Be Here Now

Maybe three days behind schedule...??

2011-12-23T16:59:00.000-08:00

I'm adjusting to a whole new schedule here...my son, Tom, has come to stay. *:0)
Lots more cooking and trips to the grocery store! So I'm behind in the 30 day photography challenge. The next one I have to do is one of the hardest, too...the time-delay one--which means I have to learn a whole new way of working the camera. It promises to be fun, but....jeez. I need a little more time.

In the meantime, here's a photo of the Christmas tree in the Greyhound Bus Station on 1st St. NE. No special technique needed for this. And I used my cell phone. Thought it was touching.

Day 15: Silhouette

2011-12-20T14:36:00.000-08:00

Well, this isn't perzackly a silhouette, but it's a profile shot. Taken with the Mac Photo Booth, which is lots of fun to play with. This is XE herself, none other.....

Day 14: Eyes

2011-12-20T14:20:00.000-08:00

Do flowers have eyes? These peeped up at me yesterday when I was walking back from downtown. People set out pansies this time of year to bloom over the winter. The first winter I was here, I was blown away by being able to see FLOWERS BLOOMING in the cold and snow. These look like eyes to me....little bright eyes, straight on, no blinking. "Here we are!!" Love 'em.

Day 13: Me and 13 Objects.

2011-12-18T09:27:00.000-08:00

This was not an easy challenge, but late in the day, I found just the thing: My dad's American Legion cap from Gilbert C. Grafton Post #2 in Fargo, ND. There are 12 little brass-colored tin attachments and one cap = 13 objects. He got the attachments for his efforts in enrolling new members from 1955 through 1961.

The little figures represent special awards. Starting at the left, the little tin artillery gun says he was "Gleason Gunner" for membership in 1958. Next to that, the little ship's wheel, "Burke Bo'sun" in 1961. The cloth patch names him a "Go Getter." Next, "Moore Missileer" in 1959. At the very right end, he was awarded the "1960 Membership Spur."

It's hard for me to think of my dad as active in any sort of club, but he certainly was--after we had all left home (I was the last to depart, in 1954). The only time in my childhood years when he was never home when he wasn't working was on Saturday. (Occasionally, after Gene left home, he bowled during the week for his NW Bell Telephone league, and he'd take me along and park me at the bar with a bottle of 7Up.) Early Saturday morning, he'd be off hunting or fishing. He provided most of the meat we ate during the war years. My mom's baked chicken was a treat. On Sunday, he went to church, and after a big Sunday dinner, he'd read the newspaper, then turn on the opera on the radio, lie down on the sofa in the living room, spread the newspapers over himself, and take a nap.

When I was about 10, we got our lake cottage, and he added golfing to his activities. He was an athlete all his life. I have a little trophy he won from the N.W.B.T. Golf Club in 1932. It even has his name on it: F. T. Dwyer.

My first day in first grade, we got to buy savings stamps for the war effort. I plopped my quarter down with great pride, but when they asked me my father's name, I was stumped! (Hey, I was 5 years old!) "Um....I dunno...(much thought)..I know! It starts with F! Fryer!!" He always signed his letters, "Your loving father, F. T. Dwyer."

Day 12 Sunset.....

2011-12-17T14:07:00.000-08:00

Sunset today 4:47p, est.....not quite this late, but almost.....

taken from the metro platform that's but 4 minutes from my house....lots higher up, though.

The Inner Object: Seeing Kandinsky

2011-12-16T17:20:00.000-08:00

The Inner Object: Seeing Kandinsky

Day 11: Something blue...

2011-12-16T08:06:00.000-08:00

Today's challenge is "Something blue." The sky is gray, so I stayed inside and took a photo of the photo on my kitchen wall. The event was Jo's birthday party at the Tombs in, hmm...2001? The three BLUE shirts look nice and are nicely arranged. Not everybody at the table is deaf, but everyone communicates in ASL.

Who are they, and where are they from? Starting with the guy on the left in the blue checked shirt: Dennis? from Ireland, Mary from Iowa, Jo from Ireland, M.E. from DC, ?? from DC, Sophie from Belgium, Susanna from Italy, Radka from Romania, and Patrick from DC. I don't know who took the original photo--maybe one of the accommodating waitstaff at the Tombs? Sorry I can't remember all the names better. Susanna may be Rosanna.

Day 10: Childhood Memories

2011-12-15T18:51:00.000-08:00

Childhood memories, photographic. I don't have anything left from my childhood except this little 2.5"x 2.5" book of 16 photos that my mother gave me a few years before she died. I used to have a note to Santa that I wrote in the first grade or so--had it for many years, in fact, but that's gone. It read, in part, "Dear Santa, I have been a jood girl." (As IF....) The little black doll I'm holding in the Omaha picture is gone, too. It was a present from Sister Mary Mark, my dad's oldest sister, who was a nun. I had maybe three dolls when I was growing up, and they're all gone to doll heaven. I can't say I liked playing with dolls, although my mother always handed one to me for photos.

The picture on the left is of me in front of our big house in Omaha, my birthplace (and excuse me while I smile....It always tickles me that I was born in the middle of nowhere.) The photo must have been taken when I was about 18 months, just before we all took off to live in Fargo. My dad and the older boys took Pal, dad's black labrador hunting dog, in the car and drove up, stopping at Mom's brother Henry's farm in Canby, MN. Mom, Paul, Gene, and I took the bus, I think. (Or maybe Paul went in the car, too.) There isn't a train running north & south between Omaha and Fargo.

The photo on the right is the first picture in the little book that I remember being taken. It may have been around my birthday (snow on the ground). I'm wearing a new green woolly blanket-material snowsuit that my mother made. (This garment later went to my oldest niece, Susan, who came along just 10 years later.) My nose was VERY COLD that afternoon when my mother hauled me out in front of the house (our first one in Fargo) and had me pose. I am holding a little rubber Porky Pig, which I'm surprised didn't shatter in the cold. I was glad to go back in the house when the photo session was over.

Day 9: Someone You Love

2011-12-13T23:22:00.001-08:00

I didn't take this today, but this is a picture of two of the people I love best on the planet: Erda (l.) and Cathy (r.). Erda, if this can be believed, is even older than I am. We've known each other since Hector was a pup. She still lives in Iowa City, and she's still a magnificent gardener, though she's cutting back a bit. Cathy and I have been co-workers and trouble-makers for going on 14 years! Both of these women are intelligent, warm, fun, funny--gifts from the gods. The picture is from Erda's most recent visit to DC last year. Thanks, you guys, for being my friends. I love you.

Day 8: Habit

2011-12-13T06:43:00.000-08:00

If I have a habit that's lasted almost my whole life, it's making popcorn! Popcorn is the bread of my life. It's saved my bacon so many times--from major digestive upsets to hunger to the dark night of the soul. I was hospitalized one time after becoming dehydrated from intestinal flu. After 3 days with an IV stuck in my arm, I got sent home as cured. Half an hour later, the unfortunate side-effect started up again, and on top of that I was starving. "To hell with this," I says, and I made a huge batch of popcorn. Ate the whole thing, and whatever had ailed my gut vanished.

When we raised it in our Victory Garden during WWII, we stored it on the cob in a big open wooden box at the end of the garage. It was my job to rub the cobs together to release the kernels so that my mom could pop them in a big aluminum kettle. She didn't use any oil or anything...just poured the corn into the kettle and turned on the heat. We grew three kinds that I remember: yellow, white, and dark blue. I loved the dark blue best. It was a native variety and the tenderest and most delicious of all. My mom always bought Jolly Time popcorn when we ran out of the home grown. Jolly Time comes from Iowa, and her farmer relatives in Iowa probably sold their popcorn crops to Jolly Time. She was very fond of it all.

And so were we, meaning my brother Gene and I, who were the only two left at home in those days. Mom poured on butter mixed half and half with Crisco, added salt, and we ate it right down to the bottom of the bowl. Ha. We always ate the unpopped kernels, too, and licked the salt and butter off the bowl.

To be properly cured, it has to be dried after picking. I grew popcorn one year in Bismarck. I hung the corn cobs with the husks peeled back from some hooks on the back porch. Brilliant. When I went out two days later, the wind had arisen during the night, rattled the cobs together, and the whole porch floor was covered with popcorn. Yes, I did sweep it up and save it. I didn't wash it exactly...I just picked out the leaves and blew the dust off.

I get it now from Glut Coop in Mt. Rainier, a 20-minute bus ride away. It costs something like 99c a pound, up from 79c a pound not too too long ago--gawd! the inflation is gonna murther us all. It's available every Sunday here in Takoma at the Farmers Market, but a jar of this size full would cost about $7 or $8! I don't think so....not yet. The jar in the picture, when full, holds about $1.40 worth.

Day 7: Fruit

2011-12-12T10:59:00.000-08:00

Nothing like a big bowl of fruit....I bought the apples last Saturday--seven of them--to make a pie. My mother's pie recipe always called for seven apples. I ate one, and one died on me through no fault of my own. It must have had a worm or something. So far, there's no pie. But the kitchen faucet is finally fixed today, and I also have my own pie pan now. So I think I'll make a Norwegian apple pie. No crust on those babies! EZ!!

Day 6--low angle photograph

2011-12-11T15:41:00.001-08:00

OK, same boots, different day, different (low-angle) view. Now let me tell you about these boots. I bought them in the West Village maybe 10 years ago, and I'll never forget what happened when I walked out of the store and down the street wearing them. A woman did a double-take when she saw me. THAT had never happened before no matter what I was wearing--except, perhaps, for the habit when I was in the convent.

What happens now when I wear them is that my ankles don't wobble so much, and I'm about an inch and a half taller. This means I can look a LOT of people in the eye now, and I have to tell you, it's a gas. I feel bigger and stronger and, yes, younger. It's FUN walking in these things. There is enough variety in the garb one sees every day here, so nobody does any double-takes now. Still, I feel like a badass, and I love it.

day five of the 30 day photography challenge

2011-12-10T15:17:00.000-08:00

I started posting these 30-day-photography-challenge photos on XE, but on second thought, I decided this blog was the proper venue. So day five (yesterday) was "high-angle" photograph. It was almost dark when I remembered this, so I took a photo of my boots from above. And of course I used my Blackberry. Hm.

Then I noticed the shadow the trash can and the bus flag was making. That's sort of high-angle, too, innit? Not really really high, but higher than if I was taking a photo looking straight at it on the same level. Hmph. I never said it was high art. It's high practice!

Day 4: Something Green

2011-12-09T16:17:00.000-08:00

The green grass sparkles in this photo of my two grandsons, Sam, left, and Joe, right. It's one of my very favorite photos, although I didn't take it today. Sam is now a freshman in college on a lacrosse scholarship, and Joe is deciding between medicine and research in his senior (junior??) year of college. But once they were happy-go-lucky children in their backyard in NJ, and Grandma was there with her camera at just the right time. Waay in the back is their sister, Annie, who can't be bothered with all that silliness.....

Today's photo is of my beloved green cashmere sweater, which I wear day and night in wintertime. The crickets have munched through it in several spots, and I've patched it with cotton embroidery floss, which keeps the wind out. I roll it up and stow it in my backpack against the cool breeze of what passes for winter in these parts. Hah...50 degrees F? It's to laugh.....

My friend Loraine made this lovely green tile in her studio at Greenbelt. She started making tiles about 5 or 6 years ago, and they're getting more complex and beautiful by the batch. Can't find the photos of Loraine. Dang!

Day 3: Clouds

2011-12-08T16:15:00.000-08:00

There were almost no clouds today, but the final moments of daylight revealed some clouds: the charcoal smudges in the sky. I took this with my BlackBerry Lite cell phone (don't ask)....the lights under the sky are from the Metro cars heading toward Silver Spring. This is the view from our parking lot. It looks like the wall around a prison yard, but there are nice cars parked down just out of the view.

30 Day Photography Challenge

2011-12-07T16:11:00.000-08:00

Nailing Jello to the Wall came up with this neat challenge t'other day. Taking a new picture every day for 30 days. I started it last night, but I can't get yesterday's photo to stick to the blog here. Well, day two photo is supposed to be a picture of what you wore today, so I'm combining days one and two into one challenge: a self-portrait of me in my wonderful Ravello Italia hoodie, which I actually did wear today. Tomorrow is supposed to be a picture of clouds. Stay tuned.......

Las Vegas!!

2009-12-03T20:55:00.000-08:00

Posting my photos will take a bit of time this week, because I just got back from Las Vegas. (Wow. Part nightmare, part fun house.)

I took my big camera, and processing photos from that takes lots longer than the ones I take with my cell phone. I did snap a bunch of shots with the cell phone, too, though. Here's a couple. See that lovely summer sky? It's fake! This is taken inside the Miracle Mile shopping mall, which adjoins Planet Hollywood, where we stayed. See in the top right photo how the sky's starting to look dark? That's because shortly it's going to rain directly over a pool in the middle of one aisle. The sky darkens, lightning flashes, thunder booms, and it rains. But not a drop will stray over the edge of the pool. The pool in the photo below is NOT the thunderstorm pool.

This pool (below) has a fountain that runs through its display of color and light every half hour. The sky is still fake. And the lovely Moorish structure houses a cheeseburger shop!

more to come....

Yes, but is it ART?

2009-11-14T15:11:00.000-08:00

If you've ever visited the National Gallery in Washington DC, you'll know it comprises two buildings: East and West. The East Building is a modern assemblage of huge triangles designed by I.M. Pei; fittingly, it houses the National Gallery's collection of modern and contemporary paintings. The West Building is a neoclassical design by John Russell Pope (the same architect who designed the Jefferson Memorial), and it shelters the Gallery's original collections, donated by Andrew Mellon and others, of such pre-20th Century giants as Vermeer, Rembrandt de Rijn, Monet, Van Gogh, and Leonardo da Vinci. (This is the only work by da Vinci in North America. It's a small painting of Ginevra de Benci, and every time I see it, I wonder if they called her "Ginny.")

You can pass between the buildings from west to east or vice versa in two ways. You can go outside and cross a plaza with simple fountains and a cluster of Pei's miniature glass pyramids--architectural sketches for his magnificent pyramids at the Louvre?--or you can go through an underground tunnel on a moving sidewalk.

The latter option brings me to this week's pictures. Last year, to celebrate the East Building's 50th anniversary, the National Gallery spent several months enlivening the walkway with a totally contemporary 40,000 LED light sculpture called "Multiverse" by Leo Villareal, an American artist who is one year older than my son, Tom. (The West Building, by the way, is my contemporary, established in 1937; FDR opened it to the public in 1941, when I was around 4 or 5 years old. Jimmy Carter opened the East Building to the public in 1978, when both Tom and Villareal were about 10 years old.)

The question has been whether Villareal's twinkling, flashing installation is REAL ART. Nobody ever questions whether all the acres of statuary in the West building are REAL ART, even though hardly anyone other than scholars ever goes to see them or enjoy what they do to the space. The Washington Post, that bastion of solidified taste and stuffy attitudes toward anything the critic can't understand or appreciate, ran a much-quoted article last November about "Multiverse" and Villareal. The reviewer sniffed, "Multiverse" is good, attractive fun, but it doesn't have the substance [italics mine] that would bring it even close to major art."

What is major art, anyway? Ellsworth Kelly's "Catalpa Leaf" is a simple pencil outline of a leaf on a piece of paper, yet it merits inclusion in Robert and Jane Meyerhoff's collection of "major art" now on display in the East Building. (see last week's post). I think major art is like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's description of pornography: "I'll know it when I see it."

"Multiverse" never fails to fill me with joy when I see it. I can no longer see the stars at night, thanks to living in a big, light-polluted city, where the only celestial bodies visible at night are the moon and a few bright planets. But "Multiverse" recreates in a small way the punched-in-the-gut feeling I used to get when I'd go out at night on the dock at Lake Sallie and see uncountable stars. And "Multiverse" doesn't call up just stars, either. The moving patterns, the waves, the shattered forms evoke raindrops falling on the lake or the window or the splash of the surf or the ripple of grass in the wind. That Villareal can create a work that evokes all of that keen sensual pleasure with a bunch of little LED bulbs and ingenious software programming is a major accomplishment. So if you ask me, "Is it art?" My answer is be a resounding "Hell, yes!"

Hanging Out In The National Gallery

2009-11-06T18:37:00.000-08:00

There's hardly anyplace here that's more wonderful at certain times of day than the National Gallery, East Building. I went there earlier this week to see the extraordinary Robert and Jane Meyerhoff collection on display now. The entire 300-piece collection of American and European abstract expressionism and other modern art is a massive gift to the National Gallery of Art by Robert Meyerhoff, a Baltimore real estate developer, and his late wife, Jane.

Harry Cooper, the curator of this astonishing exhibition, which includes about half of the collection, has grouped the artworks according to 10 categories or themes, including "scrape," "drip," "line," and "gesture." It's like going to hear a musical program comprising concertos in, say, E flat major for different instruments and by different composers. You can't say you've experienced art by Jasper Johns or Frank Stella until you've seen it mounted together like this.

After 45 minutes, I found it, as usual, overwhelming and had to leave. I can only take so much of this intense rearrangement of my senses at one time. The exit of the mezzanine gallery looked out on the glorious, peaceful scene above.

All Hallows E'en

2009-10-30T17:27:00.000-07:00

Well, it's almost Halloween. Darkness comes just after lunch (around 4 pm). The leaves are falling. Eastern Market and Penn Quarter are full of folks enjoying the beautiful fall weather. Some of the short residents need plenty of reassurance to deal with all the attention their costumes bring. And it's not even time to go trick or treating!

This week.....

2009-10-23T16:18:00.000-07:00

Cathy in Sculpture Garden, Wednesday afternoon

Cathy is standing in the smaller of the two sculpture gardens on the National Mall. It's on the east side of the National History Museum, and it's a great, quiet place to go for lunch. The landscaping is wonderful, and there are helpful little tags to show you what you're looking at. You can see one in the lower right hand corner of the photo.

Clouds Last Night, 14th Street NW

I saw these clouds while on my way to Blockbuster to return two overdue DVDs. They promised rain, and sure enough, this afternoon just as I got off the metro, the first drops fell. That was almost 24 hours later, which is a long time between weather signs and the actual weather.

Horse Getting a Bath Outside of Horse Show at Verizon Center, Friday afternoon

The 51st Annual Washington International Horse Show has been going on right downtown under our noses this past week. A whole block of F Street NW has been closed to traffic to accommodate temporary stables for the equine contestants. I suppose this horse was getting prettied up for tonight's event: the $25,000 Puissance (high jump). Notice the lavender suds on her mane. The groom applied some to her tail, also. I am only guessing, but I think it's something to make the mane and tail look whiter...like the blue rinse beauty parlors use on women with white hair.