On a Monday Evening

The sun is setting as the thunderstorms roll across the Panhandle of Florida. The coolness of the air beneath the storm is refreshing after a day of humidity.  The rumbling always brings me back to the days of my childhood when I would sit in my room reading the tales of James Fennimore Cooper and Washington Irving, two authors who wrote of the stuff that made New York famous.

Growing up in the Hudson Valley two of Washington Irving’s works come especially to mind.  The first is almost universally known, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, with Ichabod Crane and the nefarious headless horseman who terrorized him. Washing Irving wrote about these legends stemming from the original Dutch colonization of the Hudson.  The second is not as well known, but it was a favorite, The Legend of Rip Van Winkle.

Originally written as a short story included in Irving’s collection entitled The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, I was first introduced to it around fourth or fifth grade as part of our reading assignments.  Coincidently that summer my Grandparents began camping in the Catskill Mountains near the setting of the story.  It was written by an author who had never set foot in those mountains at the time he penned the story.

The story of Rip Van Winkle is set before the Revolutionary war, and Rip was a amicable colonist of Dutch decent who is taken to long walks in the woods to escape his wife’s nagging demands.  One autumn day Rip and his dog Wolf are wandering up a mountain trail when he comes upon a man dressed in the style of the original Dutch settlers.  He is carrying a keg up the trail and asks Rip to give him a hand.  Soon enough they come to a open field where Rip discovers the source of the thunderous noises he had been hearing earlier.  There is a group of fashionably dressed Dutch settlers drinking and playing ninepin.  There is no conversation but he begins to drink their liquor and soon falls asleep.

Taken from the Web
No indication of copyright

When he awakes he is surprised to find his gun has rusted away, his beard is a foot long, and his dog, Wolf, is nowhere to be found.  When he returns to the village he recognizes no one.  The pub he used to frequent, the King George III, is now called the George Washington.  All the confusion gets sorted out and it is determined he had been asleep 20 years.  His wife has passed but his son and daughter are still there and they care for him as he resumes his life.

So when I hear thunder I just know those old Dutch kegglers are calling to me to join them for a game of ninepin.

[This tale is a quick read, I don't do justice to.  I would recommend it as a good bedtime story]