
They attracted me with their solid trunks, their graceful branches, the dry leaves that still created motion and gentle noise on a November day. I walked over to one and felt the rough bark and looked up into the branches, right up into the sky.
On the other hand, while I was writing a book about Cincinnati food history, I realized that the stubbornness pays off: We have our unique regional menu because the Graeters kept doing things the old way until the rest of the world caught up with them. Grandmothers and neighborhood butchers never stopped making goetta, though no one made it anywhere else. That’s to be treasured.
When my husband and I go to concerts or any performance, of course we look around for anyone we know. With amazing regularity, we spot a woman with a familiar head of long gray-red hair, wearing colorful glasses and a flowy dress, using a cane or maybe a rolling walker. Yep, there’s Amy, we’ve said for years, always with amused pleasure at her sheer omnipresence at the cultural events of the city.