My wife, Jo, is a Downton Abbey junkie. Before Downton Abbey, it was West Wing.
Normally she’s quite agreeable and often defers good-naturedly to my tastes which center around films of the WWII era. When Downton Abbey is being played, Jo’s engagement with the tube is total. Even should I cry “fire,” I know she would still remain seated, engrossed in the vicissitudes of the English aristocracy and the struggles of its servant class while our home went up in smoke
There is something romantic about grand old mansions. I feel the lure of their mystique whenever I see one. Here on the Shore we have some of our own grand homes: Almodington and Beverly in Somerset, Mapleton and Cherrystone in Snow Hill and Wye House in Talbot County. Once on a sailboat, my wife, Jo, and I sailed to the western shore to visit Sotterley, the only Tidewater Plantation open the public. Grand houses, wonderful myths and romantic adventures to be sure.
Watching Downton Abbey on TV doesn’t do it for me.
During the Downton Abbey frenzy, near my home in St. Michaels, I began noticing that many residents had also given a name to their homesteads, like the aristocracy of the old grand mansions of England and America. What to make of the names these local dwellers assigned to their more modest estates, I found challenging. One day, I brought my tape recorder to record my thoughts as I rode my bike down the Bozman-Neavitt Road observing the names of the homes.
In a name like Sandy Pines, I assume the name reflects the land’s signature features. Other signs are more cryptic, like a large sign I saw of an orange colored cartoon cat but with no name. Cat lovers? Or are they plagued with mice and chasing them away, the way yachtsmen keep an artificial owl hoisted in the shrouds to keep barn swallows off the deck.
Apparently, living on a point of land is significant here: there’s a Pond Point, a Winterbottom Point, a Breezy Point and a Pond Point. One residence, Swan Pointe, has an “e” is added to the end of the word ‘point’. Suggestions of antiquity, perhaps, or maybe a touch of class, like the “ou” in the spelling of harbor by nearby resort Harbour Towne.
One sign, Daddy’s Folly Farm certainly catches your eye. Did the family think Daddy was crazy to buy the place? Did he buy a lemon? When he got there did he act uncharacteristically? In either case Daddy apparently got his way. Another home called, Up the Creek, identifies its location on the water but it could also suggest a mortgage the owners have lived to regret or a waterfront that floods regularly.
The word farm appears on a few signs. However, they are not working farms. The word farm might indicate nostalgia for our agricultural past rather than describing any function. One homestead, Saddlers Cove Farm, is one such property and until a few years ago had a small airport with a hanger. For a while a bi-plane came in and out, spooking birds and neighbors. Better to indicate you own this farm than to say you’ve bought the farm.
We have as many crabs as mosquitoes on the Shore but I didn’t see a single sign with a crab painted on it. There are several signs picturing dogs, but they’re invariably Black Labs or Golden Retrievers but not Chesapeake Bay Retrievers. Regional loyalty varies here, depending on any weekender’s passions.
Speaking of passions, Hidden Pleasure, a particularly equivocal name, caught my eye. I suspect the resident may have assigned his home the name to draw interest. My curiosity immediately piqued. I slowed on my bike and looked down the drive. Nothing but trees. What were the folks who lived there saying to the world about what their place meant to them? What specifically was hidden and what was so pleasing? If I could find any clue at all, the image on the sign pictured a goose. I moved on, still curious.
One sign reads Grandview. It’s located next to a cemetery. I saw an elderly man on a riding mower. The mower had stopped, and was parked just before a gravestone around which new flowers grew. The man sat there, still, deep in thought. I was certain that he was visiting with someone he loved. He misses them. He dropped by to have a visit and tell them so. It was a wide and peaceful place for him to have an uninterrupted talk.
A couple I knew once named their home on the water, Final Decision. The name was inscribed on a plaque attached to a covered well housing standing by the road. The home is still there; the well housing is too, but the name has undergone a metamorphosis. Final Decision was a word play on the husband’s profession as a judge– and the fact that this was the last move the couple planned to make. Like many here, they came to live out their lives on the Shore. The husband died but the wife stayed on in the house and disabled with age she eventually left. Over time, letters fell off the sign, until, what remained read, Indecis in.
It’s a haunting commentary. Few decisions we make actually endure. Time and experience alter them.
Some names endure. Others are lost to history. The question remains, what’s in a name?
P.S. Our story is simple. We call our home, Second Look. It wasn’t love at first sight. It required a second look.
Columnist George Merrill is an Episcopal Church priest and pastoral psychotherapist. A writer and photographer, he’s authored two books on spirituality: Reflections: Psychological and Spiritual Images of the Heart and The Bay of the Mother of God: A Yankee Discovers the Chesapeake Bay. He is a native New Yorker, previously directing counseling services in Hartford, Connecticut, and in Baltimore. George’s essays, some award winning, have appeared in regional magazines and are broadcast twice monthly on Delmarva Public Radio.
..
Write a Letter to the Editor on this Article
We encourage readers to offer their point of view on this article by submitting the following form. Editing is sometimes necessary and is done at the discretion of the editorial staff.