Reflection about this weekend’s virtual stream of the Ketchum seminar now adds to the past two year obsession with Key West which began (checking records) with the August 8, 2022 purchase of Silas House’s novel Southernmost and an evolving grief over the 2020 death of younger brother who lived in Key West for a number of years in the 1990s. I am the only family member who never visited him there, and two years ago I still knew very little about it. I have long known about several birthdate coincidences with Hemingway but for the most part was successfully subdued by a once upon a time French friend in Strasbourg who mocked me: “Oh la la, encore Emingway,” which at that time would have included too much about Nick Adams.

One thing determined thus far: our family coincidences are soundly on the Finnish immigrant maternal side, not the Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee originating and westward bound Scots-Irish kin. In these two years I also notice coincidences with the married side of the family: vacations in Cuba in 1930s, French language teachers (one chair of French department), a first guitar as a boy beginning a lifelong career in guitars purchased in Spain, faculty member and a birth in Montana, the state of Iowa, two twists with dates, and the biggest surprise this weekend, for husband as well: the title of Sherwood Anderson’s novel which Hemingway brutalized in satire.

As far as I know there are no connections on either side with Idaho. What a treat to peek into untethered realm.

Countdown: 25/297