Hometown Morning

I think that in my Hometown Memories Collection, I’ve established – at least to my own satisfaction – that you can go home again. Perhaps not with a boy’s innocence and enthusiasm, but certainly with an adult’s fond memories and deep appreciation for the gifts of community, of belonging, of shared values and dreams that are the essence of the hometown experience. Hometown Morning is the sixth and final look at the hometown of my boyhood – and, I hope, at some of the things you remember most warmly about your hometown as well.

In this series of works we have revisited my favorite places: town square, the quiet lanes and busy street corners, the country chapel, and the stone bridge. These were the stages on which the drama of my youth played out with all the joy and high spirits and occasional heartaches that a passionate young man brings to living.

I was a newspaper delivery boy so I knew the morning rhythms of my town, and how well I remember some of the characters who gave my hometown its character. They live on – in my memory and now in my art. My newspaper route took me into the heart of my hometown and introduced me to the infinite variety of human experience. Though Hometown Morning will be the last work in my Hometown Memories Collection, I see it as a beginning rather than an end. After all, I met my future wife Nanette while on my paper route. And for me, that was the beginning of all good things!