Accord vs Kerhonkson

Dear Wally:

Rather than ask for your normally sagacious advise on a particular matter, I want to share an anecdote about country living, one I found charming. I was in a diner in Kerhonkson, my town, some time ago and made the acquaintance of an older fellow, friendly as they come. In all my years I had never seen him around and it’s a pretty small town. Anyway, we were chatting about all kinds of things with the sort of uprooted abandon that complete strangers can sometimes afford--You know, the stakes are low when there’s little chance you’ll ever see the person again. In this respect, many emotional walls can come down and conversations, stripped of consequences, can quickly get very real when lives run parallel for extremely short stretches. We were victims of an unfortunate and untimely kitchen grease fire that, while not tragic in any real way, still slammed the brakes on any notion of a quick diner meal. The drama gave us some time we didn’t think we had. This fellow was every bit of 80 years old, in no particular hurry, and after discussing global issues, politics, the war, religion, Tomkat and Tech City, not to mention other hot- button issues, I finally I asked him if he was ‘from around here.’ He levered a stubborn piece of tuna fish from between his front teeth with a handy toothpick and after some time said in a thoughtful, yet deadpan voice, “nope.”
Fair enough , I thought. Here’s an old timer just running the roads, packing in life’s gritty mortar betwixt the cracks of his wizened face. God knows what corners of the world he’s seen in his day and God knows what strange calculus of circumstances brought him to pass through this skinny sluice of the Hudson Valley, however briefly.
“So if you are not from Kerhonkson, where in the world are you from?” I queried, bracing myself for a lesson in international geography.
“I’m from Accord,” he responded proudly—and I laughed. How could I not?

(note to reader unfamiliar with Rt. 209 geography—Accord and Kerhonkson are neighboring towns).

Signed,
Amused in Accord.

Dear Amused,
Cute story. Glad I could help.

Ps, To set the long standing debate straight, it’s pronounced “Accord”

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