A Treehouse, a little you-and-me house

What a weekend the three gals from Syracuse picked for a visit to Fern Forest Treehouse. They had booked a year earlier, aiming for peak foliage season, and they hit it spot on. The maples put on a show of gold, orange, and crimson accented with deep green of the pines. Cool nights made for good sleeps and after a hike to the top of Mt. Abe and a soak in the hot tub, the trio hunkered down under blankets high in the trees. In the morning they shuffled in wearing onesies—a tiger, a lion, and a skeleton—for cups of hot black coffee.             Ashley, a singer-songwriter, is known as Syracuse’s “wild child rocker,” and her band, Professional Victims, has played nationally. By day Ashley works at a tech company selling secondary market tech hardware, but at night she takes to the stage in exotic outfits, her long dark hair swinging at her waist. On Saturday night we all sat by the wood stove and she played a few songs on he...

The new Hot Springs spa must have something to do with the good night's sleeps I’ve been having lately. I admit that I wasn’t in favor of getting a home equity line of credit for this top-of-the-line item that I categorize as a luxury rather than a necessity. But that was two weeks ago. Now, even when it’s 10F out, I peel out of my socks and slip on flipflops, wrap myself in a big terry towel and pad out to the liquid massage parlor. Nothing like being surrounded by 105F H2O swirling like lava in a volcanic crater, shooting fingers of wet heat onto my muscles sore from gym workouts. A plunge into the spa just before bed is better than popping a pill, better than a couple glasses of Cabernet, almost as good as a shot of Woodford Reserve. It took just a week after installing the spa before the request came from Melissa for a return visit to Fern Forest Treehouse. Melissa came up last fall from Boston for an overnight retreat from her work as assistant to Ophelia Dahl at Partners I...