Innkeeper's
Journal
Recent News
This year the Hawthorne Inn
celebrates the 30th Anniversary of opening doors and welcoming
guests, from around the globe, to the historic village of Concord,
Mass. Even after thirty years of hospitality, life at the Inn is
filled with excitement and surprises. In January, Norm Abram, of
This Old House and the New Yankee Workshop, arrived with a film-crew
to produce a special project at the Inn. To top it off, Yankee
Magazine has named the Hawthorne Inn an editor’s choice in the April
2006 edition.
The Norm Abram project, jointly backed by the University of
Connecticut and the Department of Housing and Urban Development,
outlines safe-renovation techniques. This informative film will be
distributed by Habitat for Humanity. The Yankee Magazine article,
that prominently features the Hawthorne Inn, is entitled Walking
with the Writers of Concord, Massachusetts. The Hawthorne Inn has
been an invited member of the prestigious Select Registry,
Distinguished Inns of North America since 1980.
Shadows Falling
Our silky and extremely
athletic cat was aptly named Shadow. Though mostly a pet of sweet
disposition Shadow could exhibit a stubborn black streak to get what
she wanted, in her own time and way. This cat had developed a bad
habit of mysteriously interrupting the pattern of her nightly
hunting rounds to insist on immediate entry to the shelter of our
Inn. Her mood-swings could overtake her anytime from dusk till dawn.
Shadow had intuited, that if there was no activity at the
entranceway, she could still agitate us to proper action by scaling
the angled roofs and take up her meowing station next to our bedroom
skylight.
We had recently brought home from the hospital our third baby, which
made our tally three kids in three and one-half years. It was quite
a trick to keep everything on track, what with the careening, and
often colliding, schedules of toddlers and infants and the endless
daily chores of inn keeping. With early summer the tourist season
had come into full swing and we were busy at the Inn. For our ease,
we relocated the family to a couple of rooms on the ground floor
where we could more easily monitor naps and still respond to the
needs of our clientele.
I was pouring coffee for the guests who had already gathered for
breakfast, around the common dining table, when another couple came
in to join our merry company. Our new companions wore upon their
faces some strained look of mild annoyance. After the fortifying
effects of the first cup pulsed through their veins, and having
endured long enough the pleasantries and banter that issued from the
cheery gathering, these two could bear it no longer and burst forth.
They simultaneously launched into a tale of woe, with the staccato
precession possible only to those long linked in matrimony. And woe,
indeed, it was. The wife’s inordinate fear of things that fly in the
night, be they bats or spirits of the dearly departed, took center
stage.
They continued; that they had gone soundly to sleep in the canopy
bed, under the open skylight, when, at about 2:00 A.M…
As their story unraveled before the now silent gathering I could
only too clearly envision the entire escapade unfolding:
The cool, sweet summer breezes wafting through the skylight and the
lingering smell of grasses and dew. The cat, [who we had neglected
to inform of our move], blackening out the stars as it padded with
purpose to the open portal of the skylight. The first tentative step
and then the full weight of paws upon the mosquito screen, a
hurtling fall through the empty void and then the jarring impact as
the screen impales itself on the bed finial and the black demon
crashes through the woven canopy, dragging it down, down, onto the
bed, weighted as a fish flailing in a cast net.
The couple awoke to a crash and a heavy black form thrashing about
them and they found themselves likewise ensnared by beasties and
canopies and the dark night. With a struggle as heroic as any Labor
of Hercules, they beat back the intruder and gained the light. The
poor cat was soon ejected to the hall and cat and couple were both
left to lick their emotional wounds.
Rather than to commiserate their terrible fate, as the couple had
surely expected and felt rightly earned, the table full of fellow
travelers erupted in a grand round of laughter and congratulations.
The offended couple sat in stunned, round-eyed silence.
“Don’t you see?” one tablemate exclaimed. “You now have a great
story. You can tell it where ever you go.”
The couple finally came to realize, that what they had identified as
a tragedy and a travesty was, in actuality, a treasure. They now
owned a nugget of gold that they could use to crack the ice at any
party, any dinner engagement. They now owned, their own, Inn story.
We all seek stories. We seek context for our existence. We yearn to
be woven into the fiction of our lives and to become minor heroes,
foils and sages.
This one couple had simply sought a night away, an inn experience,
and they got the story of a lifetime.
We are proud to announce
that the Hawthorne Inn has been recognized by www.Forbes.com
as one of “The 10 Best Inns Of New England”. It is
gratifying to be placed in the company of such prestigious and
well-known hostelries. The author of this fine Travel Feature,
Breckinridge Ely, identifies the hospitality that we provide to our
guests as one of the chief reasons to seek out the Hawthorne Inn. You
can access the article in the Lifestyle section of Forbes.com via the
following link: http://www.forbes.com/lifestyle/2001/10/11/1011feat.html
Continental
Airlines magazine has printed a lovely piece about Autumn colors in
New England in their September 2001 issue under the banner
“Frommer’s Travel Guide Update: New England”. Several areas of
exquisite scenery are mentioned including historic Concord,
Massachusetts. The article goes on to say “ the Hawthorne Inn is the
quintessential New England country inn”.
In the wake of the hurt
and destruction caused by the terrorist attacks of September 11 we
were sought out by the NBC television affiliate in Boston to represent
the lodging industry. We appeared in the nightly news in a very well
executed piece by reporter Byron Barnett that explored the ancillary
and far reaching impact, of the terrible deeds, upon the travel and
tourist industry. We were grateful to be able to participate and
there-in to assuage the sense of helplessness by empowering our
friends, neighbors and fellow citizens to take an active role in the
economic well being of our nation. Marilyn was also given the
opportunity to develop this theme to more depth on our local talk
radio station.
We are still receiving
notice from readers of an article titled “Catching Fall Colors Where
America Began” that appeared as the cover of the Travel Section in
the Sunday Los Angeles Times. The Times Travel Writer, Susan Spano,
was kind enough to include a description of her stay at the Hawthorne
Inn in her writings and to declare that her guestroom “was a pure
pleasure”.
Our thanks goes
out to the Concord Journal who recently honored our benchmark
achievement with a front-page article titled “No checking-out:
Hawthorne Inn owners mark 25th anniversary”. Staff Writer, Betsy
Levinson took great effort to document our tenure as Innkeepers
lovingly tending our historic property.
Boston’s Metro
West Daily News published a cover-page article on the Inn and our
life-style in the Your Home section replete with lush color photos.
News Correspondent, Penny Abner-Kahn, used her piece titled “In with
the Inn crowd, At home at the Hawthorne Inn” to explore the
successful balance we maintain that allows us to both raise a
family and welcome guests to the Hawthorne Inn.
