Thank You

After leaving her job to raise four daughters and pursue organic farming, she also graduated from nursing school and took a job as a critical care/ER nurse at Upper Valley Medical Center. Unsuccessful in her quest for a small farm near Tipp City, she nonetheless managed to enroll her children there, and all four graduated from THS before scattering to the four winds. Jennifer is currently perched on the south side of Troy, where she lives with a large undisciplined garden, a big hairy dog, several ninja cats, her daughter’s reptile collection, and her long-suffering partner, Mark, without whom none of this would be possible. (Any male who wants to commiserate with somebody who’s put up with five hormonal women and their cats? He’s your guy.)

A lover of small towns and diners, and an unabashed fan of Norman Rockwell and Andy Griffith, Jennifer has spent most of her adult life seeking Mayberry. If Yellow Springs was Mayberry with hippies, Tipp City is Mayberry with a little more organization and very friendly firemen (thank you for allowing her to photograph the antique truck!). She loves the friendly people (thank you to everyone who allowed themselves to be photographed for this project!), the walkable downtown, the shops and restaurants, the canal lock, parks and bike path, the old-time water tower and historic buildings and the festivals. She misses the farmers’ market and old Spring Hill, where her father bought flowers when she was a child (she still has one of their 1970s mail order catalogues). 

As a biologist, Jennifer also loves “long walks on the beach and poking dead things with a stick.” Really.  It’s her thing. Her spirit animal is the flamingo (the yard kind), and she would happily move to south Florida. A compromise is North Carolina, which gets Mark out of winter, is closer to the ocean than Ohio, and is where the two plan to retire.  And, it is the home of the original Mayberry.