Letters From My Gin Mill: An Octogenarian Odyssey

In 1869 Alphonse Daudet published Lettres de Mon Moulin, (Letters From My Mill), a collection of short stories and sketches. Because he was fortunate in having an old mill in his back yard in Provence, he used it as a work shop. Not being so lucky, I nevertheless have a small but serviceable gazebo abaft my house in sunny Daytona, where ever and anon, and over a four-year period, I succeeded in batting out what have been warily described as newsletters. This I call my gin mill. Coincidently, at about the same time that Daudet was publishing the first of his lettres, the term "gin mill" was first used in America circa 1865 to describe a watering hole, estaminet or bar (according to Webster's),. In my case, the title is appropriate because mon moulin has betimes served as a gathering place for friends, neighbours and curious relatives, who partake of the cup that doth cheer, and occasionally doth inebriate. Mes lettres were written under five headings, The Canadian Shield, American Logo, Beating The Street, The Oyster World and Suckerpunch A selection of these lettres is presented here, not strictly in chronological order, although they span the 70 years during which I've toiled as a penniless scribbler - a metier my father considered a curse, but which I can hardly decry, since his labour put me through college. (Which I think S.J. Perelman described as the four-year loaf on Father's dough.) Take it or leave it. As Montaigne once confessed: "It is myself I portray."