Category Archives: Snapshots

Snapshots, Whatever

Through the looking-glass

21 Comments

Just a short pause to pat myself on the back for three years of mostly consistent blogging… it’s been quite a ride!

I love this little place we’ve made together: me alternately skipping or stumbling with the things that make up an ordinary life; you there beside me or imagined quietly looking over my shoulder, commenting on this or that or something I might have missed.

Having someone to write for, to share stories and memories with, has made this worth doing every day. Life, mine and yours, is much more interesting when shared and reflected on in this way, don’t you think?

So… a heartfelt thanks for three years of friendship and for meeting me here most days to laugh or rant or even cry at the wonder of ordinary things.

Snapshots, Wanderings

Behind the scenes

5 Comments

I wonder if you’re like me: inclined to play with all the toys that make noise, preoccupied with lifting up the table skirt to understand how the trick works, tempted to wander where you shouldn’t, add various other forms of polite misbehavior to the list…

😉

I’m not quite sure what I stumbled across here at the Grounds for Sculpture the other day, but it stopped me in my tracks as quickly as it tickled my imagination.

Can you imagine the fun to work in a place like this? Have characters instead of coworkers? Be able to tell a story by simply moving the frisbee player in front of the painter? Next to the guy with the camera?


At first glance it looked to be a loading area for newly arrived sculpture or something of a temporary graveyard for retired pieces…

But I couldn’t help feeling as if someone had arranged them just so for the whimsy of passerby… like Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting… maybe a groundskeeper who secretly wants to study art history and tries his hand at creating a tableau from discarded stories.

Creepy! With pitchfork in hand, these two guarded the entrance to this place I wasn’t meant to see. At least I don’t think I was meant to see it…

😉

Small truths, Snapshots, Travels with the flock, Wanderings

Letting go

9 Comments

Mother, I’m letting go.
It’s what you did a year ago
Now I know how, I swear
Walking so long in the dark, I arrived
To this now.
I don’t have to tell you
The forces that were my life,
You know.

You who could describe the moon
With so much care
And spoke everything – but not of your fear of dying
You knew why flowers grew on grass
To say, “I’m born”
Or that they might spring from crevices of rock to dance with the wind.
Sometimes your words split darkness the way you crack open a rock
Nothing diminished or unseen.
Like the time we described the good and happy life of a friend
And you said, “I know, I know, but he’s a hurt person.”
He’ll never know how you saw into him.
What Thoreau said he longed to do, you did –
Speak “first thoughts,”
While ours lay like cocoons spread in confusion

You never said the reasons for failure – why we get lost
Only that we are, and whether your thoughts spilled like butterflies into air
Or cut like an axe
You never lost the knowledge of center
That the failure to love ourselves deeply enough
Is more or less fatal

Well, the eventual is now
And I am broken like the moon,
Driftwood in the sea of my own drowning

Let me feel the attention you gave
To this world.
(Were you afraid of dying in case what came afterwards took less?)
With the same care you gave all along.
Safe with yourself.
I’m turning now to that shore.

–Constance Greenleaf

Bits of this were bouncing around in my head as I watched this scene, but it took a happy accident yesterday for me to come across the complete poem. It feels presumptuous to think I know anything of what was going through Lynne’s mind that day on the anniversary of her mom’s passing, but I liked the spirit of this poem, anyway, and was very touched by Lynne’s trust in sharing some of her grief with us.

Hugs to you, Lynne.

Snapshots, Wanderings

Grounds for sculpture

11 Comments
Art, especially contemporary art, is not really my thing. It’s not ever felt accessible to me. It puzzles me, mostly, or makes me laugh sometimes, but I’ve always felt that I’m somehow missing the point.

Save for a few pleasant experiences in Spain, sculpture displayed in stuffy museums or galleries doesn’t interest me. Set that artwork against a backdrop of autumn’s finest colors and well… I’m there!

I took advantage of the day off, overpaid government employee that I am, and, after doing my civic duty, visited the Grounds For Sculpture in Hamilton. It was a perfect day for a stroll through the grounds to enjoy what is also a fine garden and arboretum. The fall colors were gorgeous.

Here’s some favorite views:

This made me smile!

October Gathering by Joan Danziger… I really liked this one, though the scale was tiny compared to many of the others.

Gorgeous colors in the background here…

On Poppied Hill by Seward Johnson

Lintel by Emilie Benes Brzezinski

More pics to come…

Garden, Snapshots

Afternoon visit

10 Comments

I nearly missed him standing there beside the dogwood, but he spotted me quickly once I stepped outside with the camera. In case you’re squinting at the fuzzy focus (what’s new?) I counted six points on this buck… a trophy to some, I’d guess.

I followed him through my little woodland garden of mountain laurels and viburnum, trying to get close enough for a halfway decent pic, but he spooked and was off with a snort and a flash of his white tail to the park out back where he makes his living. Usually I see him there at night on walks with Luka, one shape among many in the moonlight, disappearing into the shadows.

Snapshots, Whatever

From kings to grooms and Luka in between

8 Comments

It’s been a busy couple of days here that involved lots of picture-taking…

Thursday there was a retirement party for my boss, whom we thoroughly embarrassed for his 38 years of service with a cape and a crown and plenty of mostly-good-natured roasting… He’s worked at social services for as long as I’ve been alive. Jeez.

Nice was the time to chat with coworkers without the pressures of ringing phones. This is my friend Anne who works in personnel and makes sure we all get paid on time and Cathy, one of my favorite people in the whole world; she and I used to work together, then she got promoted and I got promoted and now we don’t see much of each other anymore.

My buddy Pete and I; we’re neighbors and got to work together for a short time last summer while I was assigned to the homeless services unit. He was transferred to my building recently, so I stop by his desk a couple times a week to talk birds and photography.

On Halloween morning, there was a parade of trick-or-treaters through the office. Click for a peek at the Christmas tree costume – I love it! Note person at desk in background actually trying to work…

😉

I had to bribe him for it, but Luka will do most anything for a Haloween treat!

Finally, last night, there was a nephew’s wedding to photograph. My camera needs a few days off, I think.

Now to catch up with comments and all of your blogs…

Birds, I like to make lists, Snapshots, Travels with the flock, Wanderings

9

14 Comments

Maybe you’re all waiting for the telling of silly stories (check with Susan) or fabulous bird pics (check with Lynne) or tips for identifying sparrows (check with KatDoc) or maybe just Delia’s straight-forward way of saying things (which cracks me up because she’s such a hoot in person!), but if you’re looking for any of that tonight from me… well, I don’t even know where to begin, but to say that it was a fabulous couple of days for this member of the flock.

I’m still amazed with how easily near strangers can come together and feel so comfortable with one another. I don’t guess I should be anymore, but I am. Meeting other bloggers face to face makes me really aware of how much we tell of ourselves with the little things we share here. Anyway…

KatDoc was a life bird-blogger for me and, no surpise here, she was THE serious member of the flock. She had her moments, of course, but she made it obvious that the rest of us were just *social birders* out for a good time. KatDoc means business when it comes to adding birds to her life list. She was smiling here, on our boat trip around the back bays of Cape May yesterday, happy that she’d tallied a few new birds for her list.

These two, Susan and Delia, old friends of mine now. 😉 It feels really nice to say that. We first met at last year’s Autumn Weekend and once since then. We only had a day with Delia this time; time for an owl prowl, birding in the rain (again!), breakfast at Uncle Bill’s and a dinner with a whole gang of people that were in town for the weekend before she had to leave for home.

Susan and me. (Laugh.) I feel almost like we’re opposite sides of the same coin, if that makes any sense. She often knows what I’m thinking and’ll say it in that way that only Susan can. I love her for that and the way she can make me laugh until my belly hurts.

Meeting Lynne… well, I think I’d have recognized her as a friend at first sight even if I didn’t *know* her from her blog. I couldn’t resist hugging her any chance I got. 😉 Of course you all know it, but she is just the sweetest person in the world and funny in a quiet way that just tickled me. I think NJ was something of a culture shock for her and I’m just hoping that she won’t be scarred for life.

I’m hoping that everyone’s home safely by now and sorting through their own pics and memories. Really, I’m as anxious as you are to hear what stories need to be told first. I love stories.

Stay tuned…

#9 in my 38 by 39.