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Lucy and Sara with us. I can't bear to be alone. Can't compose my mind to read and in short my anxieties have too strong a hold upon me. I am discouraged but I know so well that if I could sell some thing and have the feeling that some money was coming in I would be contented. I want to be painting and shall get at it as soon as I can. I made a little fire in my stove this afternoon

Monday Oct. 18" 1886. Grey and threatening weather. Tom is picking the apples but does not get on very fast. There will be only a small crop, less than I supposed as many are defective. I went over to my studio and started a fire and finally drew in and commenced a picture from a study of a Sycamore I made at Arkville- But I do not consider my pictures sufficiently and go at them with too little deliberation. Still I cant do much until I see some thing started on the canvas. I worked there all day but I am not very well satisfied with what I did. My mind is not quiet. I worry too much and make myself disagreeable to myself and everyone else. Mrs. Cantine came to my studio to see my pictures and invited me with Sara to dine with them next Friday evening with Mr & Mrs. Cuykendall, her brother Mr. Sheffield and his wife, Mr & Mrs. Osterhoudt and some one else - I accepted but feel like anything other than dinner parties. Lucy who was to let me have the money to pay the school tax finds it difficult to spare it. I wish I could get on without it. She thinks I am anxious and troubled and so I am. I presume I tire her with my worries and she thinks me selfish. I suppose I am in some things to my great shame and regret, but after all I think I have made some effort in unselfish directions. What she said grieved me, but I expect I deserved it. I am very unhappy.

Tuesday 19". Another grey day. I worked at selecting the apples this forenoon and putting them in barrels. Lucy let me have a hundred dollars and after dinner Jamie and I drove down town and I paid our school tax. The total of my fathers, Calverts and mine was a little over $104 nearly $40 more than last year. It seems a great deal for us to pay and I doubt is every one else pays in the same proportion. There was a reunion of the veterans of the 156" Regiment at the Liscomb Opera house today and I saw them march up while I was down town. Mr. Lindley's nomination for Congress was defeated last evening. A Kaatskill man secured it. I have felt more cheerful today and mean to try hard now to think of my pictures and not my worries. I had a letter from Whittredge, very kind and friendly and like his real self. 

Wednesday 20" Worked in my studio all forenoon. Mr & Mrs. Reed were here at dinner and we enjoyed their visit very much. They seem very happy people. He had been a teacher for many years but has published several school books which are successful and now he is able to live as he wishes and to command his time. They seemed to me successful people, content with a simple life and not worried by foolish ambitions. After dinner we drove through Kingston where Fanny had not been in many years and then out on the Flatbush River and around by the river road. We left them at Mr. Crane's and came home. I would have liked the day on my picture but it was well spent with such excellent people- Girard's wife spent the evening with us and she and Sam talked of poor Emily Wood and her sad life, literally dying of a broken heart over her husbands bad habits. It makes me unhappy even to think of her and when I look around me and realize the burdens which so many have to bear I feel ashamed that I am not more happy and satisfied. I am trying not to feel so troubled and trying to be more hopeful. It has been a warm, lovely day. I would like to be in Arkville painting out of doors. Lucy and Jamie went off by the morning train. Lucy to N.Y. and Jamie to his school at Highland Falls. I drove them up. Jamie is a homesick boy and I could realize his [[?]] at going back. Lucy and Andrews will be leaving now in about a fortnight and we seem hardly to have seen them.

Thursday 21" Have worked all day in my studio and advanced my picture. It has been a windy day but not cold and I got along without a fire. Tom is still at work at the apples, a tedious job which hardly pays for its trouble. I am going to keep painting if they are now gathered. My stretcher came from Wilmarts yesterday and I put the picture in it today. It looks well but I would like to lay it aside for a while. However I shall send it to the Fall Academy exhibition next week. I had a

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