No one can read your posts without knowing the connection that you have with your town.

I would have said you were born there but, on reflection, few loves match the convert’s.

Regardless, your sense of place is palpable.

Losing someone who:
touches your life tangentially and yet deeply,
sees more in you than you saw yourself, on their first glimpse, and
is separate and apart (whether through age or opinions or background) yet intimately involved
is upsetting for so many complicated, interwoven reasons.

I imagine that all of us have been blessed with men and women like this in our lives, and it appears certain that you were open to this engagement, which not all people are.

(From your tribute, I presume this is the case.)

It sounds like Robert provided not only a beautiful, burnished, glaze to your town but also a substantial, solid mix suitable for making lasting wares.

Your efforts, here, extend his memory and remembrance.

Great piece this week. I am sure it will survive bisquing and glazing and that those who knew Robert Hunker will continue to know him well when they visit.

Tschuess,
Chris

There’s a landowner in the little town where my Honey and her Daughter have their store (rubber stamping and scrapbooking). He owns a lot of the downtown buildings and rents them out as though he’d rather not (although for rent signs are displayed). He charges excessive rents, he offers only “take it or leave it” leases which he will not negotiate. He owns so many of the small downtown’s storefronts that people almost have to deal with him. His gouging has probably closed more small businesses in town than the current economic downturn.

When the current lease expires, Honey and Daughter are going to either find premises not owned by this guy, or close up shop. They’ve been in business about 7 years, and probably have survived longer than 90 plus percent of other small businesses started at the same time, not just in town but in the country. I’m very proud of them.