My father grew up on the Massachusetts North Shore in the town where John Updike set Couples. In an old house on a hill above town. A few blocks from the church which burned down. Updike called the town Tarbox, but everyone in the area knew it was Ipswich. Same as we were sure that a certain town in New Hampshire was Grace Metalious' Peyton Place.

My father's field was the Pre-Socratic philosophers. Told us stories at dinner time of Heraclitus, Democritus, Thales of Miletus as if they were real people with whom he had just spent an afternoon.

He met my Mother on the Boston Garden while he was at Harvard. It's a romantic story. Will tell it later.

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