The Brockport Rotary Club members were vastly entertained by guest speaker Eric Weatherbee at a recent meeting. He is a farmer and author who lives on a family farm in Clarendon where he raises dairy heifers. The farm has been in the family for over 100 years and it figures hugely in his life – connecting all of his “hats.” He would like to set up a small processing plant and run the farm as it would have been in the 1940s. Early on he found he also liked writing and has since published three books of short stories and poems and is working on a novel. He owns The Book Center in Spencerport and is planning on eventually moving it to the farm. He also has done readings for many groups such as the Albion library. He read two of his works to the Rotarians: “The Portrait,” a wonderfully involving and slightly supernatural short story set in the Civil War era. Eric felt the portrait in the photo was a close depiction to the hero of the tale. For an encore, he read “The Lavender Latrine,” a short and very humorous poetic depiction of a Porta Potty set sail on a flooded river. (By the way, he is great at rhyming.) He and his wife Betty, whom he credits with considerable editing, want to make their farm a destination by including lots of interesting items for sale, sights to see and things to do. (That is the entrepreneur part.) Sitting l-r: George Dahl, presenter Eric Weatherbee, standing l-r Club president Eileen Whitney, Betty Weatherbee. Brockport Rotary Club meets most Thursdays at the Brockport Bill Gray’s Restaurant at 6:15 p.m.
