A Warning on the Topic of "New Hampshire"
Geographers have long been at a loss to describe the mysterious psychogeological formation on the eastern side of the Connecticut River. Many once held that it was simply a mirage-like image of Vermont, rotated 180° around the Irving Oil in East Thetford, VT--but then how does one explain the utterly different topography and flora, and how much worse its apparent residents are at driving? The state's malicious döppel, perhaps--yet most of the people I've met there have been really nice? A shared New Englander dream--then whence the "don't tread on me" flags? A series of island arcs in the Iapetan ocean that collided with the continental shelf of proto-North-America, now barely discernable after the closing of the ocean sutured the faults with stone-boiling heat--but where is this "supercontinent"? Seems unlikely to me.Whatever the truth, you must understand:
"New Hampshire" is not Vermont.
How can you tell if you have accidentally entered "New Hampshire"? Here is a handy guide:
| Vermont | "New Hampshire" |
| Soil limey and haunted. | Soil acidic and hateful. |
| Rivers flow primarily north or south, folded into the sinuous ripples of the plastic Earth. | Rivers flow in all directions, fleeing the great calcified boluses of half-devoured crust they call "The White Mountains." |
| The feeling that you have been pushed down (tectonically, emotionally). | The feeling that you have been pushed up (tectonically, spiritually). |
| Sales tax. | No sales tax. |
If you find yourself in the right column: I am afraid there is nothing that I can do for you. However, so long as you're there, why not visit an exposure of Kinsman granodiorite? The potassium feldspar crystals in this rock can sometimes exceed three inches in length, suggesting a slow cooling process under tremendous pressure. Check for garnets as well! This bedrock is exposed most picturesquely atop Mount Cardigan, but the best exposures of those k-spar megacrysts lie in the old quarries of the surrounding area.
Fig. 2.1 The firewatch tower atop Mount Cardigan, anchored into the granodiorite.
Fig. 2.2 Weathered feldspar crystals in an exposure of Kinsman granodiorite. One to two inches in length.