A Private World

This evening, I made a small field trip to check out some ducks with my duck... with hopes of a little time to sit and eat and rest and enjoy the evening. Being a somewhat chilly night following  a very grey day with a late work schedule, I arrived much later than I thought I would and as the light was already fading, the occasion was more suited to wearing a jacket than summer attire. Not many people and even less ducks were out at all. In sitting and 'reflecting' though, I thought to take a few phone photos as ideas to put to canvas. I have always loved this barn and it's awesome color scheme along the water and so I tried to capture a few images to review tonight as potential scenes that I would like to get into paint. 

I have always wanted to paint and over the years have made some feeble attempts at it, but never with great success or compete canvas to show. To date, my only finished work is the small square canvas shown below of a loving father giraffe leaning into his daughter that I did as a birthday present to my own daughter this past year. She loves giraffes and I was delighted later to find it is now a treasured possession to her. Anyway, tonight got me thinking again about another.

The thing that I always liked about painting was that you could literally create you own reality, your own version of life, a private world so to speak... as seen through your eyes. Photography has a similar appeal, but before widespread use of photoshop and with a few exceptions in the advertising world, what you got was what was actually there. With painting, you could perceive anything... any way you wanted... and your hand, pigment and brushes where the only limitations to bringing it out into actual reality for someone else to see and make it theirs too. In the above scene, the first thing to go would be the fence post and telephone pole for sure. You see? In painting, I don't have to 'remove' it as I was tempted to do in the image above, but I can just chose what to put down in paint. There is wonderful freedom.  After taking the photo, I saw someone doing something in the window and I immediately wanted to get closer to see them, what they were doing, to see the detail of this distant figure. I was no more than 200' away, but with out a bridge, it was impossible.

So, having a day off tomorrow, I will try again and go back there in the late afternoon, with pallet, easel and paints in hand to see what I can come up with as the light shifts from sunny to sunset. Painting for me is definitely a hands on activity (which I am usually pretty good at) and certainly a learning process... one where I will try to create a reality that I already see in my head. I think I will leave the duck at home this time. I don't think he will mind.

Time and Tide

A quote shared with me decades ago as I paid a last visit to a former neighbor, who was soon to die from cancer. It was a sad visit, as we both knew it was our last, one where he had invited me to his home in an effort to convince me to take his beloved car... a 1957 Plymouth 4 door sedan as a gift. Having had two cars already in my driveway at the time, I had no need nor space for this car that I had long admired along with the loving care that he had put into it since her purchased it new. For the first ten years of my life we were next door neighbors and I played with his children and shared many meals around their table, but what I remember mostly about him was his dry sense of humor and the way he would faithfully wash and wax that car seemingly every week, even though he took a bus to work, it was garage kept and he only drove it 3 miles to church on Sunday. It broke both of our hearts I think that I had to turn him down, but in the end was a delight for his long standing mechanic, who took it eagerly off of his hands into his own collection. I remember our conversation and it has always stuck with me the above quote that he gave to me. It is true... regardless of myself, circumstances, dreams or fears, the tides in time relentlessly march on.

As you might discern from the re-posted entry below that I had originally placed here on 5/24/2010, today it has been five years since my mother left this earth, a painful reminder of the passage of time. So many things have transpired since then, some wonderful which I would have loved to share with her... many I am glad she was not here to witness. In truth, I wouldn't want her to see me the way I am now. There are many things since her passing that I have lost that are so meaningful to me...life changing things, people and places that are now also gone from me, some by mistake, some intentionally taken away and some pulled away under their own power... but still somehow leaving me. I miss all of them dearly and I live daily in that some have left a familiar, unfulfillable hole as described below, one that I felt that day. So, today, I reaffirm the title and words that I shared long ago fresh anew. I wish I could just turn back the clock.

The image above I took recently with my phone off of my balcony of a full  blooming Magnolia tree next door. A tree similar to one that still stands in the front yard of my childhood home 40 years later. It was the only one my Mom allowed us to climb when I was young... that is... until we broke a major branch and then were moved the the riskier, but more sturdy Apple tree in the back. In another post to come, I think I might have included it in a photo of that house, while I stopped to take a peek when in that area with Hayden.



May 24th, 2010
Today, it has been one week and a handful of hours since my mom, Joan Knott suddenly passed away. After a vibrant active life, she is just gone, along with her warm smile, encouraging words (she always left comments for me here...anonymously....but I could tell it was her) and loving care for my growing family and I.

I knew after it happened that honoring her life somehow would be my next post, but I really struggled with an image and what to say. I didn't want to use a photo I already had, (although she had her favorites of mine) and knew I had to create something new, but had no clue as to what. Then I thought about just posting a photo of her, but realized that after more than a quarter century of making photographs, I had never taken a personal 'portrait' of her. I guess it never occurred to me to do so as I never thought she wouldn't be here. Now it is too late..... lesson learned.

The image today is one I made yesterday from her funeral flowers. She liked yellow and the unique, bending form of the Calla Lily was attractive to me, so I set up a small arrangement out by our pond and you see the results.

I wanted this post to reflect on her life, but now realize that anything I could possibly say here is woefully in-sufficient to begin to adequately describe the person she was to many and what she meant to me. In spite of the evidence before me, I cannot in my mind really believe that the edges of her life have now been set. The heavy hole that at times takes over my chest now is all the description I need and for some moments it is as if a deep well of tears has sprung from within me, robbing me of my thoughts for a time.

This second small photo that I have included is one that a friend of hers took while they were in a bush plane flying over Mt.McKinley in Alaska. If an image can contain a thousand words as it is said, then this loudly witnesses to her adventurous spirit and the sense of joy she had in living every day complete.



In short, she was a wonderful, cherished and inspirational human being who was greatly admired. Many have testified over this past week to our family what a huge impact she had on their lives. In spite of this tremendous loss I am thankfully left with a lifetime of memories and a wonderful family to comfort me and I know the sadness will someday turn to joy in seeing her again, but as of today, I really, really miss her and just want to turn back the clock.

Losing the Red

I struggled a bit with the title of this post, as if it is really anything that matters in the scope of life, but as I try and take time to be witty, or poignant, or meaningful to make someone think, maybe in some small way it does. In this one, it had me on a mind chase into these little rogue red parts of my body that are working against me, seeking to destroy me....clearly a sign of my over-wound imagination at work. In reality, this red.. for me... is my red blood cells and the marrow which seems to want to produced way too many of them anymore. These cells, a very good thing in a normal world, are dead set to populate so many of them selves, that unless I and the people who help me keep them in ranks, do so, they would kill me. Which brings me back to losing them. As terms of my I am told very rare condition , disease or whatever category you would want to place it in, I need to have regular and sometimes not so regular treatments to take these little travelers of my arteries away and let my blood vessels and other bits of my circulatory system rest for a spell. Today was one of those days... blood letting day I call it. These types of days seem to be getting more frequent which causes me concern, but in truth there could be a number of factors involved as to how much liquid I drink, to my exertion levels, to stress to just being that it is about summer time, but even with all of these unknowns involved. I don't like it.

Some people say "be thankful... it could be worse", but as it is me sitting in the comfy chair with the big needle in my arm, not them, I could easily say, "it could be better". It makes me wonder whether they think it is as if happiness is some scale and rich people have no right to be sad, nor the poor to be happy. Like saying to the downtrodden, be sad, it could be better. The truth is things of one sort or the other could always be better or worse on some cosmic scale if we graded life that way, which most people do. When I check in for these little sessions with the nurse, I am always given one of these little scales of pain shown below to fill in. I think it is silly for they do nothing different regardless of what I put down anyway. Any pain to me seems to fall to the far right, so what are we measuring? I have heard some people proudly profess, "I have a high pain tolerance". I guess they assume everyone feels the same pain and they are just tougher, or better than those who might complain. I wonder whether they ever thought of the other, 'maybe you feel it more than I do... maybe my senses are not as acute and aware as yours?' I do. I wonder what is the 'Worst pain possible' stated at the end? How would you know there could never be more? Clearly this is a guide to the physical...could emotional pain surpass this chart?

Anyway, as I lay there, trying to make small talk with the lady in the smock who cares for me, my mind goes to all kinds of places and I try to make it do so. This morning as a mini flood of unseen red donuts drained away from my arm, I thought about my drive on the way to the hospital. As I crossed over the Perkiomen creek near my house, I got my first glimpse this season of the Virginia Bluebells that are for the briefest period.... in bloom. As soon as I saw them. I started a visual search for a spot to get a photo and as I passed through the sleepy town of Salford, I saw an opportunity and took it. Along the edge of the road, was a small bunch and with iphone in hand, I stopped, got out and down on the ground and made a few 'exposures'. I texted one of them to a friend. They immediately remarked how pretty the photo was, not knowing the circumstances around it, so I stepped back to show the whole scene, complete with a worn garden shed, a pile of trash, plastic cup, etc...etc... and sent that. Their remark was surprise in "I would have never seen those flowers at all I think from the road." Exactly I thought.

While laying there with my needle, I was thinking that people look for the obvious, the exposed, the easy.... when looking around at life and it is the small hidden things, the special, the inward heart, that gets ignored, passed over and driven by. I realized that my illness is just that. It is something that to me is now solitary, quiet, unnoticed to anyone but me... but to me... it is still very much alive and ever so slowly working against me. As it has been well over a year since anyone... anyone... has inquired about the state of my body, I once again was reminded how alone I really am. I began to think about this 'small thing' that I was able to find on the way in and wished I had a table to bring a bouquet to. I thought about all the missed little moments in my day and thought to document the elements around me right then on my way back out to the car. The title image of the atrium room and these below are a sampling of what I found. The images of the blooms will be presented in another post.