The current issue of Yankee magazine is pretty damn good. particularly "The Throwbacks,'' about James and Sara Ackermann, a young couple working (about 18 hours a day) a Vermont dairy and maple-syrup farm. Yankee still manages in most issues to combine touristy, ad--revenue-gathering stuff and how-to material with rigorous reportage and very thoughtful ruminations about the region.
The article about the Ackermanns is about an old-fashioned work ethic (involving mind and body) squared, in a beautiful if demanding countryside.
The issue also has a silly but entertaining quote from the writer John Cheever, who grew up on the South Shore of Boston but spent most of his life in the New York City area:
"All literary men are Red Sox fans -- to be a Yankee fan in a literate society is to endanger your life.''
