 years later
Time slows down on Shelter Island, claims Codger, especially if you’re not raising kids or working a job or two, but during this past COVID year time has been softening, warping, melting like Salvador...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: Reboot
Codger is not entirely looking forward to his world returning to normal, not that he knows what normal means anymore. No masks mean he will have to start shaving regularly again. No social distancing...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Looking forward
Cricket is coming for the Memorial Day Weekend to see Codger and Crone for the first time in person in more than a year and to celebrate his 9th birthday. Codger would jitterbug with joy if his lower...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: The coming maskerade
Codger might never take off his mask if it weren’t for his iPhone, which insists he tap out his password if it can’t see his naked face. It’s easier for Codger to slip the mask down and be recognized...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: Myth makers
Codger and Cricket have almost finished the 18th book they have read together on FaceTime since the beginning of the plague year. They expect another satisfying climax as the teen-aged heroes and...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: Catching up
Wednesday is Supervisor Gerry Siller’s catch-up day, so Codger was in Town Hall last week, hoping to catch up on what has happened in the six months since Siller took office again. This was necessary...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Silly season
Codger has called this time of year the “silly season” to convey the final frantic efforts to make more money or whoopee before Labor Day allows the dogs back on the beach. Cur II has been counting...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Too many memorials
Codger and Crone attended memorials last weekend for three more Shelter Island friends gone. Between COVID, old age and perhaps a climate of hopelessness, this has been a time of disability and death....
View ArticleCodger’s column: Transparency
Even Codger is struggling to see through this transparency thing. It’s simply not clear. In less than two weeks, Shelter Islanders will vote in a complicated election in which the supervisor is...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: A local hero
It was always reassuring to open the FIT Center door and come upon the welcoming bulk and boom of Garth Griffin, the red-topped gentle giant. Typically, Codger had dragged himself to the chore of...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Ghosts at the table
It was a wonderful Thanksgiving, especially after missing out on last year. There were family firsts! A grandson brought a girlfriend. Codger actually polished the Crone family silver, hours of...
View ArticleColumn: Codger’s snow day
Codger observed last Friday’s official snow day by following School Superintendent Brian Doelger’s directive to “have some fun.” Codger sent his mind outside to play in that first week of what is not...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: After Albert
Codger was deeply disappointed when Albert Dickson announced last year that he was not running for re-election to the Town Board after only one term. For four years, Codger had admired Dickson as...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Water music
The hit show on Shelter Island these days is “West Neck Story,” a heady mix of the recent smash musical “A Hill of Beans” and the classic 1974 film noir “Chinatown.” It’s complex, exciting, offers...
View ArticleCodger’s column: Water Music, second movement
Mark Twain is supposed to have said, “Whiskey is for drinkin’, water is for fightin’,” which was more than enough for Codger to abandon his Friday evening jar for what was billed as “an informational...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: Alternate vacations
Codger’s old buddy, Crock, has been shuttling in and out of local hospitals lately and visiting him has resuscitated Codger’s own hospital memories and the accompanying feelings of dread, gratitude,...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: Unmasking Shelter Island
Behind his mask, Codger is not smiling. He is tired of wearing the damn thing and also annoyed at those who pass too close to him bare-faced in the Post Office and the IGA. Codger has his reasons;...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: A memory?
After two years of marriage, my first wife thought we were still too shaky to have children, emotionally and professionally. We were both 23. She was a student, working in a doctor’s office, I was a...
View ArticleCodger’s Column: The New Prospects
Codger has been so taken up lately by COVID, the Jan. 6 hearings, climate change, Ukraine (remember?) and the Supreme Court, that he lost sight of himself. He failed to check his legs, to ask Crone to...
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