Stop at The Shop and See Some Classics

I doubt there’s another restaurant in Seattle, and probably the Pacific Northwest, like the one I visited with friends a couple weeks ago.  The parking lot is filled with shiny Porsches, MGs, Alfa Romeros, Mercedes and others.  While it may not be unusual to find these high-end cars at other Seattle-area restaurants, this one turns heads because the cars in this lot are classics.

The bright red MG TD parked outside at The Shop was a real attention-grabber. Not sure the date of this model but the classic MG TDs were produced between 1950 and 1953. Was always a “dream car” of mine.

The Shop is found in the industrial area of South Seattle on south 6th Avenue where it opened in 2017.  The 55,000 square foot building that was formerly an electrical supply warehouse is now a climate-controlled storage facility and auto shop for local car  and motorcycle collectors and enthusiasts. Created by restaurant entrepreneur Matt Bell, The Shop bills itself as “a country club for gearheads.”

Members pay $150-$250 a month to use the services of The Shop which includes immaculate bays for repairs, lifts, classes, tools, special events and talks, access to The Shop’s conference space, club room and driving simulator. They can also take advantage of all the maintenance, repair and detailing services The Shop offers. It’s an additional $230 a month to store your car.

The Shop members have access to the facilities in its garage including this detailing bay.

Non-members, like myself and my friends, are welcome to tour the club and its garage for a close up look at some extraordinarily beautiful automobiles. The guided tours are scheduled every 30 minutes between the hours of 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturdays at $10 a person. Stepping into the spotless storage garage, you see row after row of privately-owned collectible cars, some stacked on hoists above one another.  Although considerably smaller than the auto museum further south in Tacoma, it is still a spectacle for a classic car lover like myself.

Peering through the driver’s seat roll bar to the Shelby Cobras steering wheel. Shelby’s signature reportedly is beneath the protective covering on the dash.

Many of the cars are driven regularly by the owners while others seldom leave their parking space. There are cars here that are ‘works in progress’ undergoing restoration, but the majority of the cars I and my friends viewed that day appeared to be fully restored to their brand-new beauty.

There’s a Shelby Cobra signed by the legendary designer himself, Caroll Shelby, someone I once had the pleasure of interviewing. The signature was on the dashboard hidden by a protective covering so we didn’t actually see it.

The pumpkin orange Dodge Charger, an American muscle car from the late 1960s and early 1970s, grabbed my attention. I think this one may have been a 1970 model. It gleamed under the bright, overhead lights. Its owner had customized it with little touches including substituting miniature silver skulls for ordinary door lock buttons. Even the steering wheel, dashboard gauges and upholstery convey the power of these cars and their reputation.

The door locks on this classic Dodge charger are not your ordinary push buttons.

The seven-color crest hood emblem of the 1959 Beetle predates the modern VW familiar to many.

In contrast, parked in another section by itself was a  1959 Volkswagen beetle. Even the soft, muted green paint of its body expressed the difference between the American muscle machine and a humble utilitarian vehicle of transportation. Nevertheless, this car took its place in American auto culture as one of the most popular, reliable and affordable automobiles of the 1960s and still enjoys much affection from owners today.

Everyone had their favorites on our 30-minute tour. One of my friends was taken by the row full of sleek Jaguars. I gravitated towards the American classics, like the 1957 Chevy parked on an overhead hoist and in what appeared to be its original copper tone color.  When asked, our guide said that she had never seen the car taken out of The Shop. It would be a showstopper on the street if it was, I’m certain.

Guided tours start and end in the lobby area where one of the cars from The Shop is displayed. Our guide for the tour was Victoria, standing here with me next to the Mercedes that was on display.

Our tour guide, Victoria, was very generous with her knowledge of the cars in The Shop and allowed us to stroll among them while being careful to keep us within the restricted areas.  And of course, no touching any of these beauties.  The tour winds up in the restaurant where you can grab a meal or a drink (there’s a full bar) whether or not you’re a member of The Shop.  The restaurant, known as The Derby, serves up mainly salads and sandwiches and there’s a patio area out front where you can sit, weather permitting, and admire the collector cars in the parking lot. Although we didn’t stay on this day to eat, my friends report that the weekend brunch is especially tasty.  But the real treat is behind the garage doors where your eyes can feast upon all those divine classic cars just as mine did on this Saturday excursion.

More photos of the classic cars seen on my visit can be viewed here: https://cherylcrooksphotography.wordpress.com/portfolio/classic-cars-at-the-stop/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dropping In on The Donut King

I made a quick trip over Fourth of July weekend this summer to visit my son and cousin in Los Angeles.  (Read about the road trip here) While there one evening, my cousin and saw the documentary, “The Donut King.”

The film, directed by Alice Gu, is the rags to riches story about Ted Ngoy, a Cambodian refugee who, shortly after arriving in Los Angeles in 1975, learned to bake donuts and proceeded to build a multi-million dollar donut shop empire that challenged even Winchell’s dominance in Southern California. Ngoy sponsored hundreds of Cambodians to the U.S. who then learned the business and eventually ended up with donut shops of their own. Ngoy’s is a remarkable story, full of ups and downs, but inspiring nonetheless and a fine example on one immigrants surprising contribution to America.

Director Freida Lee Mock at the reception held in her honor by CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival in 2019. Photo by Ashley Suloway-Baker.

As the opening credits rolled, I instantly recognized that of one of the executive producers who was the 2019 Honored Guest at CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival, Freida Lee Mock.  (You can watch CASCADIA’s interview with Freida here.) When I contacted Freida, herself an Oscar-winning documentary director, to tell her that I saw her credit on the film. She quickly responded to say that this film is her first as an executive producer and she was extremely proud of it.  She also suggested I drop by one of the donut shops featured in the film and sample their donuts especially since I planned to be only five minutes away from it at appointment the next day.

The shop Freida told me to visit was DK’s Donuts and Bakery in Santa Monica. Never one to pass up a good recommendation or a donut, I headed over to find the shop after my lunchtime meeting. It was exactly as Freida said, only a five-minute drive from the restaurant where I had lunch.

DK’s Donuts and Bakery sits on a corner in Santa Monica, CA. where it’s been in operation since 1980.

I pulled into the corner parking lot where the donut shop stood.  People were coming and going carrying out bright pink boxes full, I assumed, of DK’s signature pastry.  DK’s, like the other shops that Ngoy launched, is family-owned and first opened 41 years ago.  The shop is featured in the film, along with its owners, who got started with Ngoy. Today, it’s owned by Sean and Mayly,the son and daughter of the original owners, Lee and Kong Tao.

The case at DK’s was filled with too many choices! Even Matcha Green Tea and Lavendar Sky donuts!

The mouth-watering smell of freshly-baked donuts instantly tempted me as I opened the shop door and stepped inside. The sloping glass cases were filled with every kind of donut imaginable, and some not so imaginable, like the purple frosted lavender-flavored or the green tea color coated Matcha Green Tea donuts. Atop one of the counters was a tray full of Fourth of July cake donuts decorated with miniature American flags on toothpicks stuck into their white icing covered with red,white and blue sprinkles. Standing behind the counter filling the customers’ orders ahead of me were two employees who I assumed to also be Cambodian or family members.

The aproned man behind the counter was ready to serve whatever I selected. He knew exactly what movie I had seen.

“Can I help you,” the masked man wearing a white apron asked.

“I saw the movie,” I said without mentioning the title.

“Oh, how’d you like it?” he said. He seemed to know exactly what film I was referring to.

“Loved it,” I replied. “That’s the reason I’m here.”

Then came the big decision. Which of the many deep-fried rings of dough before me would I select? The chocolate frosted Devil’s food cake donut was an easy one.  Dare I go further?  Ah, why not live dangerously? After all, I don’t get to L.A. that frequently and didn’t know when I’d be likely to make another trip to this spot. I gave in again to another chocolate donut although the peanut butter cup donut was tough to pass up.  I pointed to my choices. And I added two vegan donuts to take to my son and his girlfriend.

He placed my donuts gently into one of the brightly colored boxes. I carried my tasty treats to my car.  As soon as closed by car door, I pinched off a section of the Devil’s food donut and popped it into my mouth. It was moist and delicious. Another pinch and another taste as I headed out the parking lot. This was repeated several times as I drove until  I had devoured the entire thing before arriving back at my cousin’s home.

Me with my box of donuts at DK’s, which I sampled shortly after this photo was taken.

The remaining  three donuts didn’t last long either and were equally as delicious. (I did manage to deliver the two vegan donuts intact to my son and girlfriend. They generously offered me a bite of each.) No wonder Ngoy’s donut dynasty flourished.

Upon returning home, I contacted Freida again and the film’s director, Alice Gu, to ask about screening the movie in Bellingham as a special screening for CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival.  “The Donut King” is now scheduled as an outdoor movie at Boundary Bay Brewery’s beer garden (all ages welcome) for Sunday, Oct. 3 at 6:30 p.m.  Details are here on CASCADIA’s website.  I also earned that the local donut shop, LaFeen’s, is owned by a Cambodian family!

CASCADIA is taking the opportunity to present a panel discussion that evening prior to the film about the contributions Asian Americans, like those in the film, are making to our country and the ongoing problem of attacks against them.  Freida has been an active participant in The Action Project, a grassroots group of Asian American Academy and Emmy Award-recognized creatives and leaders in entertainment and other fields, formed to help stop violence and discrimination against Asian Americans and to share their stories.  Baozhen Luo, a professor of sociology at Western Washington University, will lead the discussion on October 3 with Shing Liau and Truc Thon and the audience.

If you live in Bellingham (and are fully vaccinated as the festival requires for entry), I hope you’ll attend.  It’s quite possible that donuts will be part of the evening too!

CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival presents a special outdoor screening of the documentary film, “The Donut King,” Sunday, Oct. 3 at Boundary Bay Brewery in Bellingham. The evening starts at 6:30 p.m.

 

 

 

TIME Correspondent Characterized Magazine’s ‘Golden Era’

During my ten year tenure in the Los Angeles bureau at TIME Magazine, I had the the good fortune to work with some of the most talented and respected journalists in the business. The magazine was flourishing then and was the leading news magazine full of articles that put the news into context in greater depth than the dailies could do under their short deadlines.

Henry Grunwald, known behind-the-scenes simply as “Henry,” was editor in chief and Ray Cave sat behind the managing editor’s desk. Between the two of them, they built a journalistic institution that brought bolder graphics, more coverage of the American lifestyle, in-depth single subject issues, new sections such as American Scene, Computers, Food and Videos.  The two rocked tradition and many readers when the computer was selected in 1982 as Machine of the Year instead of choosing a person for the much revered designation.

“The magazine” as many staffers affectionately refer to it, maintained an extensive network of bureaus throughout the world then known as the Time Life News Service. It prided itself on the correspondents and reporters who staffed those bureaus and who, upon assignment from the New York editorial office, would hustle to gather the necessary interviews and information in order to file back to the writers who would assemble the final story based on the reporting coming in from the various bureaus.  The system now seems a luxury as major media outlets have pared down staffs to near skeletal crews.

TIME’s Los Angeles bureau gathered for an office photo. Joe Kane is seated behind the desk. TIME’s acclaimed photographer Ben Martin, far right in beard, set up and took the shot.

The magazine prided itself on having journalists in the field who could be dropped into any situation and ‘get the story.’ Sometimes, those reporters ended up in places they never expected or anticipated, as happened to my colleague Dick Thompson once. Dick was in the D.C. bureau covering science and medicine.  As the story goes, Dick was assigned to ‘weekend duty’ as it was called, when reports came in of war breaking out in the Middle East. Next thing he knew, Dick was on a plane headed there to cover the outbreak until TIME’s seasoned war correspondents could arrive.

The anthology assembled by John Stacks is still available and is a compendium of personal stories by TIME’s correspondents.

Those who were on staff during this ‘golden era’ have similar anecdotes that come up in casual conversation whenever they get together. Many can be found in a anthology that one-time Chief of Correspondents John Stacks put together titled: “Albest.”  It’s a good read of personal stories from their days with the legendary news service and full of behind-the-scenes memories.

Many contributors in the book were my colleagues. One of those is Joe Kane who was my deputy bureau chief in the Los Angeles bureau and one of my closest friends from my days at TIME.  I’m not able to say his name without using both first and last and articulating it in a staccato style of voice that characterized Joe’s own manner of speaking. His was a booming baritone. He was, in my mind, a consummate TIME Magazine correspondent. He had a way of asking probing questions in such a gentlemanly way that even his toughest subjects couldn’t resisting responding.

Joe Kane with boxing great Muhammad Ali. Joe spent four days tracking down an interview with Ali, and eventually jumped in Ali’s limousine with him in order to have a conversation with the famed boxer.

Joe grew up in the D.C. area and started at TIME as a messenger. It didn’t take long before his talents as a writer and his gift for quick wit was recognized and he was moved to New York where his career as a TIME correspondent was launched.  Joe was with the magazine for 30 years and contributed to 19 cover stories. Among those was his interview in 1971 with Jimmy Carter who was Governor of Georgia. “This TIME cover is widely known for bringing Jimmy Carter to the national spotlight,” writes Kane’s granddaughter Shannon in a memory about him, “opening doors for his successful presidential run. Jimmy Carter was named TIME Magazine’s “Man of the Year” in 1976, and he invited Joe and his family to the White House on July 15, 1977, prior to the conclusion of Joe’s position as TIME’s Pentagon correspondent.”

Joe kept things lively in the L.A. bureau with his wit and antics. He mugs for a photo at a TIME party between myself and L.A. bureau chief Ben Cate.

Years later Joe shared a Carter anecdote with me in  an email sent commenting, as he often did, upon one of my blog posts that he had read. (He was a loyal blog reader which flattered me to no end.) “Jimmy Carter ceremony  was yet another official at the Capital rotunda,” Joe wrote. ” I never witnessed an inaugural ceremony itself. But I  had a beige leather jacket that was  new and torn on the  locker at the National Guard Armory where one Carter ball was held. The torn jacket is still torn and I have sent it as a memento the 93-yrs. old President.”

These kind of remarks and actions of his kept those of us in the bureau laughing.  As another TIME colleague Dick Woodbury recalls: “Joe had a way of absorbing life and its range of quirky souls with a careful eye for character and fault lines. His outrageous asides and rear-view mirror sketches of everyone had us roaring with laughter until we realized later they were mostly accurate.”

In “Albest,” Joe wrote about being on the scene when Alabama Governor  George Wallace was shot. Neither Newsweek nor the New York Times  were there so Joe, knowing he had to tell the magazine “dashed across the parking lot, called Dick Duncan (Chief of Correspondents in New York} and went back to the scene where Wallace lay in the chaos and all I can remember was he wore white boxer shorts.”  The anecdote is a good example of both Joe’s humor and his sharp attention to detail.

As Woodbury puts it: “There was no one more interesting and fun to work with.”

Always a gentleman, Joe had a sharp eye for detail and persistence for getting the story.

 

Sadly, Joe Kane passed away last month at age 84, way too soon for his family and friends who loved him. He had been in and out of the hospital in the four months prior, according to his son, Chris.  One of my last emails from Joe arrived in April, shortly after he was released and recovering from COVID. In true Joe fashion it read: “Still on board. Can’t believe how busy I have come. Spent 21 days in hospital with covid-19. Six weeks with two  visiting nurses.

 

“Totaled my car en route home from covid-19. Still  tote green oxygen cables. Upcoming a visit with a pulmonologist.

 

“I promise to keep in touch…  better. JJK”

 

Albest, Joe. Those of us who had the honor of being your journalistic colleague and friend will miss you.

 

Imagine All the People

Millions of Americans this weekend remembered 9/11 and the  tragedy of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Towers in New York, the Pentagon building in Washington D.C. and the plane crash in Shanksville, Pa. Memorial ceremonies took place nationwide, special programs aired starting Friday and people exchanged memories of where they were and what they were doing when they first learned the news 20 years ago.  It’s one of those events that will be forever indelible in the minds of Americans just like Pearl Harbor Day or the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, especially for those of us who witnessed it live or via television.

The memorial at the site of the World Trade Towers is engraved with the names of those who perished that day.

Oddly, and perhaps ironically, this week also marked the anniversary of another American cultural event–the release of musician John Lennon’s utopian song, “Imagine.”  Fifty years ago, on September 9th, former Beatle Lennon rocked the world with his visionary lyrics, which he credited his then wife, Yoko Ono with co-writing, and his simple melody set to a handful of piano chords. It’s a song with a powerful message that sticks with you, especially when listening to it with the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

For me, the song also set the stage for one amazing Mother’s Day evening four years ago.  It happened when my husband and I were visiting the ancient port city of Split, Croatia.  We arrived via ferry from Italy where we had spent a week with friends.  Upon the suggestion of a friend, we took an overnight ferry to Croatia for a few days visit in that Mediterranean country. I knew little of Split before my trip there even though it is one of the more important ancient cities of the world.  Its ruins date back to the Roman Empire. The palace, built in 305 A.D. for the Roman emperor Diocletian, is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It’s massive stone walls and columns dominate the center of the city and attracts visitors from around the world.

The cellars of the Diocletian Palace are well preserved and well worth the visit.

Fans of the overwhelmingly popular TV series, “Game of Thrones” may recognize the palace’s remarkably well-preserved cellars as the place where the show’s character Daenerys kept her dragons when she was in Meereen. In actuality, the cellars was where food and wine for the emperor and his court were stored. There’s even a remnant of a large press still visible.

But it’s the Peristyle, or monumental court, that extends in the center of the palace above where visitors, like myself, congregate to sit on the huge marble and white stone steps, sip a cool drink, watch amusingly as young Croatian students dressed like Roman soldiers patrol the palace and pose patiently for photos and tips from tourists.  I was particularly impressed by the stature and poise of these young men and learned from the two that I spoke with that this was their part-time job to earn much-needed money for medical school. They seemed to enjoy their roles and talking with curious visitors.

During the day, my husband and I explored the palace, its cellars (there’s a small entrance charge but well worth it), the Cathedral of St. Domnius built as a mausoleum for Diocletian with its Romanesque bell tower added later, and the ancient palace’s enormous gates. I was taken by the smoothness of the stone upon which we walked, it is so smooth and polished by the generations who have trod upon it, that you must be careful not to slip and fall if you wear shoes with a leather sole.  This lustrous white stone, I later read, was transported from the island of Brač, and Diocletian spared no expense, importing marble from Italy and Greece.

The marble and white stone pavers of the Dioclatian Palace have been smoothed over time to a beautiful finish that can be slick if one’s not careful.

On our way out, I met a young woman from England who asked if I’d take her picture at the gate. She had come to Split just for the day and was heading over to an outlying island where she was excited to see the Blue Cave.  She was astonished that I had not heard of the Blue Cave and urged me to make a trip there whenever I could.

That evening, we enjoyed a tasty meal at a nearby small taverna that our hotel concierge suggested, Konoba Kod Josz. I ordered the recommended black ink squid pasta that is considered a local specialty. My husband, upon asking if there was a special for the day, chose the ‘deer’ as the waiter using the only English word he knew for the venison that had been brought in that day by a hunter. The dinner was delightful.

My husband’s plate of fresh venison at Konoba Kod Josz was a delicious choice for dinner.

Afterwards, we strolled back towards the brightly lit Palace entering through one of the ancient gates. The little streets surrounding the peristyle bustle with night life in the bars and cafes.  We stopped to order a gelato from one seller and then headed into the center court itself. The evening was comfortably pleasant so we chose a spot where we could watch the traffic in and around the sunken courtyard. People from everywhere gathered to do the same.  As we sat enjoying the scene, a young man sitting upon a wooden stool outside one of the bars lining the perimeter of the court started to strum his guitar and sing. His voice was strong and clear.  As he sang, the crowd quieted.  The lyrics became understandable and were instantly familiar to everyone sitting there.  Without any prompting, people began to join in when the chorus came.

“Imagine all the people, living for today, ah, ah, ah..””

The peristyle was filled with people from around the world that evening who joined in to sing Lennon’s “Imagine” together.

It was magical. There we were sitting half a world away from where we lived, with people from throughout the world, united together in song. It was a if the song that the writer, John Lennon, had written with this very night in mind. Our collective voices reverberated against the palace’s majestic stone to fill the air.  “I hope some day you’ll join us, And the world will be as one.”  With those last words, silence fell over the palace as if none of us there wanted to break the moment to end. Then, almost simultaneously, we all broke out into applause, not necessarily for the lone singer, but for all of us and how Lennon’s music and words had brought us together for.

This weekend, thinking and listening to the stories of all those who had lost family, friends and co-workers in the 9/11 attacks, it seemed no coincidence that the 20th anniversary of this tragic event should nearly occur the  within days of the 50th anniversary of this utopian anthem. Lennon’s words particularly resonated as the tearful memories of 9/11 flowed from the voices of those still grieving for the ones they loved.  I couldn’t help thinking if only the world had taken Lennon’s lyrics to heart, then perhaps the terrible actions and attacks of 9/11 might not have ever happened.

“You may say I’m a dreamer, But I’m not the only one…”

White roses are left at the 9-11 memorial at the World Trade Center in New York by family members and others.

 

 

 

Road Trip to Recovery!

Like a lot of people this year who had stayed close to home during the pandemic, I was ready to load up my car and take a road trip down the West Coast. 

My original plan was for my son and his girlfriend to accompany me and take turns driving and leaving after a family wedding in Tacoma.  But with their schedules, they needed to do it in two days, not exactly what I had in mind.  Instead, I changed to a solo trip and, after dropping the two of them off in Portland where they would fly out, I’d continue on alone, seeing family and friends along the way, many of whom I hadn’t seen two years or more.

I plotted my time behind the wheel into no longer than five- and six-hour blocks. That was just about the time I needed to travel from place to place where I had people to visit. I was excited, not only because this was a long overdue vacation, but because I had fond memories of family road trips made when growing up.  Piling the kids into the station wagon and heading down the highway was something everyone did in those days. Getting there was as much a part of the trip as the destination, and sometimes more.  We stopped to read the historic signs posted long the way, checked out local attractions en route, played license plate with my brothers while riding in the backseat, picnicked or pulled in to drive-ins for hamburgers, and slept overnight at family-run motels, like the one my parents owned and, if we were lucky and arrived early enough, took a dip in their pool.

 I looked forward to my solo drive and the chance to spend a little time to myself, listening to music, podcasts or the audio book I had selected (David McCullogh’s “The Greater Journey”) and traveling on my own schedule.

The historic Stadium High School, built to resemble a French chateau, rises behind my son.

My trip began in Tacoma, WA., the day after my cousin’s wedding.  My youngest son and girlfriend, who had flown from Los Angeles for the wedding, would ride with me the first day as far as Portland. But before we set out, we first had lunch with friends Casey and Mike in Old Town Tacoma then strolled down the street to see the architecturally fascinating Stadium High School.  The school was originally built in 1891 to be a luxury hotel and was built to resemble a French chateau in the Loire Valley. Its life as a hotel was brief and unsuccessful and in 1904 was purchased by the Tacoma School District to be converted into a high school. Now on the national register of historic buildings, the school recently appeared in the 1999 teen romance film, “Ten Things I Hate about You.” The school is well worth a stop if you’re ever in the area.

The drive to Portland was only two hours.  My an air conditioned car was a refuge from the  temperatures outside that  soared well into the record 100s.  I dropped my son and girlfriend at their downtown Portland hotel then headed one-hour south to Albany, Ore. for dinner with my cousin, her husband and my uncle. Being with my Oregon family was so wonderful after two years of separation primarily due to COVID. We exchanged family news, ate a tasty meal and talked about how unbelievably hot–113 degrees –it was outdoors. After a farewell hug and kiss, I left for my first night’s stop in Grant’s Pass, three hours further south.

Summer days are long in the Pacific Northwest and I timed it so as not to run out of light before reaching the motel I had booked. I didn’t quite make it before dark pulling into the motel about 10:30.  The parking lot was full, as were many of the motel lots I saw as I hunted for my own. Apparently a lot of people like me were taking to the road this year. Unlike a lot of private homes in the Northwest, my motel room had air conditioning so slept comfortably and cool.

The next day was my longest stretch, from Grant’s Pass to Novato, CA., in the San Francisco Bay area where my long time friend, Karen, lived. It was an estimated five and three-quarters hour travel time, not including a couple rest stops. I turned on the air conditioning (temperatures were still over 100 degrees) and switched on my book.  The book, about Americans who lived and worked in Paris from the 1840s to the turn of the century, was 11 hours long so I had plenty to listen to and keep me company.

The shady spot under a giant cottonwood in the park was a perfect place for my picnic.

A little more than mid-way, I decided to stop for lunch. I found a park not far off the interstate that sounded like a perfect place for a picnic.  Following the directions to River Park in Anderson, CA, I rolled into the 440-acre city park on the Sacramento River.  I chose a shady, grassy bank under a towering cottonwood tree with a sweeping view of the river.  Being a Monday, there were few others in the park.  I munched my ham sandwich, corn chips and cherries while watching a dog and its owner romp.  Although the sun was hot, my little picnic spot was cool and refreshing.

A couple hours later I turned off Interstate 5 and started towards the coast.  By the time I reached my friend’s home, it was shortly after 4 p.m. Traffic was flowing opposite me out of the city towards Santa Rosa and other outlying suburbs where the commuters lived. I hadn’t seen Karen in many years, although we keep in close touch and always remember each other’s birthdays.  I first met her while working for a business weekly in Phoenix. She was in the ad department and I ran the editorial side.  We became fast friends. She is an artist and the walls of her home are filled with her paintings. We always used to have tea together and this day was no exception. We sat down on her covered and cool patio to talk while sipping a brew.

My friend Karen chose for us to have dinner at Sam’s Cafe in Tiburon.

For dinner, she suggested going to a favorite restaurant situated in nearby Tiburon, Sam’s Cafe.  Sam’s sits right by the water where local boaters can tie up and walk up for a meal on the outdoor deck, which is where Karen and I were sat down. The view looks to Angel Island with San Francisco in the background.  Sam’s serves up a superb seafood menu with the traditional sourdough bread. The plate of calamari I ordered was piled so high that I had leftovers to take home. We watched the sunset over the marina while feasting on the food, a perfect end to a long day of driving.

My cousin with his Sheffield Universal stove that no longer burns coal but works as a gas stove.

The next day I headed to Pebble Beach but not before spending the morning with my cousin Larry and his wife, Cindy, at Larry’s home in Richmond.  Larry is the brilliant scientist of the family and worked on a team that created the magnetic resonance imaging machine. He recently completed his history of its development which is now in the archives of the University of California, San Francisco. Larry still lives in the same home where he grew up. His mother bought it in 1948 with money  from her cookie jar fund. Larry told me the story of how she surprised my uncle by putting a down payment on it. The house is a charming little California bungalow with a workshop and tidy garden in the backyard. Larry still has the enamel coated, gas-burning Sheffield Universal stove  that his mother cooked upon for years. I was glad to see he still had it and amazed that it still worked.

Entering the 17-mile Drive gate at Pebble Beach instantly brought back memories of the many times that I came up from Los Angeles with my three young sons to spend a long weekend with my friends Judy and John. We visited so often that my older son, Matthew, knew the 17-mile Drive by memory. During our days there, we took long strolls on the beach, visited the nearby missions, and simply enjoyed our time together. Judy and I met when we both worked at public relations firm in Los Angeles.  We started swimming together early mornings before going in to the office to keep fit and when we entered charity swims, we identified ourselves as the Bel Air Swim Team. Judy eventually left the firm and opened her opened her own public relations business and I started writing for TIME magazine but our friendship remained close. She and John owned a condo in Pebble Beach and when they retired, they built a new house there and moved there permanently.  Sadly, John passed away just before the pandemic.  Judy spent the long year of COVID largely by herself, unable to attend her exercise classes or gather with friends. She seemed thrilled to see me and said that she was long overdue, as John referred to it, for her “Cheryl fix.”

She was eager for updates about my sons, about my work and ongoing activities.  I wanted to know about her circumstances and how she was doing without John. We talked long into the evening and over a lovely dinner that she prepared.

Before leaving Pebble Beach, I walked on Spanish Bay Beach where my sons had played when they were small.

In the morning, before leaving on the last leg towards Los Angeles, I drove along the 17-Mile Drive’s scenic shoreline. I pulled over at Spanish Bay to walk on the beach and soak up the fresh sea air. Thee wind and the sound of the waves washing up on the sand was so invigorating. I took a few photos, searched for shells then hopped back into the driver’s seat for the day’s journey.

I followed highway 101 down the coast instead of the shorter, interior route of I-5 so that I could stop in Santa Barbara where my friends Margaret and Barry were expecting me for dinner.  I  listened to my book as I rolled along but the Franco-Prussian War nearly did me in.  McCullough’s description is so detailed and his research so thorough that although I learned a lot it was more exhausting than entertaining,  About an hour outside of Santa Barbara, I turned it off.  I arrived at Margaret and Barry’s home mid-afternoon which gave us a couple hours to ourselves before our mutual friends Gail and Alan joined us for a tasty Thai food take-out dinner. 

Margaret and Barry are two of my oldest friends. She and I met in an acting scene study class in Phoenix more than 40 years ago and we have been close friends ever since. They moved to Los Angeles a couple years before we did and relocated to Santa Barbara after we left for the Pacific Northwest. We know each other’s families well and have so much history together that it doesn’t take much for us to launch into a long-winded conversation.

Sitting on the patio with friends Margaret, Gail, Alan and I had an engaging conversation before our dinner.

Dinner was lively with lots of laughs and shared memories of times together and, in particular, the many games of ‘murder’–a popular party game–we played at each other’s homes. With so many of our friends in theatre, the TV and film industry, our games were often dramatic, elaborate and great fun.

My plan was to drive on to Los Angeles after dinner, but I had forgotten that the sun sets sooner in Southern California than the Pacific Northwest. By 8:30 it was dusk and I was tired.  So I accepted Gail’s offer to ‘crash’ for the night at their home, located nearby and take off for Los Angeles the next morning. By spending the night, I also had the bonus of seeing their two sons who had grown up with my own, and their granddaughter.  Like Margaret and Barry, our families are close and have spent years together celebrating birthdays, holidays and summers. They frequently visit us and whenever we’re in Southern California, we spend time with them.  Our friendship has endured many years (my husband went to college with Alan) and has deepened over time.

The final leg of my road drive was an easy one along the coast. As I neared Los Angeles, the traffic demanded my full attention.  In 90 minutes, I reached my cousin’s home where I’d spend a few days before flying home. 

My road trip was over but the journey continues. Like many others, reuniting with family and friends was high priority after more than a year of relative (no pun intended) isolation. The way we choose to spend to our time says a lot about who we are, what we value and how we live. I’ll not make another long road trip this year, but will cherish this one as a re-emergence to resume life as it was prior to the pandemic and to reconnect with people and places who have a major role in my life.  As with my childhood family vacations. the trip was as much about the getting there as it was the destination.

At the end of my trip with my Volvo.

 

 

Lummi Totem on its Way to Washington D.C.

This Wednesday  a 25-foot long brightly colored totem, carved from a 400-year-old red cedar log, will roll via flatbed trailer from the shores of the Salish Sea of the Lummi Nation to the capitol of the United States. Upon arrival in Washington D.C.  the totem will be presented to President Biden and ultimately be erected at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian where it will be displayed this fall. But before it leaves, locals here will have one last opportunity to see the totem during a ceremony to take place at noon on Tuesday, July 13 at Semiahmoo. (Just received word that this event may be cancelled. Please check Red Road’s website or Facebook page before you go.) After that, the totem will begin its trip east.

Over Memorial Day weekend, the pole was displayed at a waterfront park in Bellingham. Locals were invited to view, touch and listen to a presentation for the totem. I took the opportunity to see and photograph it then.

The totem that will make its way to D.C. on this flatbed trailer was displayed in Bellingham on Memorial Day.

The two-ton hand-carved log lay atop the trailer on which it is making its journey around the country. Imagine how spectacular the totem will be when it towers upright above those below.  The pole includes carvings of Chinook salmon, a wolf, a bear, an eagle, and seven tears—a reference to seven generations of trauma passed on from colonialism.  Each carving refers to specific Native American folklore and tribal connections, explains Lummi master carver Jewell Praying Wolf James in his artist’s statement. 

At the top of the totem is a moon with the Indian head. Note the use of copper on the face.

At the top is a Full Moon with  the “Indian-in-the-moon” in the design.  A “fire” carved before the praying/meditating male figure.  Below this is the eagle, whose head projects outward and downward. On both of the eagle’s wings are “salmon head” designs and below it are two full bodied Chinook salmon.

Towards the base of the totem is the carving of a caged child a reference to the immigrant children incarcerated at the U.S. border.

Below the chinook is Canadian copper, in remembrance to Canada’s Indigenous people. Along one side of the totem is the wolf, the scout, and opposite it is the bear, a symbol of strength. A mother sits between them representing all mothers who love their children and who seek to be a positive traditional spiritual influence on them. Behind her is her daughter.  Below and in front of the bear is the kneeling mother praying for her immigrant child incarcerated at the U.S. border.  Gouging marks around the mother, daughter, and caged infant represent falling rains that feed into the river of life the totem’s base.

 

The pole is painted in the Coast Salish style with traditional colors of red, black, white and yellow. The colors represent the four races of mankind, according to James. At one time these colors were made by mixing colored plant or mineral earth pigments with salmon oil and saliva. Traditional paints are no longer made as salmon have neared extinction. Instead, the carvers use commercial exterior paints to give their totem its bright beauty. Other colors, such as bright blues, were also used as “we are a part of the colored mosaic of nature,” James notes. 

The totem is brightly painted in colors that reflect traditional colors and those from nature.

The two week journey to D.C. marks the 20th anniversary of the Lummi’s totem pole journeys that began in 2001 with a totem that was taken to New York after the tragedy of 9-11.  (The Lummi carvers also gifted a healing totem to the City and people of Bellingham, WA. in 2007 in recognition of the Bellingham pipeline explosion that killed three boys and burned acres of city park. See blog post “Totem Memorializes Local Tragedy.”) In 2013 the Lummi people began what turned out to be, a yearly totem pole journey, in response to the threat of a 50 million ton coal export terminal proposal on their traditional and sacred lands at Xwe’chi’eXen, north of Bellingham, WA., known locally by non-natives as Cherry Point.  The terminal was ultimately defeated but the totem pole journeys continued to promote the spirit of healing, honor, hospitality, respect and protection.  

The purpose of the 2021 journey, known as the Red Road to D.C, is to bring recognition, honor, and calls to prayer for sacred Native American sites currently threatened by development and resource extraction, according to James.

A crowd begins to gather on a dreary Memorial Day in Bellingham to view the totem before it left on its West Coast tour.

James is the only surviving member of the Lummi Nation’s House of Tears Carvers. Three of the four original carvers died while work on this totem, which began in February, was underway. James was left to finish with the help of 70 others, ages four to 70 years-old. James himself was recently hospitalized upon returning from a 17,000 cross-country journey with the totem. In all, the totem has stopped at 78 scared sites, villages and tribes down the West Coast, through the middle of the country and as far as Miami, Fla. In Miami  tribal representatives presented a blanket to Mayor Danniella Levine Cava and visited the Miami Sea Aquarium to demand that the orca whale, Toketai/Sk’ali’chetenaut, be returned to its home in the Salish Sea and released from its 50-year captivity.

“We’re going to be working with local tribes to perform various blessing ceremonies and working together to help each other watch out for these sacred sites so that corporations or governments don’t go in and needlessly destroy them,” James said in a recorded interview  with the Native News Online.

Placing a hand on the totem is encouraged of those who visit the totem d imbue it with their grief, their prayers and their hope.

On the way to D.C.,  the totem pole will stop at a number of Native lands including  Bears Ears National Monument in Utah, where Navajo Nation citizens are currently calling upon the Biden administration to restore and expand the protected acreage that was shrunk 85% under former President Donald Trump.  Other stops include the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Missouri River, where the Dakota Access Pipeline crosses which Native Americans and environmental groups demand be shut down.

Along the way, Native American drummers and singers, such as this man, honor the totem and its carvers through their musical expression.

The journey of the Lummi Nation’s totem pole is intended to raise awareness of sacred sites threatened by development and resource extraction, according to organizers.

You can check out the totem’s route, updates and planned stops here and on the Red Road to D.C. website or Facebook page.  I encourage you to see it if you’re fortunate enough to live somewhere through which it will pass.  If you can’t see it en route, be sure you take it in at the Smithsonian’s Museum of the American Indian on any future trips to our nation’s capitol.

 

 

 

 

Mother MJ and Drive In Movies

 

Drive-in movie theaters had all but disappeared when the pandemic ushered in a resurgence. The few that were still in existence suddenly found themselves sold out last summer because it was a place where families could go out together and be safe under the pandemic restrictions. They sprang up in parking lots of shopping malls and recreational attractions, like the Waterslide Park here in town, where portable outdoor screens could be brought in, popped up and movies projected to people in cars parked in the big, otherwise empty lots.

For generations of families and teens in particular who grew up in the 1950s and 1960s, the drive-in movie theaters are nostalgic symbols that stir up all sorts of memories. The drive-in of my own Midwest hometown stood at the outskirts of town, in the middle of a farm field, as you headed east out of town on highway. Cars rolled slowly past the box office stand through the entrance and pulled up carefully alongside the big metal box speakers hanging on either side of the poles that jutted up from the ground. Like other drive-ins of its day, there was a playground at the bottom of the big screen where kids gathered to squeal and swing before the movie began. The smell of fresh buttered popcorn, piping hot hot dogs and greasy hamburgers wafted from the brightly lit, low slung concession building that stood at the back of the lot. As movie time neared, kids climbed up on the blanket-covered hoods of the cars for a better view of the screen.

The Parsons Drive In Theatre entrance was a familiar sight on the highway for 40 years until 1988 when it closed.

My most vivid drive in movie memory is not an evening with my parents or of a date with a boyfriend. It’s of the night that my friend Cris’ mother, Mary Jean, took a load of girlfriends to see “Bonnie and Clyde.” Mary Jean, or MJ as she was fondly called, was a super cool Mom in my book. She let our teenage gang take over her gorgeous two-story home to dance to records or play the party game, Twister. She allowed us girls to occupy their lakeside cabin for numerous weekend slumber parties complete with boat for water skiing.  To us girls, MJ seemed more like an older friend than someone’s mother although she had her limits. 

When “Bonnie and Clyde” was released, my girlfriends and I were just under the age restriction for the film.  MJ offered to take us, with our parents’ permission. Four of us piled into her classic 1960s Thunderbird which was plenty cool in itself. The Thunderbird had bucket seats in the front, one for MJ and one for Cris, and a tight backseat into which three of us squeezed sitting knee-to-knee. We didn’t mind the cramped arrangement because we were going to the Drive-In with one of the coolest Moms in town.  We chomped our popcorn, being ever so careful not to spill it it in MJ’s classy car, and tensely watched as on screen the FBI hunted down the bank-robbing duo and their gang. The suspense built until to the final scene where Bonnie and Clyde meet their demise in a violently graphic gunfight.  As tight as that backseat was, the three of us somehow managed to  duck down to avoid seeing the climatic shoot out.  We all laughed nervously about it afterwards.  It’s the night I remember most at the drive-in–Bonnie and Clyde and Cris’ mother, MJ.

The poster for “Bonnie and Clyde.”

Locally, Western Washington University hosted two sold-out drive in movie nights for its students late last summer in the same lot where the double screen drive-in known as the Samish Twin once operated. The Samish Twin closed down in 2003 although at least one of the two screens was still standing in 2008. The university eventually purchased the empty asphalt lot overgrown with weeds and long dark and converted it into a park and ride lot for its students. Few residents missed the drive-in, its popularity having long succumbed to the slick multi-plex corporate cinemas. One friend of mine, a Bellingham native who well remembers the Samish Twin and the drive-in days, says the teen crowds preferred the Moonlite Drive-In situated on the hill off the Guide Meridian where a big box hardware store now is located. “It was the place to go,” she tells me.

The Moonlite Drive In’s double screens were popular with the Bellingham teen crowd.

Not surprising then that when the pandemic created a drive-in movie comeback showtimes sold out within hours. For myself, I was delighted when the possibility came up of CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival of which I’m executive director pairing with WWU for a drive-in movie during the festival, scheduled for next week. I missed the two shows the university presented late last summer so the idea of getting a second chance at it seemed an opportunity too good to pass up. Although the film to be shown on this upcoming Friday, May 14, is not an official selection of the festival, I fully expect it will sell out. I expect to see 200 cars, full of college-age students about to experience their first drive-in movie night and older adults who remember nights at the drive-in when they were the age of the students now going for their first drive-in movie, roll in, park, turn off their car lights, open a bag of popcorn and settle in for a movie night that will both create and bring back memories.

To find out more about Bellingham’s bygone Drive-Ins, check out Bellinghamster Mike Benoit’s piece in Whatcom Talk. And you can read more about drive-ins past and present across the country on the website: Cinema Treasures.

 

‘Welcome Home’ Highlights Homegrown Musicians

Yesterday, driving home from an afternoon walk with a friend, I heard an announcement on KNKX radio about a virtual benefit concert taking place later that evening for the South Hudson Music Project with live and recorded performances by a number of Seattle area jazz musicians.  My ears perked up when I heard “Ray Larsen” named as one of those who would play.  It so happens that I know Ray, a Seattle trumpeter gaining notice in the Seattle jazz circle.  Ray was one of the members of the funk band, The Fabulous Party Boys, (FPB) founded by son, Marshall, and his friend, Jon Hansen, when they were in middle school.

Ray joined the Bellingham band around 2008, after the it relocated to Seattle where both Marshall and Jon were living. And while the band performed primarily in Seattle area clubs and events, they still came back to Bellingham for gigs here now and then. On those occasions, several of the band’s members, including Ray, would spend the night at our house instead of driving back late at night to Seattle.

Trumpeter Ray Larsen performs with the Fabulous Party Boys at the Wild Buffalo In Bellingham.

Many a weekend morning did I come downstairs to find big lumps on our family room, guest room and living sofas of soundly sleeping band members. Sometimes, upon waking bleary-eyed, they sip a cup of hot coffee and stay for a pancake breakfast before heading home. Other times, they’d finish their coffee and run off to their favorite local breakfast venue, Old Town Cafe, where they’d meet up with Jon, who had spent the night at his own parents’ home, and Scott MacPherson, the saxophonist and also a Bellingham boy, who had slept at his family’s house.

Our house was the unofficial headquarters and rehearsal venue for FBP since my son was the drummer and we had a dedicated rehearsal space for the group. Rehearsals took place throughout the week but always on Fridays after school.  I had to be sure to stock up on snacks and drinks so that when they took a break my refrigerator wasn’t emptied. On warm spring and summer evenings, the doors to the the ‘rec room’ where their rehearsals took place, were opened and we could sit on our patio, sipping a glass of wine and enjoying the music. It was like having our own music club in our backyard. Neighbors too could hear the band’s funky sounds as it boogied down the street. No one ever complained. In fact, most told me how much they enjoyed it. Who knows, they may have been sipping their own libation while listening.

The Fabulous Party Boys move outdoors for a pre-show rehearsal.

FPB played a lot of covers but they also wrote their own music, much of it characterized by complicated syncopation and a style, described by What’s Up magazine as “a merge between serious intellectual speculation, casual anecdotes, and personal narrative.”  The band remained together in Seattle for nearly eight years beyond their Bellingham beginnings. A number of young musicians rotated in and out as members went off to college, moved away, married or gave up their music for other interests. But the band produced a number of talented musicians who are now teaching, performing, recording and composing in careers of their own. (More about the band in my blog posts published Jan 3, 2015 and May 22, 2015.)

Among them are three who were featured just two weeks ago in the Bellingham Festival of Music’s (BFM) streaming video, “Where Are They Now” celebrating virtually the 11th anniversary of that festival’s annual Welcome Home concerts.  The concerts were the brainchild of former festival president Karen Berry as a way to recoognize promising young artists who received early training in Bellingham and who were studying at a conservatory or university music school to become professional musicians. 

Former Bellingham Festival of Music President Karen Berry smiles with he Calidore String Quartet after a festival performance. Her son, Jeremy, is on the far right.

The concerts have become a much-looked-forward-to event each year among local audiences.  Over the years, a variety of gifted young musicians have been showcased.  One of those happened to be Karen’s own son, Jeremy, now violist with the Calidore String Quartet based in New York. The classical quartet is recognized worldwide for its artistry and has been praised by the New York Times for its “deep reserves of virtuosity and irrepressible dramatic bn5instinct.” While Jeremy was never a Fabulous Party Boy, he sometimes was at our house as he was a high school classmate and orchestra member with my son, Matthew. The Calidore comes to perform at the summer music festival and has developed a huge hometown following.  (More about the Calidore in my 2014 post here.)

Jon Hansen plays with the Fabulous Party Boys at Belligham’s Wild Buffalo. My son, Marshall, is seen on the drums behind.

Also featured in the BFM’s video, viewable now on the website, are three other musicians who were members of the funk band. Jon Hansen, one of the band’s founders along with my son, performed in the 2013 Welcome Home concert.  Jon attended both the University of Southern California (USC) and University of Washington music schools where he earned a Doctor of Music in music performance. He’s emerged as an award-winning tubist recognized for his pioneering work on the Spacetuba, a tuba that has been modified with a MIDI controller, or connecting device, to allow the musician to interface his instrument with a computer.  As a Party Boy, Jon was always trying out new ideas to produce different sounds on his instrument. Sometimes, he’d use a modifier that resulted in making his tuba sound more like a trumpet. A performer, composer and producer, Jon currently lives with his wife and children in Zurich, Switzerland, where he’s happily occupied creating a new solo album and other collaborative recording projects. On the BFM video he performs on  the finger-snapping tune, “Sugah Daddy” by D’Angelo and The Vanguard, in a video recording he edited himself.

Guitarist Albert Diaz on guitar with the Fabulous Party Boys performing at Boundary Bay Brewery in Bellingham.

The 2013 Welcome Home concert also presented guitarist Albert Diaz. Albert played with FPB for few years while still in high school and on occasion when he was home from Los Angeles where he too studied music at USC.  He soloed with the local youth orchestra, the Mount Baker Youth Orchestra, while still in high school. He received degrees in classical guitar performance at USC and  a Master of Music in musicology from the University of California, Los Angeles.  Until recently, Albert was an associate chair of the music department at Walla Walla University in Walla Walla, WA. where he lives. He has set aside his music career for now to manage the tasting room and restaurant at Valdemar Estates’ winery which is presently closed due to the pandemic. Quite likely Albert is spending some quality time right now at home with his guitar.

Saxophonist Jeff Seigfried performs with Scott MacPherson in a Fabulous Party Boys gig at Bellingham’s Boundary Bay Brewery

A third FPB musician who performs on the BFM video is saxophonist Jeff Seigfried. Jeff probably spent as much time at our house as he did his own from middle school through high school. Even now when home visiting family from his post as assistant professor of saxophone at West Virginia University, he drops in to say ‘hello’ and catch up. Jeff, who holds a masters and doctorate in saxophone performance and a masters in musicology from the University of Michigan, played with the Party Boys all through middle and high school. As an original member of the band, he was always welcome to sit in with the band to play gigs or just to jam whenever home. Now he’s gaining a reputation as a soloist winning competitions and awards nationwide as he champions the repertoire of classical saxophone music.  An unfortunate bicycle accident in France a few years ago badly injured one of his hands to the extent that there was some question whether he’d be able to resume his playing career. But after a delicate surgery by a major hand specialist, Jeff recovered and picked up where he left off. He too has been recording a new album during the pandemic while continuing to teach. 

In a promotional shot for the Fabulous Party Boys with my son, Marshall Petryni on the left end next to Albert Diaz in green t-shrit; Jon Hansen opposite in the black t-shirt and Jeff Seigfried on the right end. Ray Larsen sits below next to Jeff.

It’s been extremely fun and gratifying to watch each of these  musicians develop in their outstanding professional careers. Although I can’t claim any responsibility for their training, I like to think I contributed, along with their own parents, by providing a place to make music, encouraging them to pursue their passion and cheering them on by attending their concerts, gigs, and recitals through the years. Each of their accomplishments bring me a great sense of pride and joy. The music they play fills the world with melodic beauty, something we could all use a little more of right now, and it began in our own backyard.

Snowshoeing Snowballs This Season for Outdoor Winter Fun and Fitness

A pair of snowshoes was on my Christmas list this year but I didn’t receive any, not because my husband and son didn’t pick up the heavy hint or didn’t try. Turns out that snowshoeing is to winter this year what biking was to spring and summer. Since the pandemic, people have looked for a way to get out of their houses to enjoy the fresh air and try to stay fit at the same time. Snowshoeing, it seems, is this winter’s favorite new outdoor sport. Consequently, the demand for snowshoes has avalanched. By the the time my son and husband started to shop around for them (neither are early holiday shoppers), there was not a snowshoe to be had. At least not until January 29, according to one manufacturer.

My first snowshoe adventure opened a new world of winter sports for me.

It’s not all that surprising to me that snowshoeing has taken off for those of us who live in this country’s colder climes where snow can cover the ground for months. Downhill skiing isn’t always an option, especially if you live in areas, like the middle of the United States where I grew up, where there are no mountains within close driving distance. Cross country skiing offers more possibilities but that too can be limited. Ice skating is a great  aerobic workout but requires a sheet of ice, a pond frozen solid or an indoor ice rink which are all closed now due to the pandemic. But snowshoeing opens up more choices because  you can don a pair and be off trekking almost anywhere, even in urban centers.

My introduction to snowshoeing occurred a few years ago when friends invited me to go with them after learning that I wanted to try it. I borrowed some snowshoes, figured out how to adjust them for my foot size and how to strap myself into the cumbersome things and was ready for a new experience. We assembled at one of their houses where we loaded up two cars with our snowshoes, poles, coats, hats, lunches, drinks and ourselves and set off together up to nearby Mount Baker.

Snowshoes, poles, coats and all our gear was piled into car that we were taking to the mountain.

The drive to Mount Baker from where I live takes a little more than an hour. In  winter, snow tires, all-wheel drive vehicles or chains are often required to make the trip up to Mount Baker Ski Area. So far this season the mountain has accumulated 361 inches of snow, according to the latest snow report, well on track to meet the average annual snowfall of 663 inches, the largest unofficial amount of snow of any resort in the world. Last January alone, 294 inches fell at the mountain. With that much snow, skiing or snowboarding season often extends to the end of May and into the summer months. This summer, for instance, when hiking on one of the trails at Mount Baker, my hiking partner and I ate lunch on the mountainside while watching a snowboarder go up and down a snowy slope nearby. The long-lasting snow is another reason why hiking trails at the top of mountain usually don’t open until July (it was August this past year) and frequently close by mid-October.

This August, the restroom facility in the mountain parking lot was still buried in snow.

This abundance of white precipitation creates great conditions for winter sports, snowshoeing included. So far, this season has been no exception. With the pandemic, even greater numbers of people are flocking to the mountain and their cars are filling the parking lots.  One skier friend reported to me that she and her family walked a quarter of a mile with their gear after parking to reach the chair lifts. I suspect one reason for this volume of vehicles is because people can not safely carpool due to safety concerns from the virus. So if you’re planning a day on the mountain,  go early and plan ahead.

One by one our colorful group trekked through the snowy path into a wonderland of snow.

Traffic wasn’t an issue the first time I ventured up.  Whenever you go snowshoeing it’s a good idea to go with someone who knows the trails and conditions. This is because, in part, of the danger of falling into a tree well. When you’re out on the trail, it’s easy to forget that you may actually be walking above or across the tops of trees that have been buried by snow drifts. For this reason, tag along with an organized club, such as our local Mount Baker Club (MBC) which has been around since 1911. The all-volunteer MBC regularly schedules outings and have members who have helped to groom and test the trails before they go.

Walking through snow-covered towering trees is like entering a winter wonderland.

On my first outing, we were fortunate to have among us two or three MBC members, one of whom had just scouted with MBC the trail we were taking that day. The snow was deep and fresh as we climbed down an embankment from the parking lot onto the trailhead. We were a colorful lot against the white landscape in our variety of bright winter jackets. We headed single file across the snow and into a wintry wonderland. Giant Douglas firs and cedars towered on either side of us as we stepped by, carefully planting one foot ahead of the other. Snowshoeing gives you quite a work out and before long I had warmed up.

The winter wilderness is incredibly quiet. The snow seems to buffer the sound and the noise of modern devices are rendered voiceless. Even with the laughing and talking of our little group, the stillness of our surroundings was powerfully peaceful. Its silence you can hear and appreciate.

Hot soup and hot cocoa was a warming meal during a day of snowshoeing.

After a while, we stopped for a lunch break. One of our group had brought along a lightweight tarp and spread it upon the snow before we eased ourselves down onto it. Trust me, sitting down in snowshoes is no easy feat. Food too always tastes better after exertion in the great outdoors. I was glad to have brought a thermos of hot chocolate, soup and an energy bar in addition to my water. Liquids are especially important to carry because you lose a lot of fluids and need to replenish when you’re burning calories snowshoeing.

A few hours after we had begun, we found ourselves back at the other end of the parking lot from where we had departed. Our course had not been far–basically we made a large loop from one end of the parking lot to the other–but it had been immensely satisfying and invigorating. My initial foray had me hooked. Not being a skier (growing up in Kansas didn’t afford me the opportunity to learn) I never had a way to recreate outdoors in the winter other than sledding. This newfound activity offered me now a chance to experience the beauty of nature when its blanketed in white and the satisfaction of physically challenging myself.

I’ve not been up to the mountain to snowshoe so far this season. The pandemic makes it logistically more challenging to arrange and reports of capacity parking lots are daunting. Plus I need to rent or borrow snowshoes until the supply chain for this year is restored so I can purchase my own. I look forward to returning to a time when friends can go together without hesitation to enjoy bracing temperatures and silent scenery and share with one another the camaraderie of a day trekking through the snow.

The big smiles of our group on our snowshoeing outing is witness to the camaraderie of the day.

 

 

A New Year’s Tradition Relived in Behind-the-Scenes Visits

The Rose Parade was cancelled this New Year’s Day due to the pandemic for the only the fourth time in the parade’s 132 year history and for the first time in the past 75 years.  Pasadena’s Colorado Boulevard was ‘strangely quiet’ on New Year’s Day, according to the Los Angeles Times. It was strangely quiet at my house too where, on New Year’s morning, I usually turn on the televised parade while cooking a holiday brunch. This year, I couldn’t bring myself to watch the stand-in program broadcast in place of the parade.

The vivid colors of the floats created by the beautiful flowers, seeds and grasses are stunning to see in person and hard to replicate on screen. It’s what has made Pasadena’s annual Rose Parade on New Year’s Day one of this country’s much-loved and anticipated holiday traditions.

Instead, I spent the morning reflecting on the three times that I attended the parade while living in Los Angeles and looking at photos I took from those New Year Days. (I wrote about these excursions in another blog post “Everything’s Coming Up Roses“). Viewing the parade in person certainly is an experience because the floats are so enormous, spectacular and the color more brilliant that what comes across on television no matter how good your screen.

A volunteer applies seeds to one of the floats for the Rose Parade the next day.

The seed chart for the Cal Poly University float used to guide the decorators, like the one seen here in the background at top.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But one year I learned that another way to experience the floats is to go on New Year’s Eve to watch volunteers as they decorate the floats and put on the final touches.  Since every inch of the floats must be covered by live flowers, seeds or grasses, they can’t be assembled too early.  Volunteers work round the clock the day before the parade to painstakingly glue or otherwise attach thousands of pieces into place by following charts and diagrams created by float designers. Some volunteers are paid with the money they earn donated back to designated charities.  I always thought it would be fun to volunteer one year but with being the mother of three little boys under the age of 9 at the time, it didn’t happen.

My ticket stub for admission to the float decorating viewing.

I took my sons to see the process one year as a way to celebrate New Year’s Eve and for a behind-the-scenes look at what was to come the next morning.  I bought an admission ticket, located the warehouse where we were to observe and dressed warmly because the buildings are kept cool to keep the flowers fresh as they are applied.  We were assigned areas where we could stand to oversee but not interfere with the ongoing work.  The volunteers carefully and tediously dabbed droplets of glue onto a seed or flower before positioning it. Some of these people, I was told, return year after year to decorate. I wondered how many of these decorators actually watch the parade after staying up all night to put it together.

After the parade passes by, the floats are parked where they are on exhibit for visitors.

A ferocious floral dragon towers overheard at the post parade review.

An alternative to previewing the floats is to review the floats after the parade.  Once the floats complete the parade route, they are parked nearby where the public can visit free of charge.  You get much closer than at the preview so it’s possible to admire the incredible detail on each.  The designs are intricate and wildly imaginative in the use and selection of the materials used. Grasses become animal fur, seeds become dragon scales, flowers become feathers.  The floats become giant, living technicolor floral arrangements on wheels with moving parts controlled by computers hidden deep inside the chassis where the floats’ drivers are tucked away with only  small opening to steer. These little details are revealed as you stop and stroll by at the post parade show. It’s a great way to spend a New Year’s afternoon which is exactly what we did on more than one occasion.

This year, without a parade, I relived the day  with the photographs and memories from those New Years past. It made an otherwise bleak and wind-blown New Year’s Day a bit brighter and cheerier.  I hope the parade will resume next New Year’s, as I’m sure Pasadena does too, to carry on one of the holiday season’s most beautiful, most watched and most anticipated traditions.  Until then, Happy New Year’s everyone!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our ‘Destination Wedding’ Venue Symbolized More than a Location

Destination weddings have become popular in recent years. The idea is that it gives people an opportunity to combine attending a wedding with a vacation.

In a way, my own wedding was a forerunner to the contemporary destination wedding. But our reasons for the location of our wedding had more to do with family and friends than selecting a place where invitees would want to visit. This came to mind this last week as my husband and I celebrated our anniversary.

Michael and I met while we were both working for a suburban Phoenix newspaper, the Scottsdale Daily Progress. When we began dating, Michael had moved on to a film critic job at the Arizona Republic and I had become editor of business weekly in Phoenix. Our close friends, however, remained those with whom we had worked at the Progress and the people we knew from the local arts scene who we had covered. We also both had family in Phoenix although my immediate family lived in Kansas. When we decided to marry, Phoenix seemed the obvious choice for our wedding.

My Mother and Father outside the church doors on their wedding day in Phoenix

But I had another reason for wanting to marry in Phoenix: it was where my parents had married. Their circumstances were quite different than ours however. My Dad had recently returned home from serving in World War II when his sister, Gail, introduced him to a young woman with whom she worked at the First Federal Savings and Loan in my Dad’s hometown of Parsons, Ks.

My Dad often said: “It was love at first sight.” My Mom was, quite simply, a knock-out. She had been ‘queen’ of the local USO where she volunteered during the the War. She was a stylish young woman with beautiful flowing brunette hair that fell to her shoulders. She was athletic and loved to roller skate with her girlfriends, play softball on the company team, hit a few tennis balls on the court or simply show off by doing some of the gymnastic moves that she had mastered. On top of that, she was smart with a good job.

Their courtship was cut short when my Dad had to leave to haul a trailer full of greyhounds for the races in Arizona for his brother-in-law, Paul Sutherland, who had given my Dad a job to get him ‘straightened out’ after the War. My Dad proposed before he left telling my Mom that if she didn’t marry him he’d re-enlist in the Army. (You can read the full story in my post, “Love is in the Air”.)

On April 9, 1946, with only my aunt and my Dad’s best man in attendance, the couple exchanged vows in the little chapel of the architecturally imposing First Baptist Church that stood on the corner of Monroe and Third Avenue in downtown Phoenix. Thirty years later, Michael and I said our vows in that very same church, although our ceremony took place in the building’s large sanctuary. By the time of our wedding, the church had relocated and the building had been converted to city offices. In order to hold our wedding in the abandoned sanctuary, we had to obtain special permission from the city and had to clean it.

The historic First Baptist Church stands proudly in downtown Phoenix as one of the city’s registered historic places.

Ours was probably the last wedding to take place in that church. Six years later it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Nearly demolished in 1992 after a devastating fire, it was saved by the non-profit Housing Opportunity Council. The church stands empty today although an attached wing was converted into low income housing.

Our December wedding was attended by more people than were present at my parents wedding. My parents, my brothers, cousin and uncle from Kansas traveled out, at one of the busiest times of the year for my Dad’s photography business, to be there. In retrospect, I realize what a difficult time it was for my parents who had to leave behind their studio just as the busy holiday season was starting. There was no way, of course, that they were going to miss their only daughter’s wedding. Our ‘destination wedding’ venue was chosen for the significance the place held in my parents’ lives, who remained married for 67 years until death did they part. Our wedding was a special occasion not only for Michael and me but my parents for whom memories of their own wedding must have come rushing back.

The sanctuary of the historic First Baptist Church in Phoenix was a beautiful setting with special meaning for our wedding.

A Final Salute to An Uncle and the Family Farmhouse

The loss of a family member is a time not only of mourning for those who remain but also a time for reflection. So it has been with me after receiving the sad news two weeks ago that my Uncle Norman, my mother’s last living sibling, had passed away. He was 93, had been in failing health this last year (not due to COVID) and was under hospice’s care so his passing didn’t come as a complete surprise.

My uncle’s obituary, published here, is filled with family history and provides an excellent biography of his remarkable life. I even learned details about his distinguished career with the U.S. Navy that I had not known. With Veteran’s Day today, it seemed fitting  to give him one final salute.

My uncle as a young sailor just starting his Navy career.

His passing represents a significant time in my family’s history in that all those with firsthand memories of my mother’s family growing up are now gone. We are left with the oral histories and stories that my mother, her sisters and brothers shared with us during the time that they lived.

Obituaries, once published, become invaluable pieces of reference material for anyone conducting future research about the individual, the family or other topics. Those of you who’ve worked on family histories  know exactly what I mean.

My uncle’s obituary mentioned that he was raised in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri with seven siblings in a log home built by the family.  My family sometimes stopped by to see it during Memorial Day trips to the Spring River Cemetery where my mother’s grandparents and father are buried.  We’d go first to the cemetery to place flowers on the family graves and after my parents were done visiting with the cousins they hadn’t seen for a year, we’d  drive by to see what was left of the cabin that was falling down and being gobbled up by the lush vegetation. It must have been hard for Mother to see her childhood home, where she nearly died of pneumonia, in such condition. But the log house wasn’t the family’s first or only home.

Great grandmother poses in front the the family farmhouse where my uncle and mother spent some of their childhood.

Before the log house, the family lived in a comfortable, two story farmhouse with their father’s parents who had immigrated from Sweden. The house was a similar style to farmhouses you’d find in their home country, although not painted the traditional red or yellow.  The house was long gone by the time I was born, but I heard many fond memories of it from my Aunt Hazel, the second oldest daughter in the family.

She often recalled evenings spent sitting in the front parlor watching the big hands on the wall clock move slowly during nightly Bible readings given by their father. Some evenings, the family gathered to enjoy her father’s fiddle or guitar music.  Her mother hosted big Sunday suppers after church for whoever wanted to join them cooked in the big kitchen across from the parlor.  On the farm, my aunt said they had plenty of food from their fruit and nut trees, garden,

My aunt Hazel shows where the cistern once was at the family’s farmhouse.

chickens, cow and watercress that the children picked from the banks of a nearby stream. Sometimes, she recalled, as many as a dozen people would show up for the Sunday supper.

When playing hide and seek with her siblings, she often hid under the stairs that led up to the second floor where she and her sisters slept together in one room. The boys, who were much younger than most of the girls, slept in another of the four upstairs rooms. The toilet was an outhouse that stood behind the house and close to the chicken house. Those were chilly trips, my aunt said, on frosty cold winter mornings.

The seven kids (my youngest aunt wasn’t yet born) all had chores assigned to them. My mother’s was to clean the etched glass window in the big wooden front door.  That door was saved when the house was torn down and later given to my parents by my mother’s aunt. They stored it for years. When they passed away, the door, with its original paint flaking and crumbling but otherwise still intact, came to me.

Uncle Norman was undoubtedly too little to remember much about living in the farmhouse. He was the younger of the two brothers and was only five when they started to build the log house after the grandparents died after their father lost the house in a

Aunts Hazel and Lavetta with Uncle Norman at the log cabin that served as the family home.

questionable alteration of the will by a couple of shady husbands of their aunts.  They constructed the new cabin in a wooded clearing not far from the original house.  The kids all had to pitch in to help build it. Five-year-old Norman’s job, according to my cousin,was to ride the horse that pulled the logs that had been cut for the walls over to the house. The log house was not nearly as grand as the original farmhouse but it served as their home for several years until finally my grandparents divorced and my grandmother moved, with the children who had not yet left home, into a two-story house in the nearby town. 

My uncle wasn’t yet 17 when he signed up for the Navy.

Norman, who had nearly burned down the schoolhouse when he dropped a lighted match between the floorboards, had already left home by that time. It’s not exactly clear to me whether this incident was truly an accident as when I asked him about it a couple years ago, I didn’t exactly receive a straight answer. But the possible consequences frightened him so at age 15 that he set off on his own maybe living some of the time with his father.  He eventually wound up in Wichita,KS. and got a job at the Boeing plane factory where two of his older sisters were already working to build the B-29s for war effort. At 17, he fudged his age and signed up for the U.S. Navy where he served a distinguished lifelong career.

In 1995, my mother’s siblings gathered at the Spring River Cemetery to install a new headstone for the grandparents designed by aunt to honor their Swedish heritage. After the graveside ceremony, someone suggested visiting where the family’s farmhouse once stood, just up the road.  We caravaned by car a short distance on the dusty, gravel road a  until we arrived at an empty field opposite a Tyson chicken farm. 

This was the first time I had visited the farmhouse site although I had been many times to that of the log house. The Lonberg ‘kids’ hopped out of their cars and walked over to the grassy drive that once led up to the house. There still stood the fence post and behind it the big walnut tree that my aunt had recalled.

My mother stands to the entrance of the drive that led to the family farmhouse.

Aunt Hazel led the group around the property and located where the cistern had once been as well as the cellar where they had stored vegetables grown in the garden.  She pointed to where the stream had flowed and where the chicken house had stood. And to where their brother Austin, had naughtily chopped off a piece of my Aunt Lavetta’s finger with the axe he used for cutting firewood. (Their mother managed to save it with a homemade remedy and surgery.) Together, they strolled through the field sharing what few memories they had, asking questions of the older sisters who remembered more of the time spent growing up there.

I regret now that I didn’t record those reminisces although I did video the cemetery ceremony. With my uncle’s passing there is no longer anyone who can retell those stories firsthand. I admire the Native Americans’ tradition of passing their history orally from one generation to the next as it’s the only way that much of what we know and learn survives.  But I am grateful to have been a witness to this memorable day at the farmhouse and to have received a few of the memories from those who lived them. I hope for those of you who still have your older generation that you’ll collect and preserve your own family’s memories and store them safely away so that you to can one day share them with others.

My mother’s siblings gathered at the cemetery to honor their grandparents heritage. Only the oldest sister, who had died years earlier but is also buried there, was missing.

 

Memories Haunt My Halloween This Year

One of the things I look forward to each autumn is Halloween. The holiday brings back many fond memories for me. From trick or treating around my neighbor as a kid, to coming up with solutions to sewing costumes for my young sons; to hosting costume parties where everyone actually wore costumes; to taking photos of the kids in their outfits at the school’s Harvest Festival; to parading across my hometown’s Municipal Building stage in my own Halloween get-up then posing in the studio with it for my Dad; to tromping endlessly through pumpkin patches to find the perfect one; to carving masterpiece jack-o-lanterns on the kitchen table; to performing the “Thriller” dance for the thousands who gathered to watch it at the park; to taking in the clever costumes of the local college students as they promenade downtown.

This year, with the pandemic still raging and scary enough, Halloween is likely to look a lot different.

The scene that greets trick or treaters to my home on Halloween night.

I debated whether to bother decorating as I usually do. Without trick or treaters or others coming to the door that night, would be worth the effort to set up my front yard cemetery or hang the bloody ‘Welcome’ sign by the door? I’ve decided it is.  I am erecting tombstones, laying out skeleton bones and putting up warning signs leading to my front door. I don’t expect, nor am I encouraging, youngsters to ring my bell.  Instead, I’ll set out my big black witches caldron at the end of my walk, fill it with candy and invite everyone, all day long, to help themselves to a Halloween treat.

The truth is our block rarely gets trick or treaters even without COVID.  My block is dark, houses are spread apart and it takes longer for the kids to cover the ground. They tend to flock instead just down the hill where houses are huddled closer together and the little witches, goblins and ghouls can quickly fill their bags or buckets with lots of tasty goodies.

One of the scariest costumes my son and his friends came up with that of the tax collectors, seen here on the right in a photo before heading out for trick or treating with their other costumed friends.

That wasn’t always the case. During the years when my three sons were growing up and going out on their own to haunt the neighborhood, the pack always ended up at our house where I had brownies and cider or something similar for them to snack on while they counted and traded the evening’s loot.

The middle school and high school years were especially creative ones. Costumes became more elaborate, clever and silly.  My middle son, for whom Halloween was the highlight of his year, alternated his costume to either his hockey or band uniform when he reached high school just so he could continue to trick or treat. My older son often went for the political statement, one year dressing up as one of the scariest costumes ever, an IRS agent complete with fedora and briefcase.  My youngest son somehow always managed to come up with the most challenging of costumes to execute going one year as a pumpkin. We stuffed it with balloons to give him the plumped up pumpkin look.

The girls arrive for the party after a night of trick or treating.

Once the girls started to join in we began to see red riding Hoods, and Dorothys, gypsies and fortune tellers show up for the evening party. But one of the most memorable years was the the year that two of my son’s friends from his hockey team arrived together as a street lamp and a fire hydrant.

While the pandemic may keep most trick or treaters off the streets and out of the neighborhoods this year there may be new ways to celebrate, from virtual costume parties to pumpkin carving at home. I’ll be haunted by the memories of Halloween past. Maybe next year we can all start making new ones to add to the collection.

The zombies take over the street to perform their ghoulish “Thriller” dance in downtown Bellingham.

Getting High Hiking Ptarmigan Ridge

Artist Point at Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest opened late this year.  In the second week of August the parking lot at this popular destination was still covered in snow.  Word was that the Park Service had no plans to plow it and with the cooler summer that’s occurred in the area this year, it wasn’t likely that it would melt on its own. Even the bathrooms there were in accessible as snow was up to the eaves.

Just two weeks before my Ptarmigan Ridge hike the snow at Artist Point was up to the eaves of the restroom building.

Two weeks later, Artist Point was open to visitors. The parking lot snow was gone although some still remained on the periphery and people seized the chance to visit to take in one of the most spectacular views of Mount Baker and Mount Shuksan and the other more distant peaks of the North Cascades.  This location is also the starting point for several trails that lead off

into the National Forest and the Mount Baker Wilderness area. Just two weeks before the point opened, I had taken a hike to Chain Lakes starting from the north that required you to go up and over the 1,100 elevation to Hermann Saddle before dropping down 500 feet to the lakes.  It’s a strenuous climb with lots of switchbacks and loose rock and isn’t my preferred way to reach Chain Lakes. But with Artist Point still closed, it was the only option.  My hiking buddy and I finished the hike by coming out at Artist Point which is when we discovered the snow-covered parking lot.

Upon learning that Artist Point had opened, we planned another hike to take advantage of the accessibility which could close again as early as October if snow began to fall. My friend, Barbara, is relatively new to the area and was anxious to take as many trails as she could before weather put an end to the hiking season.  I suggested the Ptarmigan Ridge trail which starts at the end of the Artist Point parking lot and heads 4.5 miles to Coleman Pinnacle.  It’s a popular trail because the trail is well-maintained, the elevation gain is gradual, the views are rewarding early on the trail and it’s a more moderate hike in difficulty than some of the others at the mountain.

I have hiked Ptarmigan Ridge many times but have never gone the entire length, mostly because at some points the trail can be covered in snow and ice, even in August, requiring the use of an ice axe, a tool and skill that I lack. Even on the return out of Chain Lakes two weeks before Artist Point opened, Barbara and I ran into two young women geologists who were on their way out after a day’s research and both were carrying ice axes and snow clamps for their shoes.  When asked they reported that they had encountered snow and had to use their equipment.

If we were going to hike that trail, as I told Barbara, we’d better do it now. The parking lot was full when we arrived to set out late one morning during the week. Everyone else apparently had the same idea we did.  No doubt the pandemic and our short summers drew everyone out to soak up the sunshine, fresh air and chance to be in nature.

It’s always a good idea to sign in at the trail head.

We signed in at the trail head, always a good precaution, and headed off.  This first portion of the trail skirts along the bottom of Table Mountain and is open to panoramic views of the meadows and mountains to the south. If you look carefully, you can see Baker Lake tucked in the distance. Sometimes, usually later in the day, you might spot mountain goats frolicking in the meadow far below.  The wildflowers that covered the slopes along this trail had peaked. We caught them two weeks earlier. Nearly all that was left was the bright blue spikes of the lupine which still made for gorgeous color.

The blue spikes of the lupine.

At a favorite cluster of trees, we stopped to take a couple of photos and to oblige another hiker with his friendly by taking a photo of him there too. He had spent the night in the Artist Point parking lot he said. “I’ve seen the Milky Way before,” he told us, “but not like this. It was incredible.”

Leaving the spot, we met another hiker and his dog coming up behind us, a tall, lanky man with a tripod and camera over one shoulder.  I asked about his camera gear and then learned that he had recently moved to the area from California. I gathered he had retired and now was devoting time to photography.  He followed along behind us for a while before stopping to set up to capture the scene. Before we moved on, I told him about Chain Lakes and mentioned that it offered great photo opportunities too.

Moving on, we continued to meet people coming out from their earlier hike, past the fork where you drop down to Chain Lakes and on towards Mount Baker. About two hours in, we stopped off the trail for lunch where a nice flat rock made for a good picnic table; a mountain stream serenaded us with its tumbling water from the snow melt and where we had a big broad view of the mountain.  We pulled out our lunch to eat. Food always tastes better outside on the mountain. As we enjoyed our meal, several other hikers passed by.

Our lunch spot was beside a mountain stream with a sweeping valley view.

One couple, we learned, was visiting from a town not far from Oregon’s Mount Hood.  They looked more dressed for a casual walk than a hike on a rugged mountain trail. He carried a small backpack with snacks and water and a Nikon camera slung around his neck with which he was snapping photos of the wildflowers.  “These North Cascades are really spectacular,” he declared.  I pointed out to him that Oregon is full of gorgeous scenery too, especially with its abundance of waterfalls. He agreed but thought the views here topped those.  They ambled on further across the next big ridge and disappeared around the corner where we would later meet them at another higher meadow.  I mused at the woman’s ability to traverse the trail in her low cut walking shoes. I myself wore hiking boots that offered some support around my ankles. Last thing I wanted was to injure myself on the mountain during this pandemic.

The last of the wildflowers were still in bloom when we hiked the trail.

A carpet of wildflowers with the rocky Mount Shuksan beyond was a picturesque place to rest 3.5 miles in on our hike.

Lunch over, we continued on.  From this point, it was new territory to me. I had never been able to cross this broad ridge because of snow. Even now, a skier who we had seen earlier toting his skis, poles and shoes, was practicing short runs down a far snow-covered slope. Once we got past a rocky stretch, the trail made an easier, gradual climb up to a point covered in wildflowers and small clearings left behind by campers. It was an ideal place to rest and enjoy the surrounding breathtaking beauty.  It was the furthest I had gone on the trail to date and well worth the effort.  The quiet, the color, the sun, the gentle breeze, the expansive vistas of meadows, mountains and sky was a perfect antidote to the daily stress and troubles we had left behind in the parking lot. Here you could breathe and listen to the soothing sounds of the wilderness.

Two more hikers, men in their mid-30s, arrived on their way to Camp Kiser where they planned to overnight. It lay just a little more than a mile ahead, they said.  One of the two had been there several times and agreed that this year, the trail had opened later than usual.

The lupine sweeps like a river on the slope with Mount Shuksan rising in the background.

Barbara was eager to go further and pointed out we might not have a chance to return this season. So we picked up and walked on. As the trail grew narrower, more narrow than elsewhere so far, along a steep drop off, I decided I had enough and said I’d meet her back at the clearing if she wanted to go on.  I sat on the trail’s edge before turning back and was treated to a beautiful view of blue lupines as blue as the sky above Mount Shuksan.  As I sat reflecting, I heard the distinct squeak of a marmot. The pika is a small rabbit-like mammal that makes it home high in these mountains. I listened carefully and tried to figure out where it might be. I scanned a rocky outcropping just beyond me and spotted small movement. I pulled up my camera, pushed out the telephoto lens and focused in on the object. There it was. And there we were, just me and the little pika sharing a moment on a mountain. How could it get any better?

This little pika made an appearance for just a moment before disappearing again in the rocks. It kept its back to me so wasn’t able to capture a great image of it but was just thrilled to even spot it.

A few minutes later, Barbara returned having gone as far as she dared alone and we began our trek back to the parking lot.  Once again we encountered the same two young women geologists as before making their way out after a day’s work. They moved nimbly over the trail leaving us behind.

Two hours later we were back in the parking lot, shedding our shoes and dipping our feet into a nearby invigorating stream before hopping into the car and starting the drive down.  The day had provided a much-needed respite from the perils the pandemic has produced.  I am grateful to live in a place where such natural beauty is a reminder that the world truly is wonderful if we simply take the time to detach ourselves from life’s problems and demands long enough to experience it.

Kayaking Restores the Soul during COVID

Summers are short but glorious in the Pacific Northwest. I learned not long after I moved  there to take as much advantage of them as I could.  That’s been especially true this summer with the COVID pandemic limiting socializing and nearly everything else. Finding ways to keep active and eliminate the stress that it has created has been a challenge.

Typically, I swim twice a week (sometimes three) for exercise and have done so for years. But with the pool no longer open, that is not an option unless I plunge into one of the local lakes which is chilly water even in the summer.

Kayaking was an activity I took up after moving to the Pacific Northwest and has become one of my favorite activities.

Fortunately, I’m also a kayaker. Maintaining ‘social distancing’ is no problem when you paddle if you’re in a single boat.  And being on the water, away from cell phones, computers, televisions and practically every other form of electronic device, brings much needed relief and respite from the incessant, daily updates about the virus and its devastation.  It’s one of the best ways I’ve found to restore my soul.

Chuckanut Bay is one of my favorite spots to paddle in the summers. Friends who live there allow me to keep my two boats on their beach during the summer so it’s easy to hop  in and go out if tide and wind conditions are good.  My sons and their kids literally grew up on that beach in the summers.   My sons still like to paddle out whenever they can and  are in town.

I have several paddling partners who join me, including Jennifer, here in my Necky boat, who spotted some otter playing in the rocks of Chuckanut Island.

Initially, we bought two recreational boats years ago when the boys were young because they were so stable, safe and good for people who had never paddled or kids.  But those were sold and now I own Necky Looksha IVs, really good sea kayaks that the company unfortunately doesn’t manufacture any more. Even though they are made of plastic, which makes them a little heavier than the fiberglass models, they track well, are relatively stable, quick in the water and comfortable. It’s likely that one of my sons will take them if I ever decide to part with them but for now they go to the beach in the summer for me and whoever goes out with me to enjoy.  For safety reasons, I never ever paddle by myself.

In all the years that I’ve been paddling here, I never tire of Chuckanut Bay.  The water there tends to be a little warmer than in Bellingham Bay, it’s a little more sheltered from the winds and there are plenty of different places to go.  Some evenings I set out towards the north to the little cove by Clark’s Point where you see fascinating formations the wind carved into the sandstone shoreline. Some locals will tell you these are fossils from the Ecocene period but they are not, according to retired Western Washington University geology professor George Mustoe although such fossils do exist elsewhere in the area.

Locals like to think this ‘concretion’ is a fossilized palm tree from the Ecocene period but geologists say it’s ‘stricktly an inorganic structure.”

On other evenings, I paddle down the coastline to Teddy Bear Cove a popular spot for sunbathers during the summer. Or head south to the next cove over which leads out to Governor’s Point. This cove is much deeper and well protected and is where the tall sailing ships once anchored to winter over. Often my paddling usually takes straight west towards Chuckanut Island.  The island rises right out of the water with sheer cliffs of Chuckanut sandstone on the east and thickly wooded shoreline around the west and north.  On the south side, the island connects to another big rock where you may find seals sunning themselves.  Even at high tide it’s fairly shallow between the two so you must pay attention as you slide your boat between them.

The big rock that rises beside Chuckanut Island is a favorite place for seals to sun. This mama and her baby were doing just that one recent evening.

Chuckanut Island itself is now a bird preserve where birds nest in the beautiful, sculptured cliffs of  Chuckanut sandstone or in the towering trees that grow top. You can beach your boat, walk and even picnic there (on the little coves) but you can’t overnight or leave anything. And you need to keep a mindful eye on the tide because if it changes to high tide when you’re on the island you could lose your boat or find yourself unable to get onto the beach when you return.

Oyster Catchers make their home on the island but on this evening I found them looking for food on my friends’ beach.

A family of Oyster catchers usually make their summer home on the south side of the island.  (See my blog July 14, 2007 Oyster Catchers Catch My Eye) They’re distinctive looking black birds with bright orange beaks and skinny legs and an orange ring around their eyes. My paddle buddy and I were looking for them last week when we were circling the island and were a bit disappointed when we didn’t see them only to find them back on my friends’ beach when we put in at sunset.

The red-barked Madronna trees hug the island’s cliffs and are spectacular in the sunset light.

One of the tree species growing on the island are Madronnas.  I never knew Madronnas grew anywhere other than California’s Carmel coast until I discovered them here. Some of the island’s Madronnas have become diseased and are dying but the red bark that peels back on the healthy trees is especially beautiful and deep in the sunset light.

Summer sunsets at Chuckanut Bay are often quite spectacular too.  It’s a great place to end an evening of paddling by watching the sun slowly sink behind that little dot of island in the bay.  No matter that I’ve seen it many times,  sitting quietly on the shore taking in the beauty of the surroundings and the last light of the day never ceases to leave me thinking how fortunate I am to live near such a scenic location where it’s possible to get outdoors and get on the water and escape the trials of the day.  It’s one of the pleasures that has sustained me this summer as social distancing continues to be  necessary to keep everyone safe and well.  Once the virus subsides, if it ever does, I’ll continue to enjoy my summer evening paddles as long as I’m physically able which I hope will be for a long time to come.

What better way to end an evening paddle than by enjoying the last light of summer sunset over Chuckanut Bay.

Protests Call Up Memories, New Discoveries

I, like a lot of Americans, have been thinking, reading, listening and reflecting on the demonstrations taking place in this country (and around the world) these past two weeks.  It’s been a good time to take stock about the problems of racism that still exist in this country, 155 years after the last slaves were emancipated on June 19, 1865 and 56 and 52 years after the President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1968.

The protests, fueled by the death of George Floyd, have given rise to concerns  that many may have thought had been resolved.  The protesters, who risk their lives in the middle of a deadly pandemic, have brought widespread recognition to the fact that discrimination, inequality and profiling are still rife in the United States.

The announcement of the President’s upcoming visit to Tulsa, OK. for a political rally brought up that city’s terrible history when, in 1921, hundreds of black citizens were literally massacred.  I’m ashamed, and a little shocked, to say that I grew up just 90 miles north across the state lines in Kansas and never knew anything about that tragic event during all the time that I lived there.

Likewise, I learned something else new earlier this week from my friend, Virginia, a friend who I’ve known since grade school.  Years later, Virginia and I frequently got together whenever the two of us were back in our hometowns at the same time.  She, like me, had moved away but returned occasionally to visit our respective families who still lived in town.  We’d have long talks about all sorts of things but often our conversation drifted towards politics, family and childhood memories.

On one such visit, I recall Virginia telling me about a section of town referred to by a derogatory nickname because it was the ‘Black neighborhood’.  It was the first time I had heard of it but Virginia assured me it was commonly used when we were both kids. (My memory fails to accurately remember the exact name so I’m excluding what I think it was, but if anyone reading this blog knows, please tell me and I’ll make the correction.)

My second grade classmates stopped one recess so I could take a photo. My friend Virginia is second from the left.

Virginia has since moved back to a neighboring community and earlier this week was on her way to participate in one of the Black Lives Matter protests being held in my hometown. That was when I learned from her, indirectly, that my kindergarten class of 1958 at McKinley School was the first integrated kindergarten in town.  I had no idea.

In fact, I remember little about kindergarten except for my teacher’s name, a few of my classmates (including Virginia), the fact that I was in the morning kindergarten and that one of the little boys in my class, Jeff, had to stay after school one day for crawling up during story time to give me a kiss on the cheek.

But Virginia remembers well that she was one of the first Black kindergarteners to attend McKinley School.  As she says, she and the other Black children had never heard of McKinley and were scared to death because they didn’t know what they would find there.  Previously, all the Black children, went to Douglass School which taught students from elementary age through junior high school. The school was eventually closed when enrollment declined as more Black parents chose to have their students attend the White junior high school, according to historian Jean Patterson who wrote “The Final Days of Douglass School” chapter in the book “Breakthroughs in the Sociology of Education.”

Until 1958, Black children in my hometown attended the Douglass School. This is one of the few, if only, photographs that may exist of that building.

As Patterson reported:  “To this day, many (White) townspeople believe the school board was being progressive in acting to desegregate the Parsons schools before the U.S. Supreme Court made its final ruling. However, many Black citizens of Parsons tell a different story. Although leaders in the Black community at the time favored integrating the schools, they were concerned about what would happen to their teachers. Their
worst fears came to pass when all but two Douglass teachers were either terminated
or forced into retirement. Most White teachers were not prepared to teach Black
students, nor did they welcome these students in their classrooms. In what many
Black citizens believe was one final act of hostility on the part of the superintendent,
Douglass School was bulldozed over with everything in it; nothing was salvaged
as trophies, photographs, books, and other artifacts were destroyed along with the
building. What remains of the school are the memories of the alumni and the pictures
and artifacts they kept over the years.”

Indeed, years later, when a local organization commissioned a company to include the school in its miniature historical building series, it had trouble finding any existing photos of the school.   Local news reports say that the organization had to resort to drawings and sketches made by former students.

How differently history is perceived when the facts are either erased, ignored, forgotten or simply not known.  As in my own case, I never knew that my Black friends, friends I kept all through my school years and continue to have to this day, were the first to be integrated in my elementary school.  How could I not know this?  I guess, like so many, other things, it simply wasn’t discussed. Or, if it was, I was too young or too sheltered, to know.  Clearly, my friend Virginia and I’m sure others like her, were very aware and, like her, were frightened of being the first to break the color barrier in my small town.

Looking back, I imagine there were many other ‘firsts’ to which I was woefully unaware. The first Black cheerleader in our high school may also have been a member of my class, for instance.

Protesters on the streets today are strongly reminding us that this country has not ‘fixed’ the problems related to racism despite the gains made in the 1960s.  The protests are shaking us back into reality and out of the complacency that had settled over this country. Maybe this time, the change needed will happen.

Honoring a Mother, a Nurse, and Life Devoted to Caregiving

Mother-in-Law Day (yes, there is such a thing) doesn’t come until October 25 this year but I’m not waiting until then to tell you about my own mother-in-law.  On this Mother’s Day so many are separated from their mothers due to the COVID-19 pandemic or can not be with their children because they are caring for the critically ill in hospitals and nursing homes across the world.  My own mother passed away nearly eight years ago (still hard to believe) and my mother-in-law died only within a year of my family moving to Bellingham, nearly 24 years ago.  That too is hard to believe some times.

My mother-in-law’s nursing school’s graduation portrait.

I’ve been thinking about my mother-in-law a lot recently since the COVID-19 crises brought to the forefront the important contribution, and seldom recognized, work and sacrifice, that healthcare professionals, nurses in particular make to our society.  I have long had the utmost respect for nurses.

As a journalist who covered medicine for part of my career for TIME and others, nurses were some of my most trusted, reliable and valuable sources when reporting on medical events or issues.  I developed a relationship with many to whom I could turn when I needed a recommendation, not only for personal medical care, but for experts to quote, insider info and verifications on stories.

One of the few photos of Elaine on duty as a nurse in World War II, taken, no doubt while on her way to a patient’s room.

I suspect this was due, in part, to Elaine, my mother-in-law, who was a career nurse.  Elaine began her nursing career in the most dramatic way, graduating from nursing school at Kansas State University and enlisting immediately in the Women’s Army Corps as a nurse.  Not long after, she was shipped overseas (on the very same ship as my Dad, see my post: Saluting a Veteran…) to serve in a field hospital for the Fifth Army during World War II.

Imagine what it was for a young woman still in her early 20s, fresh out of nursing school and never out of Kansas (as far as I know) to be suddenly thrown into a situation caring for and attending severely wounded and dying soldiers, most of them no older than herself.  I suspect that many of the nurses on the front lines in our hospitals today, caring for COVID patients, are facing some of the same challenges, stresses and strains.

Most of the photos from Elaine’s war years are with her nursing friends, shown here in helmets and uniform, the PPE of their time.

We have photographs that Elaine took during her service overseas, but with the exception of one, none were taken of the hospitals or her patients.  Instead, she focused on her nursing friends, the local children and the places where she was stationed.  These were the visual memories she brought home with her after the War ended.  I am sure the mental memories stuck with her until her passing nearly 50 years later.  The only time I ever heard her talk about her wartime memories, was on a few occasions when she and my father sat down together.  And even then, their conversations were tinted with the happier times of those life-changing years.  I think about that because I am sure that all of the nurses tending today’s COVID patients, will carry with them the faces and cases of their patients for long time after the virus subsides and many, I am sure, will suffer post-traumatic stress syndrome.

That’s why, last Wednesday, May 6, National Nurses Day, was such a significant day this year and why, when International Nurses Day comes up this week on May 12, people need to remember these incredibly dedicated people and honor them.

As a grandmother, Elaine took special care of her three grandsons, shown here still being a nurse giving medicine to her grandson, Marshall.

Elaine spent her entire life as a caregiver, returning after the War to a career as a nurse in the Veteran’s Administration hospitals in Phoenix and Prescott, Az., as a single-mother who worked the graveyard shifts so she could be home in the early a.m. to send her only son off to school and see him again after and early evening before heading off for her job, as a daughter who took in and cared for her own mother in her last years, and finally as a grandmother who looked after my own three young sons on days when I worked.

I consider myself fortunate to have had her in my life, regret that she didn’t live longer to see my own sons grow up and to share their triumphs and tribulations along with us.  I have no doubt, had she lived long enough (she would have been 100 this year) she would have been right beside all those dedicated nurses laboring daily at great risk to themselves, in the hospitals now, if only in spirit.

One of my personal favorite photographs of Elaine and my husband, taken at a surprise birthday party for me. You can see how much she beams with pride for her only son.

Mardi Gras Indian Chief Preserved Tribal Traditions

COVID-19 claimed another cultural figure this past week when Ronald Lewis of New Orleans died.  Lewis was respected locally in the city as a member of the legendary Mardi Gras Indians and for his efforts to preserve and pass on the traditions and history of its culture.  The Mardi Gras Indians are by far one of the most colorful ‘krewes’ of Mardi Gras, not only in its costumes but in its heritage.

The Mardi Gras Indians pass their traditions from one generation to another with even the littlest members taking part in the parades and costumes. It was a rare treat to see these two Indians in their full regalia.

Their traditions date back to the 1800s when Native American tribes living in the area helped to shield and protect runaway slaves.  The Mardi Gras Indians honor the friendship and bonds that were formed during that time in modern day Mardi Gras parades. Today, there are more than 40 Mardi Gras Indian tribes that includes the Wild Magnolias, the Yellow Pocahontas and the Choctaw Hunters of which Lewis was once Council Chief.

During the performance, the Chief stopped to tell the crowd about the Mardi Gras Indian tradition in New Orleans. The elaborate costumes, or suits, take hundreds of hours to construct and are dazzling to see up close.

I’ve never had the chance to see the Indians parade, as their parades usually occur after my annual visit to New Orleans during the Carnival season.  But a couple years ago, I was lucky enough to catch members of one of the tribes perform one afternoon at the little outdoor stage in a section of he French Quarter down by the Mississippi River in what is known as Dutch Alley.  The area is filled with tourists who wander in the Artist Co-op, stroll through the Mask Market (see blog post Reveling and Revealing at the Mardi Gras Mask Market, Feb. 2016. ) held here the weekend before the big Mardi Gras parades or visit the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park’s Visitor Center where you hear a jazz session, read about the history of the genre and pick up a recording or two of some of the local musicians.  The Visitor Center is a stop that I recommend everyone make when they are in the city.

The tribal members performing the day I saw them wore their beautiful feathered and beaded costumes.  I had seen many lustrous prints made by photographer Christopher Porche West of Indian members in their costumes displayed on the walls of the Snug Harbor jazz club.  But never had I seen one in person until this one day.

The patches of the Mardi Gras Indians are intricate pieces of beaded artwork designed to tell a story on the the costume.

Each tribal member creates and sews their own costume or ‘suit’ as they are known.  The beading is intricate and detailed and takes hundreds of painstaking hours to finish.  The colors are vibrant and shine in the New Orleans sunlight.  The feathers are carefully placed one by one and when worn sweep with the wearer’s motions.  On the costumes are ‘design patches’ that are first sketched on a canvas before decorated with beads and sequins. Each patch tells a story and matches the overall design and color of the costume. These costumes truly are artistic creations and can cost thousands of dollars in materials.  Sadly, the suits are worn for only one season, then are broken down and reassembled into a new costume for the next year.

Lewis recognized the importance and value of this tradition and the mastery of the skills needed to create each of these suits.  He created in his backyard The House of Dance and Feathers to preserve and educate others about the culture surrounding these unique organizations.  His collection of masks, suits, figures, and other related artifacts have been on display  there since 2003.  It has been open to the public by appointment but, as the website notes: “We’re pretty flexible and we’d love to see you down in the Lower Ninth Ward. Just give us a call and we’ll make an arrangement for you to come and visit.”

Whether or not Lewis’ family will continue to maintain The House of Dance and Feathers is not certain. If they do, I plan to pay a visit next time I’m in town.  I only wish that I had known about it while Lewis was still living and would be there to share the stories he told. One thing that is certain is Lewis’ contribution and efforts to bring attention to the extraordinary culture of the Mardi Gras Indians will not be forgotten just as the African American descendants of those runaway slaves have not forgotten the role Native Americans played in sheltering their ancestors two hundred years ago.

The celebratory spirit of the Mardi Gras Indian is obvious. The ornate headdress is an art piece unto itself.

Jazz Legend Leaves Legacy for Music’s Next Generations

The music world lost one of the jazz greats this past week when pianist Ellis Marsalis died in New Orleans at 85 as the result of complications from COVID-19. Marsalis was no less than a giant in the jazz world, having taught and mentored thousands of young musicians privately and through the University of New Orleans’ jazz program, a program he founded. He fathered four musician sons, Wynton, Branford, Delfeayo and Jason, who are themselves outstanding and well-known jazz players.

Every Friday night for years, Marsalis sat down at the baby grand on stage at Snug Harbor, the legendary jazz club on Frenchman Street in New Orleans to play for the audiences who gathered at 8 and 10 p.m. to hear him. I was lucky enough to be among them a couple of times. Marsalis was not showy at the keyboard. The times I heard him play his styling was more like that of Duke Ellington, classy, elegant and sophisticated. “Mr. Marsalis’s interpretations were impressive in their economy and steadiness,” New York Times critic Stephen Holden wrote. “Sticking mainly to the middle register of the keyboard, the pianist offered richly harmonized arrangements in which fancy keyboard work was kept to a minimum and studious melodic invention, rather than pronounced bass patterns, determined the structures and tempos.”

Jazz pianist Ellis Marsalis performing at Snug Harbor in New Orleans.

I count the times I heard him play at Snug among the best concerts that I’ve ever attended. Upon occasion, his celebrated sons would join him for a song or two. Both Branford and Delfeayo sat in with him once when I was in the audience. I caught Jason’s show on another evening at Snug. And once, Wynton and his Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra performed at the Mount Baker Theatre here in Bellingham, WA. So I managed to hear all of them, who were named in 2011 named Marsalis and his musician sons Jazz Masters by the National Endowment for the Arts. It is regarded as American jazz music’s highest honor and until then had only been awarded on an individual basis.

Marsalis was dedicated to educating young musicians, a legacy that he passed on to his sons. I witnessed this first hand the year that Wynton came to Bellingham. After the concert, Wynton and a few musicians from his band, walked down the street to jam in the bar of a local Mexican restaurant where another musician, Chuck Israels, who they knew was playing. Naturally, a crowd quickly filled the place. I phoned my high-school age son, Marshall, who, inspired by the concert, had gone home to with his musician friends to jam. “You need to come down here,” I told him that Wynton and group were playing in the restaurant bar.

Th

My son’s high school funk bank plays a parking lot gig in Bellingham. Wynton Marsalis took time from jamming one night to talk to them about their music.

e boys hustled back downtown but, because they were not of legal age, they had to stand on the sidewalk outside to listen. Someone from the crowd inside, who knew about my son’s band, told Wynton that they were outside. Upon hearing this, Wynton stepped away from the little stage, went outdoors to talk to the boys and invited them to come inside where they were told to stand and listen.

Years later, Marshall, a drummer, was in New Orleans with my husband and I. Together, we made our annual pilgrimage to Snug Harbor, to catch Charmaine Neville who performs her high energy show on Mondays and also Stanton Moore (probably the best drummer in the world, according to my son) who has the Tuesday night spot when he’s in town. Charmaine is considered a ‘grand dame’ of New Orleans jazz world. Like Marsalis, she fosters emerging jazz musicians and invites them to join her onstage for a song if she knows they are in the audience.

Charmaine and Cheryl after a performance at Snug Harbor in New Orleans.

I met Charmaine personally the first night Snug re-opened after Hurricane Katrina. There were only about a dozen of us in the audience. I’ve made sure to say ‘Hello’ to her before or after a show ever since. On this particular evening, I mentioned to her that my son, a drummer, had been with us.

“Where is he?” she demanded. I motioned to the street outside saying that he had already gone out the door. Charmaine marched out to where my three sons were standing with my husband and asked, “Which one is the drummer?” I pointed to Marshall.

“Come on back in,” she ordered. “I want you to play with me in the next set. Come on.” My son, who is shy for a drummer, followed her inside because it was clear that Charmaine was not going to take “No” for an answer.

My son, Marshall, on drums, sits in with Charmaine and her band during a set at Snug Harbor.

Midway through her second set, she asked Marshall to come and sit in. Her drummer passed over the sticks to my son and, as he settled in, she asked him to tell the audience where he was from, what the name of the band was and what they played. Then they started up. Marshall was clearly nervous at first but began to get into the music as they jammed. Afterwards, Charmaine gave him a hug and told him he could play with her anytime he was in town.

It’s that kind of nuturing spirit that both Marsalis and Charmaine were and are known for: the tradition of handing down from one generation to another the gift of music. With Marsalis’ passing this last week, that responsibility now falls to all of those who he trained and shared his remarkable talent and love for the music.

Wyton reported in a Facebook post, that his father said to his son Wyton just a few days before he died when his son cautioned him about COVID-19: “Man, I don’t determine the time. A lot of people are losing loved ones. Yours will be no more painful or significant than anybody else’s.” While his words are true enough, it can be said that his passing leaves a very empty spot at the piano at Snug Harbor.

Saluting a Veteran Who Served Her Country and Cared for Its Soldiers

When most people think of Veteran’s Day, they think of those in our military who fought in our armed services.  Since becoming a national holiday in 1938, Americans have honored those who served in the military, particularly those who are still living.

I have written previously about my Dad’s service in the U.S. Army during World War II as well as that of my other uncles who also fought in that War.  But I’ve barely touched on another who’s service was equally as important and heroic, that of my mother-in-law.  I thought this year, I’d salute her.

Looking every bit fresh off the farm, Elaine was only in her early 20s when she signed up to go overseas with the Army Nursing Corps during World War II.

Elaine signed up after graduating from nursing school in Kansas.  She had grown up on a small farm in the western part of the state and as far as I know, hadn’t been that far from home except perhaps for a visit or two to family living in Topeka.  But upon finishing her nurse’s training, she joined others in her 36th General Hospital unit and the troops bound for Africa and the War aboard the U.S.S. Harry Lee, a converted banana freighter (thanks to my brother Brad for this detail).  Also on that very ship was my own father, was a 22-year-old farm boy from the opposite side of the state.  Their oceanic crossing was in the largest convoy ever to cross the Atlantic.

My mother-in-law and my father never met on that journey. In fact, they didn’t discover that they had  both served in the 5th Army until after my husband and I were married.  The two traded ‘war’ stories one afternoon while sitting at the kitchen table in my mother-in-law’s Arizona home.

The troops disembark from the ship.

As they talked, they were surprised to learn that not only had they shipped out together, but that they virtually followed one another throughout the Italian campaign.  Of course, my father’s chemical battalion was at the very front of fighting, laying down mortar shell cover so that the infantry could advance.  Elaine, on the other hand, was at the rear, in the field hospital, assisting in surgeries and tending those who had been injured in battle.  My father once told me he was certain that some of those from his ‘outfit’, who came down with malaria, had turned up in her hospital.

Like many veterans from World War II, Elaine didn’t talk about her war experiences, at least not when I was around. I regret that I didn’t ask her more about it before she died 22 years ago. I know that she was a Lieutenant in rank. All the women nurses were officers primarily so that the enlisted men couldn’t ‘fraternize’ with them.  As such, they had access to the ‘officers’ club and enjoyed other privileges that came with the rank.  Those small ‘perks’ were not many and offered little in exchange for the endless and tireless work that they did to try to save the lives of those who arrived daily from the front lines.

Her hospital unit trailed my own father’s route, starting in Africa, then up to Sicily, the southern coast of Italy to the interior until they finally liberated Rome.  She, like my Dad, was also in France for a while but never entered Germany as he did.  I wish now that I knew more.

My mother-in-law was one of the nurses for the 36th Division General Hospital during World War II. Don’t know the location of this photo.

I have learned a little from a file in the 36th General Hospital collection at the Walter P. Reuther Library at Wayne State University in Detroit, MI. “…After first being shipped to Algeria, the 36th was ordered to Caserta, Italy in October of 1943. Established in the rear of the Fifth Army, the hospital had an average daily census of 1,800 patients. In June of 1944 a Texas hospital unit was added to the 36th to make it a 2,000 bed facility. The
hospital followed the allied invasion forces north into France and was located successively at Aix-en-Province, Dijon, and Garches. The unit was deactivated at Baston in November of 1945. During its 3 1/2 years of service the 36th had treated over 45,000 sick and wounded and received two decorations.”

Unfortunately, my husband and I never heard stories from her about the War and I wasn’t quick enough to take notes the day she and my Dad were exchanging memories.

Elaine was invited by a friend from ‘back home’ to take a plane ride during her wartime tour.

I recall her telling about the time that a pilot whom she knew from Kansas, invited her for a ride in the plane to which he was assigned.  He was flying to pick up some supplies and asked Elaine, who had the day off or requested it, if she’d like to go along.  It was ‘loud,’ she said about her seat in the bombardier window of the aircraft.  The photo of her taken on that day shows her wearing big lace-up boots obviously too large for her feet, a military overcoat and gloves and a tentative smile.  Whether this picture was taken before or after the trip I don’t know.  Despite what must have been a cold, loud and probably bumpy flight, she said had had a good time.  I can imagine that any break from a day of hospital duty would have been welcome.

Her other photos show places where she visited or was stationed.  The cathedral at Rheims in France seems to have made a huge impression on this Catholic-raised young woman from the central U.S. as several photos are from her visit there. In southern Italy, she saw the isle of Capri which also enchanted her. Like so many of the soldiers and service personnel at that time, seeing places that one had only read about in books must have seemed like a  dream.  Sadly, the circumstances under which they found themselves made it much more like a nightmare.

Elaine, on the far left end, and others from her hospital unit at the cathedral in Rheims, France.

Upon returning to the States, Elaine stayed in nursing working for the hospitals of the Veteran’s Administration in Arizona until finally retiring.  I never ‘thanked’ her for her service and am sure that few did.  She was an excellent nurse, precise, kind, caring and thorough.  She was just the sort of person you’d want tending to your wounds.  No doubt  those war years left her with many memories that she preferred to forget.  She did what she felt she had to do for her country and those fighting for it. Her skills and knowledge were essential at a time when nurses were rarely respected or acknowledged. I am grateful for what she did.

This Veteran’s Day I want to posthumously recognize her, along with all the other nurses who like her served our country, for the sacrifices they made and hardships they endured, to provide medical care to the troops. Without them, far fewer would have returned home to be honored later on Veteran’s Day.

An ‘official photo’ of Elaine’s Army Nursing Corps in a Victory Parade. The location isn’t identified on her photo but an arrow indicates where Elaine is in the group.

 

Autumn Shows Off University Sculpture Garden

The crisp, clear autumn days of the Pacific Northwest draw you outdoors to garden, hike or just take a walk, as I did one recent Sunday.  I borrowed my neighbor’s dog, Tuppie, and together we strolled down the hill and onto the campus of Western Washington University (WWU).  WWU is a beautiful setting this time of year for a leisurely walk.  It’s a long campus that stretches across 220 acres and backs up against the 620-foot hill of Sehome Arboretum this time of year, the deciduous trees of the arboretum turn a golden yellow and are stunning against the deep color of the towering evergreens.

The campus is full of color too as the trees there, set against the red brick and brown stone buildings, are vibrant reds, oranges and yellows and shed their leaves to carpet the walkways through the commons.

“The Man Who Used to Hunt Cougars for Bounty” by Richard Beyer overlooks the commons at Western Washington University with the Old Main Administration building in the background.

I’m fortunate to live close to campus so that on weekends, when the campus is quiet and crowd free, I can take a relaxing walk through it.  The university is home to one of the finest college contemporary outdoor sculpture collections in the United States.  Founded in 1960, the collection has grown to include at least 37 public sculptures in large part due to funding from the state’s one percent for art program the National Endowment for the Arts and through the generosity of the Virginia Wright Fund.

Richard Serra’s massive iron sculpure Wright’s Triangle frames a golden tree on WWU’s campus.

Scattered throughout the campus are monumental works by such renown sculptors as Richard Serra, Mark di Suvero, Isamu Noguchi, Beverly Pepper, Nancy Holt and Tom Otterness. It’s amazing to be able to amble through at one’s leisure, stopping along the way to study and view these public art pieces.  Autumn is an especially wonderful time to admire and photograph them because the rich colors of the season seemed to bring out the weathered patinas of the works.

On this particular autumn day, I decided to photograph some of them even though I had only the camera on phone with which to do it. (Poor planning on my part.) Seeing them against the autumn palette of the campus trees and vegetation painted vivid images. Tuppie, my black and white canine companion on this day, was patient as I squatted, knelt down, backed up and moved in and out searching for the best angle that would convey what I was seeing.  Fortunately, she was happy enough to sniff out the surrounding territory as I was angling about.

One of the charming figures from Tom Otterness’ sculpture, “Feats of Strength,” found in Western Washington University’s outdor sculpture collection.

I have personal favorites in the collection:  Tom Otterness’ goonie-like figures of his “Feats of Strength,” Nancy Holt’s  beautiful Celtic-like brown stone “Stone Enclosure: Rock Rings,” Richard Serra’s massive iron wedges of his “Wright’s Triangle,” and Alice Aycock‘s archeological influenced “The Islands of the Rose Apple Tree Surrounded by the Oceans of the World for You, Oh My Darling.”  But the one I go back to time and again is unquestionably Noguchi’s “Skyviewing Sculpture” that’s prominently positioned in the northeastern corner of what is known as “Red Square” on campus.

Noguchi’s “Skyviewing Scultpure” is one of my favorite pieces in the WWU outdoor sculpture collection.

Red Square is an expansive red brick plaza surrounded on three sides by classroom buildings on three sides and the university’s library on one.  Near the center is a big circular pool with a fountain that sprays jets of water high overhead. Noguchi’s big iron block sculpture sits diagonally from the fountain.  It’s balanced on three corners with huge holes punched through its three upward-facing sides so that when standing beneath it your gaze is directed skyward. There’s something very hopeful to me about this sculpture because it raises you up, just by unconsciously forcing you to look upward.  I love standing inside, watching the clouds above shift and change.  And when you’re within the sculpture, it’s as if you’re observing everything outside of it unseen as people pass by.

“For Handel” by Mark di Suvero sits on the plaza in front of the university’s fine arts building.

The newest addition to the collection is a split boulder, polished on its two faces and dotted with subtle pastel dots that remind me of the colors I saw at Arizona’s Grand Canyon.  “Split Stone, Northwest,” by Sarah Sze was installed in May, 2019.  It sits on the grassy lawn with the university’s Old Main Administration building rising in the background. At one time, another sculpture, Donald Judd‘s “Untitled” stood near here but was removed five years ago to be restored after the welded seams that held together the structure’s steel slabs began to deteriorate. The sculpture has just recently been resited on campus, on the grassy area next to the university’s Flag Plaza at the south end of the campus. I have yet to see it in its new spot as this autumn walk took place before the piece was replaced.

The burning orange leaves of the tree as seen through Lloyd Hamrol’s “Log Ramps” looked to me like a campfire.

One hour after I had set out with Tuppie for a 30-minute dog walk, I was back home, refreshed by having taken the time to not only stop at some of the sculptures but to capture them in the morning autumn light and color.  Even though I have taken that same path many times over, today’s was like a new adventure.  It’s the impact that public art, like this university’s incredible collection, can have on a person.

Alice Aycock’s sculpture “The Islands of the Rose Apple Tree is Surrounded by the Oceans of the World for You, Oh My Darling” is tucked on the lawn beside the Science, Math and Technology Education building.

 

Church Celebrates 150 Years of Service to a Community

In 1857, there were just 13 log houses in the newly founded town of Fremont, Neb., located along the banks of the Elkhorn and Platt Rivers.  The Mormons had made the same place a stopover on their way from Missouri to Salt Lake City. Today, a plaque in Fremont’s Barnard Park commemorates where the Mormon pioneers once made camp.

By 1866, the Union Pacific Railroad had come to Fremont, soon to become a railway hub.  Three years later, a small group of people met together to organize a church, the First Baptist Church of Fremont. That church celebrated its 150th anniversary yesterday.  Two years ago, my brother Richard became its minister.

Fremont’s First Baptist Church is located on the edge of the downtown where it has stood since it was built in 1901.

He and his wife, Nola, moved to Fremont, a lively town of approximately 27,000.  My brother has settled into his new position, learning about the members of his new congregation and community.  Since its founding, the church has played an important role in Fremont,  such as aiding those who need help whose homes were damaged by the flood waters this spring.

The church sanctuary of the Fremont Baptist Church has a simple beauty .

I made a trip earlier this summer to visit my brother and his wife there and to see their new home and church. Their home is situated next door to the red brick church built in 1901.   The church is a Romanesque revival style architecture. Its solid exterior exemplifies the kind of church buildings that dot small Midwestern towns.  They were the center of  activity, where townsfolk gathered for social events as well as to attend services on Sunday.  They were places, and still are, where families of like faiths, beliefs and values congregated and came together to help one another through tough times as well as good. They were where lives were celebrated through baptisms, weddings and funerals.

The back door to the church is right around the corner from the front door of the church parsonage. One evening, I joined my sister-in-law when she invited to give me a tour of the church. I followed her through the church’s back door when she went to feed the baby chicks, waiting for her nightly arrival, that were peeping hungrily in their temporary cardboard box coop in the church’s youth classroom.  The chicks had been living and growing there since Easter and were soon to be relocated to the farm of one of the church members.

The evening light coming through the church windows cast a warmth over the rows of empty pews in the darkened sanctuary.

We headed up the back stairs into the church and passed into the sanctuary.  The sanctuary was empty, dim and quiet when we entered.  Strong, simple dark timber beams supported the steep pitched high ceiling.  From these beams hung long lantern-like lamps that beautifully lit the interior with a soft white light  when my sister-in-law switched them on.  Behind the altar and the the choir pews at the front of the aspe was a large blue stained glass window.  The blue glass of the arched window was deep and tranquil.  Lining either side of the sanctuary were golden crisscross leaded windows through which the evening light cast a warm glow over the rows of the dark wooden pews.  The mood was reverent and peaceful. It indeed felt like this place, at this moment truly offered sanctuary from the troubles of the outside world.

On Sundays, my brother takes his place at the pulpit to speak to his Sunday congregation. The services are projected on the screen behind him as well as recorded and posted on the church website and linked to its Facebook page where people can tune in and watch it later.

On Sunday, when I attended my brother’s church service, the sanctuary had come alive as people came in to find their seats in the pews in preparation for the 9:30 a.m. traditional service. (A more contemporary and casual worship takes place at 11 a.m. in church’s Family Center located adjacent to the main building.)  The church members greeted one another by name and welcomed me as they introduced themselves before the service started. It was a reminder that the church is not the building, as fine a structure as this one is,  but the people within. Like those first Fremont residents who had come together 150 years ago to start their church, the current members carry on their work to keep their church alive.

My brother talks with members of his congregation prior to his Sunday morning service.

My brother, as its pastor, now leads this group of faithful members to continue its outreach into the community and to serve its greater mission of providing a place where people can come together to freely worship and commune with one another.  Besides its regular services, the church provides assistance to the  families and staff of Fremont’s Washington Elementary School, where many children from the town’s Hispanic population attend school.  It provides birthday cupcakes at the LifeHouse homeless shelter. Two Alcoholics Anonymous groups meet at the church as does a woodworking hobby club.  During the downtown’s annual Halloween Hysteria, it served free hot dogs to hungry costumed characters and their parents last year.  At the town’s John C. Fremont Days in July, it set up to sell 50-cent hot dogs and soda to celebrants and offered crafts activities to the kids.  It also began a ‘Big Truck Day’ a couple years ago and invited local companies and utilities to park some of its over-sized trucks on the church parking lot where delighted youngsters and their parents could get a close-up look at these gigantic vehicles.

But its biggest role and challenge this past year was in orchestrating and providing local disaster relief efforts to the hundreds of people living in and around Fremont whose homes and belongings were damaged or destroyed when the rivers flooded caused the town to be cut off from outside help for several days.  When the water began to recede, the church still continued to deliver and distribute much-needed donated basic supplies, such as diapers, mops and cleaning products, food, socks and water to those most impacted by the crises.  Together with members from their community, they coordinated efforts to help the flood victims get back in their houses and back on their feet.

It’s a role that my brother sees as an important part of his church’s work and mission. “We can’t do a lot of stuff, ” he told a local newspaper reporter, “but we can help fill in the gaps here and there.

“We want to be known as a church that’s a blessing to its community,” he adds.  I’m sure the original founders of his church, 150 years ago, would have agreed.

 

 

 

Destination Moon Draws Visitors into Its Orbit

Anyone who was a kid or older in 1969 is likely to know exactly where they were when astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins made history with the first moon landing.  Most of the world was glued to a television set or, in some cases, a radio, to watch and listen that day as Armstrong and Aldrin became the first humans to set foot on the moon’s surface.

Like many Americans, I was fascinated by the “space exploration race.” The astronauts were national heroes who captured the imaginations and dreams of millions. I remember how excited I was to hear astronaut Gordon Cooper, who flew in the last Mercury mission, address the Professional Photographers of America at a convention in Chicago.  He was the size of my finger from my balcony seat but his presence filled the vast auditorium.

Taken with my Brownie camera, Mercury and Gemini astronaut Gordon Cooper speaks to photographers assembled at the Professional Photographers of America convention in Chicago. The image is grainy. My arrow indicates Cooper.

My brothers and I launched rocket after rocket into space from our Cape Canaveral set.  We transformed the shower stall in one of our bathrooms into a space capsule to simulate adventures to the stars.  The “astronaut” lay with their back on the shower floor, feet up against the shower wall and communicated via walkie-talkie radio to mission control located just outside the bathroom door.  We flew many imaginary missions to and from the outer reaches of our galaxy on those Saturday afternoons.

In junior high school, I was selected, maybe because I was a reporter on the school newspaper, to take part in a special science assembly with a guest speaker.  I don’t recall  who the presenter was but I was asked to don a spacesuit, crawl into a mock-up Mercury capsule while sitting onstage and clicking a switch every few seconds that turned on and off a red light atop the capsule.  The demonstration pointed out how easy and quickly we can lose our sense of time.  I didn’t do well as a test subject but I was thrilled at putting on that spacesuit and being an astronaut  for the experiment.

Years later, when working for TIME Magazine, I joined the entire Los Angeles bureau at Edwards Air Force Base to watch one of the Discovery Space Shuttles land.  (Story for another blog post.)

A view of the Columbia command module through the hatch window. The hatch has been removed from the capsule so that visitors can see its inside design. The lever on the left was added as an escape measure after the tragedy that killed the three Apollo astronauts of 1967.

So naturally, when I learned that Seattle’s Museum of Flight was presenting the exhibit, Destination Moon in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution to mark the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, I was determined to go.  The exhibit, which opened in April and will close Sept. 2, is its only West Coast appearance.  While relatively small in size, the exhibit displays 20 artifacts from the Smithsonian, many of them from that historic moon landing mission, as well as several other objects from the Seattle museum’s own extensive collection.

The Saturn V rocket’s F-1 engines were the most powerful ever built. These components were salvaged from the ocean floor and are now part of the museum’s permanent collection.

My husband and I entered at our assigned time yesterday and wound our way through the items, stopping to read each description.  Among the artifacts are a restored console from NASA’s mission control.  The buttons and monitors look primitive compared to today’s computer systems.  I chuckled overhearing one young man explaining to his young female companion that the rotary dials on the panel weren’t for phoning “your grandmother.”

My husband who is six-foot, four-inches tall stands next to one of the spacesuits on display at the Destination Moon exhibit. You can see for yourself the difference in size. He never would have qualified for an astronaut!

I was also struck by the various ‘spacesuits’ on view and the smallness of their size.  Although the personas of these early space pioneers were gigantic, in reality, they were not large men.  Most, if not all, had been fighter pilots, and physically had to fit into the tight, compact cockpits of both the fighter planes and the cramped quarters of the early space capsules.  Some of the suits resembled expensive homemade costumes, and, in some ways they were.  For instance, ordinary blue rickrack was stitched to finish off the suits’ hose attachment openings.  This little touch must have made some of the women who sewed them smile.

You can see here a detail of the decorative rickrack used to trim the head opening of the spacesuit. The exhibit lighting made it next to impossible to photography objects in the display cases without reflection.

Also fascinating are the mangled F-1 engine sections of the Saturn V rocket, the only parts to ever have been recovered.  The components were found and lifted from the bottom of the Atlantic a few years ago in a project financed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.  After  restoration at the Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas, the surviving pieces were sent to Seattle’s museum and the Smithsonian where they will remain on permanent display after the Destination Moon exhibit closes.

Of course the centerpiece of the Seattle exhibit is the conical-shaped Columbia command module from the Apollo 11 mission.  Again most striking is its size, so small compared to the enormous space shuttles used today.  It’s mind-boggling how three men traveled to the moon and back in this compact capsule.  I missed the 3-D interactive tour of the capsule’s interior but just being within arm’s reach of this historic vessel was overpowering.

The Columbia command module was the centerpiece of the exhibit. In the background you can see the video of the rescue of the astronauts from the space capsule after landing in the ocean.

So too were the gloves and helmet with its gold visor worn by Aldrin and that reflected Armstrong’s image in the now iconic photo of Armstrong standing on the moon. I attempted to preserve the moment with a photo reflecting back my own image.  Mine didn’t turn out nearly as well as Aldrin’s. Amazing too is the fact that on that mission, and others, the astronauts used Hasselblad cameras and film as digital cameras were yet to be invented. (More about the equipment used can be found here. )

The famous gold visor and gloves of astronaut Buzz Aldrin worn on the moon are displayed in the exhibit.

One of the moon “rocks” returned by the Apollo astronauts can also be seen in the exhibit.  Surprising to me was how many people simply passed by without stopping to wonder at how far away this rough, gray, volcanic-looking stone came to end up here on earth.  Perhaps this is an indication too at how much we now take for granted travel into space.

The moon rock on display in Seattle came a long ways to be seen.

At the time of the Apollo missions, space exploration was still an incredible phenomena.  According to the exhibit information, NASA’s space program at its height employed 400,000 people.  It embodied the vision, ingenuity and skills of people at all levels.  It gave Americans a unifying reason to be proud of its country at a time when the VietNam War was tearing them apart.  And it gave the world a challenge that remains relevant today–to create a single event that can bring people together for the greater good.  It was indeed a small step for man but a giant leap for mankind.

Outside the exhibit, visitors, like myself, can take their own ‘moon’ photo as did Neil Armstrong.

Baker City Booming with Life

“What’s there to see in Baker City?” a friend asked when told that my husband, Michael, and I had stopped there on a recent (and rare) road trip.

“The town!” Michael declared emphatically,

Indeed, we turned off the highway at Baker City, Ore. for a lunch break and ended up spending an unplanned three hours in the town of 10,000. Most people stop here to visit the town’s excellent National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretative Center located just five miles east of Baker City or the Baker Heritage Museum found just off the highway as you enter the main section of town.   Both are good museums and offer a glimpse into pioneer life for those who came through here during the gold rush of he 1860s.  For many, Baker City was one of the last stopping points before traversing the Cascade Mountains that separate Eastern and Western Oregon.

Welcome to Baker City! The sign denoting the town’s historic center.

Some are now crossing back to settle in Baker City.  Like the architect from Portland (and a graduate of Kansas State University) who has retired in Baker City because it’s a ‘real town, with a walk-able downtown and doesn’t live behind walls.”  Larry and his wife now own one of the many historic buildings in downtown Baker City and have been restoring it for new tenants.

As Larry pointed out, Baker City is almost an anomaly these days in America in that this town, with a fabulous view of the snow-capped Cascades, is a fully preserved and functioning small town.  It’s what people who visit Disneyland’s Main Street expect, except that it’s not fabricated.

The Baker City trolley runs through downtown.

The buildings that line Baker City’s Main Street have been there since the late 1800s when Baker City was known as the “Queen City of the Mines.”  At the time, the town’s population exceeded that of either Spokane or Boise.  Miners, cowboys, ranchers and gamblers were drawn to its dance halls and five saloons.  Those who needed a place to stay could pick from any one of the town’s ten hotels.

The Geiser Grand is open for guests and on the National Historic Register.

One of the grandest of these, the Geiser Grand, is still in business and now listed on the National Register of Historic Places.  During our self-guided walking tour of the town, my husband and I wandered in to the lobby of this corner hotel to be greeted with  a decor reminiscent of its glorious days past.  The hotel was only reopened and restored in 1997 after having been shuttered for nearly 30 years.  Today, the front desk clerk says the hotel is a favorite choice of government and business people who come to town.  The hotel offers tours of its interior once a day at 2 p.m. but unfortunately one wasn’t available the day we visited.

In the 1890s the Geiser Grand was a grand place to stay.

I learned from the bartender on duty at the hotel that the people of Baker City made a conscious decision ten to 15 years ago, not to permit the big box discount stores to build in town.  The nearest one of these you’ll find is an hour’s drive away in either Le Grand or Ontario.  As Larry, the architect, explained, Le Grand is Eastern Oregon’s center for the Arts; Ontario is for the shopping and Baker City is all business.

The stores and shops in Baker City’s downtown appear to be thriving and cater to those who live there, not just tourists.  There’s a fabric store, a toy store, a stationers, a couple bookstores, a home store, legal and financial offices, a radiator repair shop, a jeweler’s, a women’s clothing boutique, an eye clinic and a movie theatre–the kind of places you’d expect to find in any American small town not that long ago.  If you’re hungry, as we were, there are plenty of tempting cafes, bakeries, breweries and restaurants from which to choose for whatever suits your appetite.

One of several restaurants and cafes in downtown Baker City is Charley’s Deli.

Don’t miss the town’s Crossroads Carnegie Art Center housed in what was once it’s public library.  In fact, we started our tour of town there.  Formerly a Carnegie Library, designed in the classic colonial style typical of so many Carnegie Libraries, the building was constructed entirely of “black speckled stone” quarried from the area, according to a docent I met there.  The interior was similar, if not exactly, as the one I remembered from my hometown.  The stacks have been removed to create an open gallery for rotating art exhibits, one of which was hanging when we visited.  Downstairs, once occupied by the children’s library, is now an art studio and small space for lectures and special presentations.  It’s well worth spending some time.

The 110-year-old Carnegie Library now serves as the town’s art center.

One of Baker City’s biggest events was brought to our attention by Larry, the architect. The Great Salt Lick , an art auction that occurs the third week of September, benefits Parkinson’s Disease research.  It’s an event befitting the agricultural and ranching center and goes towards a good cause.  Local ranchers and others scour the fields looking for the most creatively licked salt blocks by elk, deer, cows, horses, etc. The blocks are then named, poems are written about them and both are displayed for the auction.  There’s even a sculpture downtown now commemorating this truly unique art form.

The Baker bull sculptre stands on Main Street outside one of the local art galleries.

We stopped for lunch and ended up spending a little more than three enjoyable hours, strolling through downtown, looking at the building, talking with locals and finally finishing with a tasty late lunch at the Lone Pine Cafe on Main. I’d recommend it.

Driving out of town, I spotted what I thought was the official post office, again nearly an exact copy of the same post office in my hometown. But it turned out the building was now private offices; the official post office has moved up the street into a newer, less impressive structure. That was the only disappointment during our brief visit to Baker City.  I’d happily drop in again, eat, visit the Oregon Trail Interpretative Center and maybe even spend the night because Baker City’s an authentic step into the past that’s living in the present.

The old post office was a near duplicate of that in m own hometown.

 

Race Day Brings Excitement, People, Surprises

Today is unquestionably the biggest day of the year in Bellingham.  An estimated 35,000 people come to watch or participate in the Ski to Sea race.  It’s a seven-leg 93-mile relay race that starts at the top of the 10,000 foot Mount Baker and finishes in Bellingham Bay at Marine Park.  During the course of it, competitors ski, bike, canoe, run and kayak.  It’s likely to be one of most demanding and grueling competitive races in the country.

The race began more than one hundred years ago in 1911 as the Mount Baker Marathon organized by the Mount Baker Club as a way to call attention to the area’s spectacular scenery.  But it was suspended when a racer fell into one of the mountain’s crevasses.  Then, in 1973, it was resurrected by Bellingham’s Chamber of Commerce with 177 people competing on 50 different teams. This year, there are 414 teams entered in the race of eight people  each.

A few years ago, I was one of those.  My team, the Angst-Ridden Mamas, made its first appearance in the big race in 2004.  I had decided that to be fully considered as a Bellinghamster, I needed to do the race at least once.  So I signed up a few of my most active friends, paid our entry fee and started to train.  This is a race that attract not only local and amateur athletes but professionals and Olympians who come to be on teams sponsored by local business.  Ours wasn’t one of those.

Team member Terri early on the morning of the race about to head up with other team members to the mountain where the race begins.

There are several different categories under which a team can enter.  We chose to skirt the ultra-competitve professional categories and opted instead to put ourselves into the Whatcom County Women’s Recreational division.  Not only did we think this gave us our best shot at not coming in last, we thought it best fit the skill level and activity of our team members, who like myself were all mom’s with school-aged kids.

That didn’t mean, however, that we didn’t taken ourselves seriously as competitors.  Each of us were signed up for a leg in the sport that we competed or participated in regularly.  As a kayaker who frequently paddled in Bellingham Bay, I took that, the final leg of the race.  Mine was a five-mile course that started at Bellingham’s marina and ended at Marine Park across the water in the historic section of town known as Fairhaven.   In some ways, I felt I had one of the lighter legs in the race compared to the 8-mile run down Mount Baker or the 18.5 mile canoe paddle on the Nooksack River.

The reality is, that each of the seven legs presents its own set of challenges so that none are a ‘piece of cake’ when it comes down to it.

Connie, on her cross country skis, got us started at 8 a.m. on Mount Baker.

My paddling partner, Pat, who also entered on another team that same year, and I increased the frequency of our kayaking practices out in the Bay and lengthened the amount of time that we were in the water as the weeks leading up to race day drew closer.  We tried to improve our stroke technique and build up the distance we could get on each one.  We usually put in our boats early in the a.m. or late in the day when the water conditions are most optimal and the wind less likely to be a major factor.

On race day, however, you don’t have the luxury of choosing your time and the conditions can be considerably treacherous with wind, waves and currents.  While the first professional and Olympian-level teams often enter the water about 1 p.m., we were left sitting by our kayaks, waiting for our mountain biker to arrive well into the afternoon.  I don’t believe I got the hand-off from Carolyn, my mountain biker that first year, until after 4 p.m.

Waiting to go out on race day is one of the hardest parts of the race

The water was choppy but thankfully without white caps. I must note here that no one is allowed in the water without wearing a certified life vest.  You’re also supposed to verify that you know how to get back on or into your boat should you capsize.  I had both qualifications, as did my co-competitor Pat.  Even with all the official chase and spectator motor boats along the course, there was a possibility that you’d need to be prepared to be in the water.  The first turn around the buoy way out in the bay was especially difficult when the wind, coming from the west this particular year, kept pushing you off-course.

I rounded that buoy giving the other nearby paddler plenty of room.  My heart was thumping pretty hard as I did so.  Just as I completed my turn, one of the racers ahead of me dumped out.   Kayakers are also required to stop and assist if another racer needs help but as one of the observation boats was already headed towards that paddler, I kept on course.

The wind was the biggest factor on the second of the three legs of my course.  It seemed to pick up and kept shoving the bow of my boat back and forth .  My rudder was almost ineffective at countering the force as my boat bounced up and down over the waves like a bucking bronc trying to toss its rider.  One thing I knew was that I didn’t want to wind up in the water.  I wasn’t concerned about passing other paddlers, I just wanted to get to that second buoy, safely go around it and start down the final leg which I thought might be calmer water since it was more protected.

Valerie, our team’s road cycler, after finishing up her 40-mile ride.

I managed to do just that and though the water was still choppy, I no longer was battling the wind as much and could actually start to make some headway towards the final buoy and the stretch to the beach in the park.  I could hear voices from the shore cheering on those of us in the water. I even heard someone who recognized my yellow kayak and me call out my name.

With the hardest part of the race behind me now, I felt a surge of adrenaline in my tiring arms and lateral muscles, from where a kayaker really generates their power.  I could make it.  My team might not place but I we wouldn’t be the last ones in either.  I expected that we would end up about in the middle of pack in our division.  I had passed one other woman who I knew was also in that division.  My friend Pat, was somewhere behind me.

As I neared the last buoy and I could now see and hear the crowd that had collected on the beach to watch the finishing leg.  I pushed harder, grabbed the sides of my kayak with my thighs and put everything I had left into the homestretch.  I wasn’t likely to make up much time on this last approach but I was determined not to lose any more either.

Our team’s canoers Sue and Joanne bring their boat up to the finish line of the canoe leg with a little help from Carolyn, our mountain biker who took over from there.

With a few final strokes, my kayak rammed into the pebbly beach where Boy Scout volunteers were waiting to grab the bow and help stablize the boat so I could get out.  My legs wobbled and quivered as I lifted myself outside of my cockpit and scarmbled up the sloping bank to the big brass bell waiting for me at the finish line.  I grabbed the cord still swinging from the previous competitor and gave the bell one big clang.  I had made it. And I hadn’t capsized or lost my paddle or come in last.

My teammates waiting for me rushed over to give me a group hug. There was Connie who had started us off at 8 a.m. that morning on the cross country ski leg on the mountain, and Kathy, who took over from her for the downhill ski portion.  Terri, who’s now on the Board of Directors for the race, had run down the mountain.  Valerie gave us a big lead during her road biking leg to put Sue and Joanne in good position when they took off in their canoe.  And Carolyn delivered to me the sweaty orange elastic wristband that we were all required to wear when she rolled across the finish line of the mountain biking leg. And our support crew–Marla and Gaye.

In my kayak, giving it my all to push through the water on race day.

I was weary and dehydrated but felt exhilarated by the race, the camraderie of my team and the sense of having accomplished and completed something I wasn’t entirely certain I’d be able to do.  Now, came the best part–the party!

I carted my boat back to the community storage shed then went home to quickly shower off the salt water and sweat before going to the party.  I put on my yellow competitor’s t-shirt, given to each team member registered in the race, and walked around the corner to Vicki’s house where we were joining two other teams and friends for food, drink and fun The parties are what many regard as the best part of the race!

I had barely stepped in the door when my teammates surprised me with the declaration:  “We won third place!!”

Much to our surprise, the Angst Ridden Mamas took third place in our division in the Ski to Sea race in 2004.

“What?” I said in disbelief.

“Yes, we came in third,” one of them explained.

Then someone slipped the bronze-colored medal attached to the blue ribbon over my head. They weren’t kidding.  We had managed to medal in our first race ever.  None of us were expecting it. We all just wanted to finish.  So when the “Angst-Ridden Mamas” was called out by the race officials to come to the podium and receive our medals, only one of our team members was still there to receive them.

The third-place medals taken by our team in a surprise ending to our first race.

In my wildest dreams I hadn’t thought we’d place in a race of 300 teams with 2,400 competitors!  I was so surprised, as were my teammates, and proud of what we had done together for fun and so that I could feel a full-fledged Bellinghamster.

Our team competed in the race the following three years. While we didn’t repeat the glory of our inaugural appearance, we had a lot of fun and pride in participating and giving it our best on this one big day.  As I watch racers come in today, I’ll be thinking of how it felt, how hard it was and what a great time I and my team had being part of a very memorable Memorial Day weekend!

 

 

Fremont Church Answers Flood Victims’ Prayers

The carillon of the First Baptist Church in Fremont, Neb. plays every hour on the hour during the day.  Chimed music gently floats over the neighboring area and reminds one of a time gone by, when people dressed in their Sunday best strolled down the brick streets lined with big, two-story American Craftsman and Victorian-styled homes nearby, on their way to morning services.

My brother, Richard, and wife Nola, at the church where he is pastor in Fremont, Neb.

The 150-year-old church sits on the corner of C and Fifth Streets and within sight of the Episcopalian, Lutheran and the former Catholic churches.   These churches likely were built about the same time. First Baptist’s founders met and started their church in 1869, just two years after Nebraska became a state, in a private residence down the street that still stands and is the second oldest structure in Fremont today.  Their current red brick Romanesque Revival style church building is their third and was dedicated in 1923.

The sanctuary reflects the simplicity of a time when it was built in 1923.

Inside, the sanctuary is dignified but simple with massive dark wood beams arching up to the ceiling above the two sections of wooden, upholstered pews divided by a center aisle leading up to the altar area. The minister’s pulpit and choir director’s podium stand on either side of the stepped-up altar area with the choir pews directly behind the massive wooden altar with a large blue stained glass window rising behind in the background. The church still has its pipe organ too with the banks of pipes hidden behind arched screens on either side of the altar area.   Crisscrossed leaded stained glass windows on either side of the sanctuary flood the interior with golden light when the sun shines through.

Golden light illuminates the church’s stained glass windows.

But the heart and soul of this small town church isn’t its brick and mortar building, it’s the people.  During the past two months, have been one of the most generous and helpful to those in Fremont and the even smaller, surrounding towns that are still trying to recover from the massive flooding in mid-March.  This happened when the two rivers in the area, the Platte and the Elkhorn, overflowed after sudden warm weather melted piles of a recent snowstorm and rainstorm after rainstorm dropped more water than the land or rivers could absorb.  The area was literally turned into islands, cut off from one another and outside aid by washed out highways and interstates that are just now re-opening.

From the air you can se the flood water that still stands over much of the area.

Led by its minister, my brother, Richard, his church has provided assistance to 30 outlying communities and “scores and scores of people.”  The church’s family center was turned into a major distribution center and filled with supplies once they could be delivered.  Financial aid, to purchase essentials and food or to replace damaged hot water heaters or propane tanks that had been washed away, was given to those who needed it.  On a recent visit, I went with Richard to give gift cards for these items to three flood victims who were grateful to tears.

Recovered propane tanks that were washed away by the flood waters stamd abandoned and await disposal.

 

We also spent part of an afternoon handing out bottles of energy drinks, packages of athletic socks, cans of vegetables and soups, 5 pound bags of rice and boxes of nutrition bars to those who lived in one of the hardest hit areas of Fremont.  These were largely low income Hispanic families whose mobile homes were livable but badly damaged. Five families took refuge in a local Hispanic church, staying in the basement until they were reassured that it was okay to return to their home.

Maricella emerged to lead the relief effort with the Hispanic community.

One from their community, Maricella, began the relief effort for these people by giving out donations from a truck at a corner Mexican food market in town.  When Richard and his church discovered this, they stepped in and offered to contribute supplies and people to help.

Buckets were filled by church funds and distributed to flood victims/

With help from her organizational skills, they put together a plan and a place for people to safely come to get what they needed. “We don’t ask where they come from or if they are citizens, or church members or what political party they belong to. If they need help, we help them,” says Richard.

During my brief visit, Richard drove me around the areas so I could see the impact the flood had made.  In the tiny town of Winslow, where 81 people once lived,now only three households are there.  They still have no running water and electricity, if they have it, is created by portable generators.  One couple is living in their garage. A giant mountain of ruined possessions, including appliances and furniture is piled along one of dirt streets awaiting someone to come pick it up.  As we were surveying it, one of the remaining residents walked up and tossed something else onto the pile. Richard stopped to talk with him.

The man, probably in his late 30s, told him that his house had been deemed ‘livable’ by diaster authorities but that he had four inches of mud in his basement. Insurance would cover some of the damage but not all. He was lucky, in some cases,  insurance companies are refusing claims because the water came into the house through the basements, not the ground floors, my brother explained.  Richard wrote a name and number on his business card and handed it to the man telling him to contact them for assistance.  The man’s eyes teared up as he thanked us and we said good-bye.

Richard offers some words of comfort and suggestions for help to a flood victim.

These are the kind of interactions that have occurred over and over as Richard and his church have encountered flood victims. People needing help, not knowing where to find it in many cases or denied aid for various reasons from outside government and disaster relief agencies, grateful to learn that this little Fremont church is offering to come to their aid however they can.

Richard carries out boxes of supplies from the church to deliver to the flood victims.

Donations have come from the church’s national association and through many outside individuals in addition to the church members themselves. The last of the relief funds was used for the three gift cards.  There’s still a Donate button that takes you to PayPal on the church website.  If more donations come in, they will provide whatever aid remains to done, not asking for proof of insurance, or citizenship or political affiliation or church membership.

The Sunday I was in town, my brother delivered a message to his congregation that included the story of Jesus feeding the multitude 5,000 with five loaves and two fishes.  I’m sure that he chose to relate that particular story because it illustrated so well what his little church itself has done recently to respond to the flood victims.  They have made a difference in the lives most in need and have made their funds and supplies go further than anyone would have thought.

Richard retells the Biblical story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 people to his Sunday congregation.

 

 

Mother’s Day Memories Are Homemade

I hadn’t planned to write about Mother’s Day for this posting, after all, what more can be said about it?  But then my sister-in-law asked if I would trimming drawings– some in colored-pencil, some with markers–done by the children and teens of her church to give their Mom’s.  As I slid the blade of the paper cutter up and down, along the lines of each child’s message to Mom, a flood of memories came back to me.

I remembered the homemade cards my own sons had done for me, mostly made in their classroom at school, of construction paper and cut-out flowers glued to the fronts with their simple, hand-lettered messages scrawled inside: “I love you. Happy Mother’s Day.” Construction paper doesn’t hold up as well over time as other paper mediums, it crumbles into flakes so I no longer have many, if any, of those lovely greeting cards.  But I can see them in my mind’s eye just as if they had given them to me yesterday.

Handmade cards by children of the church will be given to their Mom’s.

 

More lasting were some of the handcrafted gifts that they created at school for the special day.  In particular, are the little square boxes made of wooden popsicle sticks stacked like a Lincoln log house and glued together in the corners. Each was painted and had a top individually decorated with various shaped pasta pieces.  One is a delicate pink with pieces of shell-shaped macaroni pasted to it. Another is plain wood with rainbow colored twisted pasta pieces, rotelli and macaroni.  The third is golden, again with the rotelli, bow-tie and twisted pasta attached to the top. There’s also a small block of wood on this one, a handle by which the lid can be lifted.  I keep them in a drawer and use them to store my costume jewelry where I see or touch them almost daily.

Among my most treasured items are the homemade boxes by sons made and gave to me on Mother’s Day years ago.

On another Mother’s Day, I received baked clay figurines.  One of my son’s sculpted what appears to be a steagosaurus, the length of my forefinger and painted blue and green and nicely finished with a shiny glaze.  I keep it on a little shelf near by kitchen along with some other collectible figurines that  aren’t nearly as precious to me.

As they grew older, the gifts changed or stopped entirely.  One year, however, I asked for and received from my youngest son, who was writing poetry, if he would write a poem for me.  He did.  It was about dusk falling over New York City, where he now lives.  I placed it in clear glass and it hung, for a time, in his old bedroom at home.  Now I have it among my keepsakes.

Made for me by one of my sons, this tiny steagosaurus has a place on a shelf in my home.

My oldest son, also a fine writer but different, made a card with a photo of a lighthouse, of which he knows I’m fond, that he found on-line and printed a simple, but heartfelt message inside.  This stands on my bookshelf in my studio where it’s easily in view.

Sure, over the years I was given some lovely Mother’s Day presents, a lot of flowers and treated to brunches or dinners out.  But truly, the ones that I treasure are those simple, handmade, hand-crafted or handwritten gifts or cards.  Who knows where the pictures I trimmed this morning will end up?  In some shoe box saved along with other, similar drawings? In a little frame that sits at work on a desk?  Or slipped into a scrapbook with the grade cards and photos from school?  One thing I do know, the will certainly bring a smile, maybe even a tear to each Mom who receives them and maybe, like my own, become an enduring memory of the little one who created it and gave it with love.

 

 

Believe It or Not, Tulip Fields and Festival Top Unbelievable List

A blog that I follow, Culture Trip, popped up in my e-mail the other day with an article entitled:  15 Unbelievable Places You Probably Never Knew Existed in America . Of course I couldn’t resist the challenge to check it out.  As it turned out, I actually was aware of several of them and had visited four.  To my amusement, topping the list was “Skagit Valley Tulip Fields, Washington.”

The Skagit Valley tulip fields attract photographers, professional and amateurs alike, because of the beautiful settings it provides/

Amusing to me because the tulip fields lie just 20 miles to the south of where I live and have been the subject of my own blog twice.  (Tourists and Locals Love Tulip Time and A Trip to Skagit Valley’s Tulip Farms)  I had already planned to make my re-entry this week to my blog  about the tulip festival (after an absence due to my preoccupation with my duties as Executive Director for CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival) .  The idea was prompted by a notice that this weekend would be the last for the tulip festival this year.  It’s always a little sad to learn that those beautiful flowers will be clipped and harvested starting tomorrow bringing an end to another display of fields of color.

Visitors are asked to stay out of the fields and park only in designated areas.

I’m sure those who live in the immediate area are a little happy and relieved to see the month-long event come to a close as literally thousands of people are drawn to see the brilliant blooms causing residents to post ‘no parking’ signs along their property and take alternate routes to avoid the traffic back ups leading to and from the nearby freeway.  For visitors, finding a place to park along the roadways becomes a challenge if you opt not to pay the fee asked by those with the lots.  But it all seems worth the time and money spent to admire the planted ribbons of color and masterful landscaped gardens of the various growers.

Mount Baker rises in the distance with bulbs of bright red in the foreground .

Among the most popular of these farm stops is the RoozenGaarde owned by Washington Bulb Company.  The company flourished under the ownership of William Roozen, a Dutch emigrant who purchased the business in 1955 from its original founders and the first bulb growers in the area, Joe Berger and Cornelius Roozekrans. Today, the Washington Bulb Company is the largest tulip-grower in the country with  350 acres of tulips and 70 million cut flowers shipped throughout the U.S. annually.

In addition, the company also plants 500 acres of daffodils (not nearly as much a draw as the tulips), 150 acres of iris and 600 acres of wheat (no one goes to see that.)

Boxfuls of tulips are cut from the fields and shipped throughout the country.

Someone, I can’t recall who, once told me that the tulips cultivated in the Skagit Valley when harvested are shipped to Holland where they are propagated then returned to the U.S.  and marketed as “Dutch” tulips. Whether or not this is true or just legend I don’t know and haven’t, as a good journalist should, followed up to ask company officials.

The flowers were late this year due to an unusually longer cold spell of weather and didn’t come into full flourish until mid-April.  The festival itself, begun in 1984 by the town of Mount Vernon, starts April 1st, regardless.  What began as a three-day event now is a month-long celebration that includes not only self-guided visits to the fields, but a parade, a ‘tulip’ run,’ concerts and a street fair.

Photographing the tulips looking skyward, the cup-like blooms remind me of colorful balloons on strong green strands.

I’ve not seen the figures but I can only imagine what the economic impact of this highly attended annual festival has on the town and the surrounding area as people make the trek from all over the state and British Columbia just to take in the splendorous display by nature and the bulb farmers. Kind of nice to know that in this day and age of virtual reality and high-tech devices that people can still find such enjoyment and pleasure in what nature has to offer.

I didn’t make the trip down to the fields this year, opting instead to satisfy myself with the tulips growing in my own garden.  But it’s likely I will, as in years, past, go again along with the thousands of others because the beauty of the tulip fields of Skagit Valley is still compelling no matter how many times you’ve seen them.

Food, Family and Fun Times around the Christmas Table

This year for Christmas, I made a photo book for each of my brothers titled:  “Food, Family and Fun Times.”  I was prompted to do so when my younger brother, Brad, asked if I had any of the recipes from my mom and my aunts.  He was looking for one in particular, the red-hot salad that was on our table at nearly every Christmas dinner.   Maybe you know the one I mean:  cherry or strawberry jello combined with applesauce and those pill-sized red-hot candies that are melted before you stir them into the mixture.  You chill it to congeal.  It’s tasty but full of sugar. That’s probably one reason I too liked it so much as a kid.

One of the photos I found while assembling my photo gift book was this one of my Dad slicing green tomatoes for his pie.

Everyone has their own traditions when it comes to Christmas dinners, if your family is fortunate enough to be together for the holiday and can afford this one big feast.  As I assembled the photo book, I searched through my parents’ old photo albums, many of which I have, as well as my own to find photos that I could include in the book.  Originally, I was looking for snapshots taken of my parents and my aunts in their kitchens, preparing some of the foods for which I had the recipe cards.  But I discovered that I had very few of these photos and the ones I had were mostly of my Dad taken just a few years before he died making his favorite picalilli relish or green tomato pie.

One of my Dad’s favorite recipes was this one for the piccalilli relish.

Instead, what I  had were several snapshots taken at the family dinner tables before the meal commenced.  Many were taken on holidays or special occasions, such as birthdays. As I sorted through the years of photos, I studied the dishes placed on the table. Some I could easily recognize, like the fluffy lime green jello salad with pineapple and whipped cream (usually the artificial Cool Whip product) folded in.  Sometimes there was turkey, often ham as the main course.   Mashed potatoes, especially for the Thanksgiving dinner, but at Christmas it often was scalloped potatoes that I recall my Aunt Marie prepared.

There were dinners at the table in the make-shift dining room at my parents’ house at the motel my parents co-owned with my aunt and uncle and where grew up.

The dining room wasn’t large at my parents’ home at the motel where I grew up but the Christmas dinners always took place.

It was a pretty tight squeeze to get everyone seated around my mother’s Duncan Phyfe table, even with the leaves put in.  My mother’s nice china was set out with the centerpiece a little  handcrafted tiered Christmas tree made from red netting material.  Some years my Aunt Oleta and Uncle Joe who had moved from my hometown to another small town 45 minutes away joined us; sometimes it was just my Aunt Marie and Uncle Dale.

Two of my favorite Christmas dinner photos were taken years apart of the family together in the basement of my Aunt Marie and Uncle Dale’s home where we gathered for big celebrations.  The first was made when I was eight-years-old (I can tell by the dress I’m wearing). This photo special because one of my aunt and uncles from California, along with my cousin, is there as well as my aunt and cousin who lived in Hutchinson, Kansas,three hours away in Kansas. My cousins, Kevin, Leland and Debbie–just a baby–are there too with their parents, my Uncle Jiggs and Aunt Bernice.  It’s quite a photo because so seldom was this many of the Crooks clan together at Christmas.  Even though we’re not sitting at the table, I know that the table is set just on the other side of the camera with dinner no doubt waiting for us all.

The family gathers for a Christmas dinner.

The other recalls the another big Christmas gathering the first year I was in college.  (Know that from my hairstyle.) We’re all there again, minus the California and Hutchinson families and plus my youngest brother who is standing beside my uncle and just peeking over the back of one of the heavy, tall, carved oak chairs at the table’s end.  And again, the cousins who lived in town, are there, with my aunt and uncle.  This time, however, the photo is in color, the color film technology having long since become readily available.

Taken years later from the first gathering, the family comes together for another Christmas dinner in my aunt and uncle’s basement.

I carry on the Christmas dinner tradition with my own family. My parents, aunts and uncles with whom we ate have passed on but there’s a new generation who gather round the table that includes my sons and when possible the grown children and now grandchildren of those aunts and uncles.  I still insist on taking a photo of everyone once we’ve all sat down for the holiday dinner so we can relive these priceless moments in the future through the photographic memory.  The foods, the fun and the family time together are the real recipes for what makes the season bright.

An Illustrating Lunch in a Little Museum

“Can meet for quick lunch at 1:30.  You need to pick place.”  The text from my son, Tim, came in at 11:30 a.m.  I had just enough time to change clothes, walk to the subway and travel from where I was staying in Brooklyn to 63rd and Park in Manhattan where my son was working for the day.

Fortunately I had a little extra time because I accidentally round myself on the wrong train. Luckily, I soon discovered my mistake and was able to get off and switch to another train that delivered me within blocks of my destination.

I walked from the station up Lexington Avenue looking for a restaurant where my son and I might meet to eat.  At 62nd I turned to head over to Park Avenue and then up towards 63rd Avenue.  I saw the building where my son was working but no restaurants or cafes.  So I started back towards Lexington.  I hadn’t quite gotten to Lexington when a sign on a wall caught my eye.  “Maurice Sendak Exhibition and Sale,” it read. The poster featured an illustration I recognized from the Sendak’s classic children’s book, “In the Night Kitchen.”

The main gallery for the Museum of Illustrators is open to the public and free of charge.

Curious, I opened the red door, stepped inside 128 E. 63rd and found myself at the Museum of Illustration.  The museum, founded in 1981, is the home of the Society of Illustrators, established in 1901 to promote the art of illustration.  Its membership has included such illustrious artists as N.C. Wyeth, Maxfield Parrish and Norman Rockwell, among others.  The five-story townhouse was purchased in 1939 by the society for its headquarters and over several years was renovated to create offices for the society, two galleries and a bookstore on its lower floors for special exhibitions and programs and on the third floor a lounge and library for its membership. In the 1960s, that space was converted into a handsome bar and a cozy but airy dining room that, I discovered, is open to the public from noon to 3 p.m. for lunch.

Among the works on display at the museum were illustrations from Sendak’s “The Night Kitchen.”

It was an ideal spot for my lunch with my son and sent him a message to join me there. In the meantime, I walked into the main gallery where the works of illustrator Maurice Sendak were on display.  Sendak is regarded by many as “the most important children’s book artist of the 20th century,” according to the New York Times. “Where the Wild Things Are” and “The Night  Kitchen” were two of the best read books on my sons shelf when they were growing up so it was a treat to see Sendak’s original sketches, watercolors and ink drawings in this special exhibition. More than one hundred pieces hung on the walls representing some of Sendaks’ rarest work from his books, theatre designs and commercial assignments.  Incredibly, all of them were for sale but at prices beyond my pocketbook.

I hadn’t quite finished viewing the entire exhibit when my son came in. Given his limited 30-minute time for lunch, we went directly upstairs to the bistro, took a table and quickly ordered.  I chose the Cobb salad which was fresh and delicious and reasonable.  Halfway through my meal, Tim received an alert on his phone from a friend.

The bistro serves food for lunchers with illustrators’ works on the walls.

“Where’s your meeting?” he asked referring to my appointment that afternoon.  I told him. “You’re not going there,” he said firmly.  The area, he explained, had been placed on ‘lock down’ when pipe bombs, delivered to various locations throughout the city, had been discovered.

Some of Sendak’s rarest works, such as this sketch, were displayed in the museum’s special exhibit.

With my meeting postponed, I suddenly had two free hours. I decided since I was already there, and somewhere safe, to spend the afternoon at the museum and its relaxing bistro. I went back to the Sendak exhibit and finished looking at the Sendak exhibit.  Then I worked my way up the artwork hanging on the stairway wall to the narrow halls of the second floor where illustrations by the members and now in the society’s permanent collection of 2,500 were

The bold, black and white art from comics such as The Vault of Horror was displayed on the museum’s bistro walls. There’s a bit of humor, along with horror in this illustration of a detached arm hanging onto a subway holder.

displayed.   Magazine illustrations, comic books drawings and cartoons was included.

I returned to the third floor bistro so I could have a closer look at the Norman Rockwell mural that permanently hangs over the bar in the lounge and the illustrations from Mad Magazine and E.C. Comics in the Tales from the Crypt special exhibit. A number of the bold, strongly stylized black and white comic book illustrations came from horror titles, appropriate since Halloween was just around the corner.  Weird Fantasy, Weird Science, Vault of Horror, Tales from the Crypt were among the comic book titles represented.  The illustrations were detailed, gory and violent in some.  Their graphic-ness disturbed some when they first appeared but their creators were also pointing out hypocrisy, prejudice and inhumanity.  More than 70 pen and ink drawings from the 1950s by some of the genres most celebrated comic artists were on view. I took my time examining each and reading the extensive commentary written by the curator Rob Pistella.

The red canopy of the museum welcomes visitors to the home of the Society of Illustrators.

The afternoon went by quickly.  Before I knew it, it was time for me to leave for my appointment rescheduled from earlier that day.  My plans had taken a sudden turn and given me the unexpected time to spend in this little unassuming New York museum.  In future trips, I’ll check the museum’s calendar and gladly return to the bistro for another lunch.

 

Popping In on Pink at FIT

One of the things I love about travel is the surprises it often brings, even when the trip is tightly scheduled, as it was for me on a recent visit to New York City.  In town for both business and personal reasons, I managed to work in some unexpected stops at a couple of places in the city I’d not been previously.

The first came on Tuesday. My day was full of meetings with me running back and forth from Greenwich Village to  the lower West Side on the subway. It started with a lovely lunch meeting at Mary’s Fish Camp in the Village; then I hopped the Number 1 train to my next appointment on 29th and 7th Ave after which I returned to the Village to drop in on a filmmaker at her office in the West Village.

The sign at the top of the stairs leading to the exhibition clearly says it all.

With my day over, I had a couple of hours free before I was to have dinner with my son.  I had learned about an exhibit at the Fashion Institute of Technology called quite simply: “Pink.” In all the years that I’ve been to New York, I had never gone to this little museum, located  on 7th Avenue and at 27th street on the college’s block long campus. FIT is part of the State University of New York‘s system and focuses on those disciplines related to the fashion industry.

The Ralph Lauren gown worn by actress Gwyneth Paltrow to the 1999 Academy Awards was intended to recall Grace Kelly. It is one of the items displayed in the Pink exhibit at FIT.

The special exhibit, “Pink: The History of a Pretty, Punk, Powerful Color,” explores the changing significance of the color pink in fashion over the past three centuries.  It’s eye-popping displays of mannequins dressed in clothing from the 18th to the mid-20th century are elegant, colorful, curious and brilliant.  Represented in the 80 ensembles is everything from glamorous gowns to hip-hop influenced threads.  Children’s clothing from the past are presented as are contemporary men’s and women’s suits, dresses, pants and lingerie.  From high fashion to the everyday, it’s all included in this special exhibit.

You’ll see designs by such contemporary fashion industry giants as Valentino, Gucci, Dior and Yves Saint Laurent. And there are styles by the more avant-garde such as the Japanese designer,  Rei Kawakubo.  It’s quite a treat to see some of these styles up close and so beautifully shown.

Pink was a fashionable color for men in the 18th century as well as for women.

Hot pink, pastel pink, pale pink, bright pink. Every imaginable shade of the color can be found in the exhibit.  “Pink” curator Valerie Steele also places into perspective the color culturally and explores how it came to be so strongly gender associated with women. That was not always the case. In fact, you learn in the exhibit that pink had neither a feminine nor masculine connotation in the 18th century but rather was associated with “elegance, novelty and aristocratic splendor.”  Perhaps one explanation for this is because the dye used to produce the brighter shades of the color popular at the time was newly discovered and came from Brazil, undoubtedly making it an expensive and limited to only those who could afford it.

The idea that pink was for girls didn’t taken hold until the early 1900s and was further reinforced with the highly publicized purchase in the 1920s by railroad tycoon Henry Huntington of artist Thomas Gainsborough‘s renowned paintings, “The Blue Boy” and “Pinkie” by Thomas Lawrence.  In the 1950s, according to the curator’s commentary, that the stereotype solidified.  But the exhibit also explores how other non-Western cultures have embraced and continue to use the color in dressing both sexes.

Not only is outerwear on display but historic pink undergarments, such as this corset, is included.

I spent nearly two hours browsing through and photographing the exhibit. Pink is, after all, one of my favorite colors (as long as it’s a warmer toned pink).  I have had and still have a lot of pink in my wardrobe. When I was a teenager, my bedroom walls were painted a hot pink.  So the FIT show was  an appropriate stop for me to make.

The clothing in FIT’s exhibit is handsomely and tastefully lit against black backgrounds that make the clothing and the color stand out.  If you find yourself headed to New York between now and Jan. 5,  plan to visit the FIT exhibit and museum.  Admission is free, it’s fairly easy to get to by public transit and it’s certainly not an exhibit that you’re likely to find elsewhere.

As for my other ‘surprises’ from this trip, you’ll need to wait for an upcoming blog.

A luxurious pink bodice from one of the gowns displayed embellished with a bouquet of silk flowers.

Crab Fishing Outing Ends Summer Season

With the arrival of autumn, I’m taking this opportunity to look back at the summer which seems to have gone by all too quickly.

One of the summer pleasures of living in the coastal region of the Pacific Northwest in the U.S. is crab season.  The waters of the Salish Sea are typically abundant with delectable Dungeness crab, yours for the taking with a crab pot, some bait, and a valid crab license from Washington Fish and Wildlife Department. It also helps to have friends with a boat to carry you out to the deeper waters where these shellfish tend to congregate.

When looking for a good spot for your crab pots it helps to have a map with the water depths.

I am lucky to have such friends and was invited (okay I ‘fished’ for the invitation). to go along with them one summer Sunday ‘crabbing’ in the bay.  The thought of coming home with a bucket of Dungeness for dinner set me in action. I hopped out of bed early to meet them at the boat launch by 7 a.m. I grabbed my plastic bucket, my camera, a thermal bag with packed snacks and a bottle of water and headed out the door. Low tide had just passed; the water was flat and smooth.  It would have perfect for kayaking if the skies hadn’t been so smoke-filled from the fires burning in British Columbia to the north. The sun was a ball of red, as seen through the smokey cover.

We had the bay to ourselves as we headed out towards nearby Portage Island where my friend Roger’s brother reported catching his limit of crab the day before.  Each license holder in Washington is entitled to five crabs. They must be males and measure more than six and three-quarters inches across the back of their shell from point to point. Roger pointed the bow of the boat towards the West and we sped off.

With chicken used as bait and placed in a red plastic bag, friends Tina and Roger lower the crab pot over the side of the boat.

Portage Island is a small, uninhabited island located just off the Lummi Peninsula, north of Bellingham, WA.  and is part of the Lummi Nation‘s Tribal Lands. During very low tides, it is possible to walk from the island to the peninsula, which is how. it is said, the cattle that roam free on the island arrived.  People too are welcome on the island for day trips to explore its 1,400 square miles and observe the bird and wildlife that live there.

As we approached the southeastern point of Portage, Roger slowed the boat and switched on the radar. We were looking for a spot that was ideally 65 feet for the crab pots.  We bobbed around for a while until we found a spot closer to Hale’s Passage that was deep enough. Roger cut the engine and lifted one of the two rectangular metal cage pots onto the side of the boat. Tina, his wife and my friend, opened the bag of chicken parts that had been soaked in sardine liquid to make the bait more attractive to the crabs.

After a couple of hours, Roger pulls up a crab pot to check the take.

The pot was tossed overboard, along with the buoys attached to them so that we could find then later.  Roger steered the boat out further looking for another possible location. After cruising around a bit, we settled on a spot that was about 70 feet deep and threw the second crab pot, loaded with the chicken bait into the water.  Now we had only to relax and wait an hour before we would haul up the pots and pull out our fresh shellfish.

Tina turned on some rock music on the player as we kicked back, munched on our snacks and enjoyed the cooler temperatures brought by the smoke-covered skies. Part of the ritual of crabbing is this waiting time filled with talking, laughing and eating. Before we knew it, an hour had passed.  Roger started the boat and we motored back to our first crab pot.

Only crabs that measure to the legal size and are male may be kept. All others must be returned to the sea.

Roger attached the handle to the pulley and began to crank in the metal wire pot. All three of us were anxious to see just how many of the shelled creatures we’d caught.  Water streamed from the pot as it lifted out of the water. About half a dozen crabs sat in the bottom. With the pot balanced on the side of the boat, Roger lifted them out of the pot one by one, their large claws pinching as he did. Carefully, he rotated each one so that Tina could measure each one.  Disappointed, we tossed one after another back as they weren’t large enough to keep. By the end, we had one keeper.

But we weren’t discouraged, we still had another pot to check. We moved the boat over to that buoy and repeated the process. Unfortunately, none of the crabs in that pot measured up.

When the water is boiling, it’s time to lower the day’s catch into the pot.

Not dissuaded, Tina loaded the pots with more chicken and we pitched them overboard once again to give it a second chance.  And again we waited patiently another hour with our hopes still high that we’d haul in a mess of the tasty crustaceans. When the hour had passed, we pulled up the pots once again.

Our luck was slightly better this second time but not overwhelmingly so.  Although there were several crabs in each of the two pots, only three were large enough for us to take home.  By now, we had invested nearly four hours of the day to this adventure and though we had started out early, it was already nearly noon.  We still had to get back to shore, hose off and clean the boat, take the crab back to Tina and Roger’s house where we’d cook them in a pot of boiling water (the worst part of the process for me) so that they’d be ready to eat later that day.

That evening, we sat down to our separate dinners to savor our catch of the day. To say that there’s nothing like a mouthful of that sweet, white and flaky crab meat taken fresh from the water that very day is an understatement. I’ve now lived in the Pacific Northwest for a little more than 20 years and I still am grateful and excited whenever I have a meal made of food caught, grown and cooked right from the waters and farm fields of my surrounding area. There truly is nothing that compares to the taste.

For me, catching and eating fresh crab is now part of my summer. I can not imagine a summer without it.  Crab season lingers into the fall as the leaves begin to turn color but the activity is mostly something I  now associate with summer. And although autumn is clearly here,  and gives me something to look forward to for next summer.

 

Solomon’s Story Pole Is Towering Artistic Achievement

“We are all one. No matter whether the color of our skin is brown, black, white, red, yellow; no matter whether we are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, atheist; no matter where we come from. We are all one,” said artist and former timber businessman David Syre welcoming guests to the dedication of  the 38-foot story pole he commissioned to stand on his Whatcom County farm.

Lummi carver Felix Solomon speaks to those gathered at the dedication ceremony of his most recent commissioned piece.

I was fortunate to have been among the 100 who attended that recent rainy day having been invited by a friend who was the guest of the artist, Lummi carver Felix Solomon.  I had met Solomon just the week prior at his home where he graciously took me out to his workshop where the totem lay awaiting transport to its new home.  The 35-foot cedar log had been transformed by Solomon over the past several months from a rough piece of timber into a majestic and colorful totem.  Solomon had been given little guidance by the commissioning Syre, leaving it up to the master carver to come up with the figures and design for the pole.

The various tools of carver Felix Solomon used when working on one of his projects await their master’s hand.

Solomon drew on his familiarity with the work of carver Joseph Hillaire,  in carving this pole, to carve both sides of the pole instead of just one. Hillaire (1894-1967) is regarded as one of the greatest Coast Salish artists and carvers of the 21st century.  His work was extensive but may be best remembered for his two friendship poles carved for the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair, one of which went to Kobe, Japan where it was placed. Hillaire and a generation of Lummi carvers ahead of him instituted what is known as ‘story poles,’ according to Seattle Art Museum curator Barbara Bretherton. The poles are tall like totem poles but they tell a story.

Topping the story pole is an eagle with its wings outstretched.

Solomon’s story pole represents “The Creation of Life Story.” At the top of the pole is the eagle, the being that flies closest to the spirit world but is still connected to the earth, according to Solomon.  The moon in its talons represent feminine energy and the reproductive cycles.

Directly below are placed the faces of five animals found on Mount Baker, the Nooksack River and in the Salish Sea–the wolf, the mountain goat, the bear, the cougar and the sea wolf or Orca.

Next comes the design which Solomon received special permission to use in this pole, the Sun Dog, which was on the door of the Lummi Nation chief when they signed the Treaty of 1855 with the United States. In that treaty, the Lummi relinquished much of their native homeland but they retained the rights to the natural resources found there, specifically the salmon, and have seen themselves as protectors of these resources ever since.  It is one reason the Lummi Nation has been a key activist in local, state and regional environmental issues.

The River Woman holds a basket of life in her hands.

Below the Sun Dog design is a concave oval that Solomon says represents the Lummi elders and ancestors.  The crescents on the side are the voices that pass down the tribe’s stories from one generation to

another.

On the back side of the pole are rain clouds that pour into the Nooksack River with the River Woman holding a basket of life in her hands.  At the bottom can be seen spirit dancers, two-legged humans who were the last to be created.

Solomon has received considerable recognition for his carvings and creations.  One of his ‘story poles’ is located in Bellingham’s International Airport; another can be found in the Silver Reef casino in Ferndale,  Wa.  The National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. honored him for his canoe carvings.  But the Creation of Life Story pole is the largest piece he’s done to date.

Carver Felix Solomon with his completed story pole in his workshop only a week before the pole was dedicated.

In order to accommodate the 39-foot cedar log from which the totem was carved, Solomon had to expand his workshop by building on an addition.  The massive totem took Solomon months to hand carve once he worked out the design.  It had to be specially engineering with hidden reinforcements from the bottom so that it would stand securely once positioned into place.  Just sliding the pole from Solomon’s workshop and hoisting it carefully onto a flat-bed truck for transport to the Syre farm was in itself an engineering feat. Solomon gratefully recognized those responsible for that part of the project during the dedication ceremony.

Originally, the ceremony had been planned to take place around the totem. But  rain forced organizers to move it to under the tent that had been erected for the grilled salmon luncheon that followed. Before the ceremonies began, Beverly Cagey brushed the pole with branches of cedar, blessing it while her husband, Jack and their grandson, Hank, accompanied with singing a chant and drumming.

Beverly Cagey brushes branches of cedar over the story pole prior to the dedication ceremony.

Guests gathered beneath the big tent, just steps away from the log cabin that stood close by the Nooksack River.  Nooksack tribal drummers led the small procession that included both the artist and the patron down the short path from the cabin to the tent where Darrell Hillaire, Lummi Nation elder, stood at the microphone waiting to introduce  the speakers and witnesses and welcome the day’s guests.

Lummi Nation member Darrell Hillaire welcome the Nooksack drummers, the host and artist in the opening processional.

Syre spoke and told how he viewed this story pole as one of unification.  Solomon thanked him for the opportunity, gave a brief description of his work on the pole and recognized those on his team who had assisted during the process. Then, as is tradition, Solomon presented the four ‘witnesses’ he had designated for that day with ceremonial blankets which each of them draped over one shoulder for their turn to speak about what they had ‘witnessed’ that day.  Among them was a childhood friend of the host, a Nooksack tribal member, who remembered the times the two had together playing along the river and in the woods on the farms where they grew up.  They had not seen each other in nearly 50 years and had, as

Jack Cagey, foreground, awaits his turn to speak as a witness as host David Syre welcomes the guests.

the friend put it, “a lot of catching up to do.”

Jack Cagey, a Lummi Nation elder, stood from his place at the table where I was sitting and spoke of the need for greater communication between generations, for the need to talk face-to-face and not just through electronic devices.  Another of the witnesses, Candy Wilson, read a poem that I found particularly moving, the name of which I unfortunately missed in her introduction. Their words were eloquent, appropriate and heartfelt. Clearly they were speaking about more than just the pole; they were making a case of for humanity and the practice of it towards one another.

The dedication ceremony program with a description of the story pole, an art piece by Syre along with cedar and feather were set at each place.

Ninety-minutes later, the ceremony drew to a close and everyone was invited, elders first, to share in the grilled salmon luncheon that had been prepared especially for the day. The meal is as much a part of these ceremonies as the ceremony itself because it gives time for those who gathered that day to share not only food with one another with stories across the table.

Solomon’s story pole towers over those who came to the dedication ceremony on a rainy Pacific Northwest Day.

By the end, the rain that had steadily fallen had stopped so that people could walk across the field to where the story pole towered and admire Solomon’s finished work.  Indeed, it is a commanding and colorful piece. It is one of Solomon’s finest accomplishments to date. The public isn’t likely to see this fine story pole unless they catch a glimpse of the eagle’s upward extended wings from the country road that passes close by the pole’s location., ut it’s sure to stand for a very long time on this private property as a powerful reminder that, in the words of Syre: “We are all one.”

 

 

 

Tour de Whatcom is Tour de Force

Bellingham is a town that loves its bicycles but even more of them than usual could be found all over the surrounding streets and roads this last Saturday when hundreds of cyclists pedaled between 22 to 100 miles in the Tour de Whatcom.  The popular charity biking event is in its 13th year and this year benefited the Whatcom Mountain Bike Coalition.

The back of a cyclists racing jersey says it all.

It’s a colorful display of bicycles and cyclists as they whip across county roads, past lakes, through farm country, by rivers and along beaches with views of snow-capped Mount Baker rising in the distance all the way. The tour started and ended at the award-winning Boundary Bay Brewery in downtown Bellingham located directly across from the Bellingham Farmers’ Market which was also in full swing yesterday.  In fact, that’s why I was there. I spent two hours yesterday distributing postcards to people to promote the upcoming July 26th outdoor adventure film evening–Sports Shorts–being presented by CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival at Fairhaven’s Village Green.

The aluminum arch of the Tour de Whatcom’s finish line spanned across the street from the Farmers’ Market Railroad Depot buildings.

Afterwards, I wandered over the market and Boundary Bay for a closer look at the activity.  Boundary Bay’s beer garden was filling up with cyclists who had just come in and were thirsty and hungry.  Outside, a long line of cyclists strung down the street as they checked in their bikes into the secured bike parking lot set up in the street. Other muscle-weary cyclists were receiving  rubdowns under the purple canopy of the Massage Envy tent.  And some, as did my friend Audrey who rode the 22-mile route in the tour, mingled with the marketgoers to have a bite of lunch there.

Following a long ride, the massage tent was a popular place.

The entire place was bubbling with bikers, beer and booths full of farm fresh food and crafts.  It brought back memories for me of the summer my family and I spent a month in Bellingham prior to deciding to move here permanently.

We had rented a house from friends (long before VRBO or Air BnB existed) for the month of August. It gave us a chance to explore the area and experience it as if we lived here.  One Saturday, we strolled down to the historic Fairhaven area where we discovered a road bike race was about to get underway.  At that time, the race–the Old Fairhaven Bicycle Race–began on Fairhaven’s main street and the course tracked up and down the hilly Fairhaven area to eventually finish a little further down the street from where it started.

Cyclists line up in the Fairhaven Bicycle Race.

We nabbed a ringside seat with two of our sons at an outdoor table in front of the Colophon Cafe. The Colophon was favorite spot with my sons because of its ice cream counter where big scoops of the cold dairy delight were heaped on top of waffle cones for a dollar or so. The boys ordered peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, my husband and I had bowls of clam chowder.  We ate and watched as the nearly 20 riders whizzed around the corners.  Other race watchers stood behind or sat upon the hay bales that had been places along the street for the purpose of blocking off the streets and marking the course.  It was truly a fun afternoon and one that I’ve long remembered.  The photos I took that day preserve the day not only for me but for my sons who have long since grown up.

Racers round the corner while competing in the Old Fairhaven Bicycle Race.

Sporting his new helmet, my son readies to take off on his own bike ride. Notice the training wheels on the rear.

That was the same summer too, that my oldest son, Matthew, learned to ride a bike.  Neither I nor my husband recall now where we got the bike, but unlike in Los Angeles where we lived, the sidewalks of Bellingham’s South Hill proved a great place for him to hop on and take off.  He wasn’t a particularly coordinated kid when it came to physical activities but once he figured out how the chain drive of the bike worked, riding it was no problem.  He returned to L.A. ready to ride with his friends and we returned to L.A. convinced, in part by community events like the bike race, that we wanted to make Bellingham our new home.

The Sounds of Silver

Summer is a reason in itself to celebrate in the Pacific Northwest but this summer, there’s one more thing to celebrate and that’s the silver anniversary of the Bellingham Festival of Music.

I’ve written before here about the festival which happens every July since I moved from Los Angeles to Bellingham.  In fact, the festival is one of the reasons that brought me and my family to Bellingham.  Although I didn’t realize, the festival at the time we first began to consider and explore this area was only three years old.  As the three visits we made before deciding to relocate here were all in August, we missed the festival but became aware of it.

Maestro Michael Palmer greets orchestra concertmaster Richard Roberts at the opening concert of the festival’s 25th season.

Soon after settling in, we began to buy tickets to attend some of the concerts and we’ve been faithful festivalgoers ever since.  Through the years, we’ve heard some amazing music performed by an orchestra with top-notch players from major orchestras around the country, including the N.Y. Philharmonic, the L.A. Philharmonic, the Boston Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony, the Cincinnati Symphony and the Montreal Symphony.  And the guest artists who have soloed with them are world-class.  Sometimes it’s hard to believe that I’m sitting here in my small community listening to the kind of classical concerts that you usually only find in large, metropolitan cities.

A map marking all the cities from where come the musicians that make-up the festival orchestra.

For any music festival to have survived 25 years is an accomplishment, let alone one that thrives in a community of 100,000 (and less when it first began) and now runs on all volunteer help.  Much credit must be given to the festival’s hard-working boards who  put in hours and hours of time all year to bring the festival together.

A salute must also be given to the man who’s been the artistic director and conductor since the beginning, Michael Palmer.  Palmer, who I’ve come to know in recent years, has a gift for pulling together musicians, most of whom only play together once a year, to present tight, strong performances of classical favorites as well as contemporary new pieces.  It’s a strenuous and demanding job in the three short weeks of the festival’s duration.

Artistic director Michael Palmer, left, confers with composer Aaron Jay Kernis whose “Symphony No. 4, ‘Chromelodeon'” was given it’s West Coast premiere at this year’s festival.

Of course without such talented and professional musicians, the festival would not nearly be the quality it is.  Sitting among the ranks of players are the first oboist for the Boston Symphony, the first violist of the Cincinnati Symphony, the first clarinet and flutist from Atlanta’s Symphony and the first bassist from Seattle’s Symphony, to mention but a few.

This year, much to my delight, also joining the violin section is a young woman named Rachel Frankenfeld Charbel who grew up in Bellingham, played in the Sehome High School orchestra before going off to college at the University of Texas in Austin to study music.  She was among one of my sons’ closest friends as a kid and now plays with the Cincinnati Symphony.  It makes the festival’s 25th anniversary particularly special to those of who have watched her mature into the fine musician she now is.

Violinist Rachel Frankenfeld Charbel grew up playing in Bellingham and is now a member of the festival orchestra.

Also special to Bellinghamsters is the Calidore String Quartet that has become recurring guest artists at the festival.  This young, gifted ensemble has emerged as a major chamber group winning awards, prizes and recognition throughout the world.  To have them return every year for the festival is a special treat for all of us.  The violist also happens to also be a Bellingham native and coincidentally, a classmate of Charbel’s.

Music Festival chair Karen Berry, right, with two members of the Calidore String Quartet, cellist Estelle Choi and violinist Jeffrey Myers.

Only three concerts remain in this year’s 25th anniversary season; one this evening with guest violinist Simone Porter playing Prokofiev’s “Violin Concert No. 1 in D Major;” a free chamber concert on July 18 at the Whatcom Museum of History and Art and the final closing concert on July 20 featuring the festival chorus singing Poulenc’s “Gloria” with the orchestra.  If you’re in close range, I encourage you to attend one of these and if not this year, plan to go next year and celebrate yet another season with the Bellingham Festival of Music.

 

 

Lummi Nation’s Stommish Celebrates Veterans and Traditions

Americans think of Veteran’s Day as occurring on November 11 but tribal members of Lummi Nation honored the service, bravery and commitment of their veterans this past weekend during the tribe’s 72nd annual Stommish celebration.  It’s a three-day event that takes place on Lummi Nation’s Stommish Grounds located just a 30-minute drive north of Bellingham.  The waterfront festival is open to everyone and draws people from throughout the region.

Stommish means ‘warrior’ in the Halkomelem language, the language of the Lummi and Cowichan tribal people. It began in 1946 when tribal members Edith and Victor Jones planned a community celebration to honor and welcome home their two sons, Bill and Stanley Solomon, from World War II. Of the 720 Lummi members in 1946, 104 served in the armed forces and 101 of them returned safely home to return to their Lummi way of life.  Today, the event has become an annual festival that not only recognizes those veterans, but also one that traditional dancing, games, food and canoe races.   Stommish starts, however, with an opening ceremony during which the veterans who are introduced to the assembled crowd.

Afterwards, celebrants line the beach along the stretch of Hale’s Passage to watch as teams of canoers compete.  The sleek, cedar canoes are paddled by teams of twos and sixes, with some racers as young a 10-years-old, down one length of the course and back again while those onshore cheer them on.  The boats are beautiful on the blue water and bright summer sun.  The paddlers are strong and at the race’s end dripping with sweat from the effort.

Teams compete in the cedar canoe race in the waters where tribal ancestors have paddled for generations.

In another section of the grounds people participate and watch the traditional Sal Hal Bone Game. Sal Hal is an old Native American Pacific Coast guessing and gambling game.  It involves teams of players who face each and must correctly guess which hand holds the unmarked bone.  Correct guesses or losses are tallied with a set of sticks.  The team or person with the most sticks at the end of the game wins and collects the money that has been wagered.  The game is accompanied by traditional song and instruments performed by the team hiding the bones in their hands. It all makes for good-spirited fun and, for the winning teams, a pocketful of cash.

A set of sticks is used to keep track of the wins and losses of the team guessing during the traditional Sla Hal Bone Game.

A tribal dancer performs.

No celebration is complete without dancing. Lummi tribal members wearing traditional costumes performed a number of dances for those who gathered around an artificial grass carpet.  Dancers of all ages entertained while those of us on the sidelines watched or,  during one number, joined in as participants.

Throughout the day, people feast on a variety of food sold by the different vendors set up on the Stommish Grounds. The most popular of all, however, was the delicious $10 salmon filet plate served with side dishes and the large, fresh cooked crab so tasty, juicy and caught right from the bay beyond the festival grounds.  People, like me, enjoyed the seafood while viewing the canoe races taking place.

Fresh cooked crab caught right from the waters beyond the Stommish Grounds was a treat for hungry attendees.

Under the canopies of booths set up around the grounds, people demonstrated and sold Native American arts, handicrafts and souvenirs. Handcrafted woven reed hats, made in the traditional way and skirted style, was one of the many items for sale. Bold, geometric Native designs decorated the t-shirts  and hooded sweatshirts that could also be purchased.  Cruising through the various tents provided an opportunity for a little holiday or birthday gift shopping.  I did both!

The day’s activities also included an old-fashioned Princess and Warrior crowning, a cute baby contest, oldest Veteran recognition and a small carnival with rides for kids.  It’s a festival full of family oriented fun that, judging by those attending this past weekend, was enjoyed by everyone.

Stommish starts at noon and lasts well late into the long summer day.  Campers, both in tents and recreational vehicles, are packed tightly into the designated overnight area on the grounds. Parking can be challenging so car-pooling is a good idea.  The event was a great way to spend a summer weekend day with the friends and families of this Native Nation, to become familiar with this proud tribe’s traditions and to join tribal members in saluting and thanking those who served in the United States military and returned. Hy’ shqe! (Thank you!)

A child checks out the curious but probably significant arrangement of found items placed on the floor of the beach shelter.

You can view more of my Stommish day images in my blog portfolio.

 

 

Culinary Matriarch Commanded Legendary NOLA Restaurant

Ella Brennan was a  giant among restaurateurs in New Orleans as was her reputation for establishing and running one of this country’s most renowned culinary institutions, Commander’s Palace.  She died this past week at age 92 leaving her daughter, Ti, and niece, Lally, to carry on the reputation of operating  the prestigious restaurant located on the corner of Washington and Coliseum in the  Garden District of New Orleans.

Whether you arrive by carriage or car, Commander’s Palace is ready to serve you.

Indeed, Commander’s has become part of my own tradition since my husband and I  started going to New Orleans 17 years ago.  We originally went to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary.  We’ve returned year after year for a winter-break.  Usually, we only stay a week, but it’s been enough time for us to become very familiar with the city and its outlying area, to make some very good friends and to sample lots of good food all over the city in its too many to mention restaurants.

The mosaic seal in the lobby at Commander’s Palace notes the year it was established.

Every year, however, Commander’s is at the top of our list as the way we start our visit.  It has become our personal tradition to make the Garden District restaurant our first stop for Sunday jazz brunch.  Without brunch at Commander’s I honestly don’t know how to begin our trip.  There have been a couple of years when I failed to phone early enough (a month in advance is advised) to book our table and no reservation was available.  Fortunately, Jimmy, the reservation agent who I’ve come to know over the years, told me to call back a few days before our given Sunday because often there will be an opening.  When I did, as I had to do this year, we’ve managed to get in.  I have been so thankful for this accommodation on these times that I now take a little box of chocolates for Jimmy in gratitude.

Ti Martin, one of the restaurant owners, right, in a photo with me during one of my visits.

What makes Commander’s so special is not only the delicious Creole-style food served on its menu (recently updated by current executive chef Tory McPhail who hails from nearby Ferndale, WA.), but its impeccable service, lovely surroundings, fun, relaxing atmosphere, the jazz music played while you eat and Southern hospitality shown by its owners, Ella, her sister Dottie, and the aforementioned Ti and Lally.  Whenever Ti and Lally are in-house, they tend to alternate shifts, they make it a point to walk through their dining rooms to greet and check on their customers, whether or not they know them.

Birthdays celebrants at Commander’s are presented with a chef’s hat along with your dessert, like this bread pudding soufflé.

I’ve had wonderful conversations with them both over the years, had the chance to introduce them to friends who’ve joined us for the meal and to tell them time and again how much I love their restaurant.  I have celebrated anniversaries, birthdays and Carnival with friends and family there, just as many New Orleanians do.  I’ve seen parties of grandmothers, mothers and daughters who’ve come in after church, all wearing a single strand of pearls, to celebrate a special occasion.  I’ve enjoyed overhearing excited chats by tables of tourists experiencing Commanders for the first time.  And I’ve had the immense pleasure of taking my own friends and family their for their first meal.

Ella Brennan’s restaurant is more than just a place to eat fine food, it’s a place where these sort of traditions are established and carried on by generations of patrons, for whom, like myself, life or a visit in New Orleans is unheard of without Commander’s.

Reopening after Hurricane Katrina, Commander’s hung out its ‘Now Hiring’ sign. My friend, Mary Lou and I were among the first diners that year.

After Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005, leaving considerable damage to Commander’s as well as the rest of the Garden District, largely due to the high force winds, people wondered if Commander’s would re-open.  For the Brennan ladies in charge, there apparently was no question.  They took the disaster as an opportunity to rebuild and renovate. It took them more than a year.

I walked by the winter after the storm to find it all boarded up.  But then I returned the following year when it was back in business, listened to Lally as she described to me the full extent of the restoration and relished in the fact that it, like New Orleans, was resilient and determined to get back on its feet, despite a lack of support from some in government.  That was the year that I talked with the group of women sitting at the table next to me, heard their ‘storm stories’ and learned that their Episcopal church had been the recipient of recovery funds from the Episcopalian diocese in Washington state.  Their gratitude was touching.

Typically, I ask for a table in the dining area overlooking Commander’s tree-covered courtyard because I feel more like a ‘local’ there and enjoy sitting at eye-level with the big, gnarly branches of the Southern oak that stretches over it.  The chairs are cushioned and tables are arranged with plenty of room between for the jazz trios that play during brunch (one usually cruises downstairs while a second plays upstairs) to maneuver their instruments, including a stand-up bass, between to play requests. Every now and then, diners are coaxed into a joining a ‘second line’to wave their napkins as they wind through the dining room.

Brunch guests join the restaurant’s jazz trio in an impromptu second line parade through the dining room.

The menu is extensive and all of it tasty.  I tend to order the breakfast entrees, rather than the luncheon selections, whenever we go but had the pecan-crusted gulf fish this year instead of my favorite Cochon de Lait Eggs Benedict.  Of course you must order a ‘starter’ to begin–the turtle soup is always popular as is the gumbo but I usually opt for a seasonal salad, quite often topped with fresh, local strawberries.  I always save room for dessert because Commander’s creole bread pudding soufflé with whiskey cream sauce is not to be missed!  It’s a once a year splurge that I’m not willing to pass up.  And to drink, a Bloody Mary or Mimosa followed by chicory coffee for those, unlike me, who consume coffee.

Commander’s courtyard and the trumpet on break during a Sunday brunch.

While the food is wonderful, it’s the little touches that make the meal even more memorable–fresh, crusty French bread laid on the table in a wrapped white linen napkin nearly as soon as you sit down; bus boys and girls who refill your water the instant the level drops much below two-thirds of a glass; the simultaneous serving of each course by the black and white attired wait staff; the cheery, welcome by the maitre d’ the minute you step in the door and of course the personal table visits by the owners.

After eating, I enjoy strolling through the rest of the restaurant, including a stop in the spacious and sparkling clean kitchen (the swinging doors leading into it are labeled “Yes” and “No”) where you can watch the amazing cook staff in action.  There is even a table in the kitchen where diners can sit and watch the show if you reserve it.

Diners are welcome and can even eat in the kitchen where you can watch the cook staff in action.

If it’s Carnival season, as it was this year when I was in town, you’re invited to go watch the parades moving along St. Charles Street just a few blocks away and welcome to return to Commander’s for the toilet should the need arise.  Or, if not, we wander through the historic neighborhood, admiring the elegant, old homes there, which include Miss Brennan’s herself located right next door to the restaurant.  If someone is with us who has never visited the city before, we walk through the Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, across the street, the oldest city-operated cemetery where the tombs are above-ground and the statuary and inscriptions represent New Orleans’ rich history.

The elegant dining room on the main floor of Commander’s Palace as viewed through the glass window in the restaurant’s lobby.

For me, Commander’s is the consummate culinary experience with outstanding food, unsurpassed service and Southern hospitality at its finest. These are the qualities that Ella Brennan insisted be carried out in her beloved restaurant. They are standards to which other eating establishments throughout the U.S. have aspired to achieve as a result. Whether or not you’ve ever been to Commander’s it’s possible that you’ve eaten somewhere that has been influenced by her example.

If you’ve not yet been to the New Orleans restaurant, I hope you’ll consider making it part of your visit when you go.  But be forewarned, it still maintains a dress code that is enforced although it’s been relaxed some in recent years.  I guarantee it will be a culinary experience you’ll not forget and it might become, as it has for us, a new tradition.

 

 

Totem Memorializes Local Tragedy

On this weekend in the U.S., people are honoring the memories of the country’s military  who died in action. But another memorial is on my mind today prompted by an article that appeared the other day in the local newspaper.  That is the beautiful totem pole memorial that stood along the trail of Whatcom Creek on the edge of Whatcom Falls Park in our city.

The healing totem was especially beautiful in the spring when the trees surrounding it flowered.

Sadly, the totem was recently removed, I read in the Bellingham Herald after someone vandalized and ‘tagged’ the pole with graffiti.  Not long ago, a friend of mine had told me that the box that sat atop the pole, was missing and wondered why.  Now the entire pole and the two carved wooden benches that sat beside it are gone after city workers removed them and placed them in protective storage until they can be restored.

While the city’s action is commendable, that of the vandals was disrespectful and, frankly, inexcusable.  I am giving those individuals the benefit of the doubt that they apparently are unaware of that they not only did they deface a significant Native artwork, but in so doing they insulted the artist, the Lummi Nation and the families of those killed in the 1999 Bellingham pipeline explosion for whom the pole was intended to memorialize.

The vibrant, bold colors of the totem can be seen in this detail of a salmon.

The 15-foot cedar log pole was created by the Lummi House of Tears carvers under the direction of Lummi Nation’s master carver Jewell James. Its bright, bold and beautiful paint was applied under the supervision of head painter Ramona James.  The pole took months to carve and paint before finally being erected and dedicated during an Earth Day ceremony in 2007.   “The pole is to restore the stream and its habitat and to remember the three boys who lost their lives,” carver James told American Profile reporter Heather Larson.

James referred to the three boys–Liam Wood, 18, Wade King and Stephen Tsiovras, both 10, who were killed when the Olympic pipeline (now owned by British Petroleum) carrying gasoline exploded dumping an estimated 277,000 gallons into the creek that runs through Whatcom Falls Park, located in the middle of Bellingham.  Liam was fishing after having just graduated from high school; Wade and Stephen were playing, as they often did together, further down creek.  It was a day that darkened the sky over Bellingham as the black cloud billowed above the park.  The explosion literally stopped life in town as everyone, myself included, wondered what had happened and emergency first responders rushed to the site.

Lummi Nation master carver Jewell James speaks at the dedication ceremony.

The explosion made national news, changed national pipeline regulation (although the families of those who died will tell you not enough) and some believe awoke Bellingham to the dangers that unregulated and aging pipelines pose for not only our city, but others like it throughout the country.

Lummi Nation tribal members as well as family and Bellingham community members gathered on April 20, 2007 to dedicate the healing totem.

I was present, along with a few others, on the day of Lummi Nation gave and dedicated the totem and benches to the city. The ceremony was emotional and moving with other Pacific Northwest Native Nations witnessing the event in order to pass the story along to the next generation. Those gathered listened solemnly as carver James spoke eloquently about the need to promote healing for all those impacted by the explosions, wildlife as well as human life, and about the importance of being good stewards of the environment.  Members of the Lummi Nation, also delivered a heartfelt messages for the family members attending. Lummi drummers and flutists played.  Blankets were draped around the shoulders of the deceased boys’ young friends, now high school students, participating in the unveiling during the ceremony.

The parents of Wade King, Frank and Mary, watch as their son’s personal belongings are placed into the memorial box on the totem.

Then, James asked the family members of the victims to bring forward the items that they had brought to be placed into the memorial box positioned atop the totem.  One by one the personal belongings of Stephen and Wade were handed up the tall ladder to the tribal member who carefully laid them inside.  A teddy bear, a baseball card and cap were among the things. The lid was fitted tightly and sealed.  Tears streamed down the faces of not only the family members but others who were that day.

And, as the ceremony was ending, two solitary eagles soared and glided over head, just as James had told Wade’s mother, Mary, earlier that day that they would.

As if on cue, two majestic eagles appeared, silhouetted in the sky, as the totem’s dedication ceremony concluded.

It was a day I’ll never forget.  When I read about the vandalism of the totem and its removal, my heart ached.  The city is apparently intent on repairing and restoring the totems and benches but in the meantime, there is a huge emptiness where they stood in the opening by the creek. The runners, walkers and visitors who pass by it will miss it.  The totem served as a somber, dignified reminder, as well as a memorial, to those who tragically died on that early June day in Bellingham.  That’s what’s on my mind this Memorial Day.

Love Loved Life

I didn’t make or send any Mother’s Day cards this year.  Making cards and sending them to my Mom and my aunts was something I always enjoyed and had done for many years after leaving home and living on my own.  Sadly, I my Mother passed away six years ago, (simply hard to believe still) and the last of my many aunts died only a month ago leaving me now with only two uncles whom I love and keep in close touch.

It’s an odd feeling to go from having such a large, extended family to such a compact one although I have many cousins who now make up the family network.  I was fond of all my aunts and feel fortunate to have had them throughout the greater part of my life. And now that I don’t, it’s disconcerting.

My mother’s sisters and brothers assembled for a rare photo together taken in 1944. From left: Norman (on leave from the War), Austin, my mother, Phyllis (in front), Oleta (the oldest sister), Lavetta, Imogene and Hazel

My mother had six sisters and two brothers.  She was the third in line.  They all had names that you don’t run across everyday, even for the time that they were growing up:  Oleta, Hulda Victoria (whom we called Hazel), Ollie Nadine (my mom), Jesse Imogene, Lavetta and lastly, Phyllis.

My aunt Phyllis, the baby in the family, passed away two years ago leaving only my aunt Lavetta, who died last month.  I hadn’t seen Lavetta in several years although we kept in touch through Christmas cards and correspondence.  But during the past two years, dementia took its toll and it became difficult to connect with her although she still responded and remembered her brother Norman (my uncle) who played his harmonica for her whenever he phoned.

The sisters and brothers assembled again for a photo in 1985 at the cemetery where their grandparents, father and oldest sister are buried. They were there to honor their grandparents who immigrated from Sweden. From left: my mother, Hazel, Norman, Austin, Phyllis, Lavetta and Imogene.

As a kid, she was pretty mischievous and was often sucked into trouble by her older and younger brothers.  Once, so the story goes, her younger brother talked her into laying her finger down onto a tree stump whereupon he then sliced off a chunk of it with his little hatchet.  Whether it was an accident or intentional, her brother was severely punished. My grandmother managed to save Lavetta’s finger without a doctor’s assistance, although I don’t recall exactly how.

One of her jobs on the Missouri farm where my Mother’s family then lived, was to bring the cow up from the pasture to the barn. Lavetta often did so by riding the cow instead of herding it in.  She could never retell or listen to the story without breaking into laughter, I suppose from recalling what must have been a very bumpy ride.

One of my favorite photos of my aunt Lavetta taken by my father on the tennis courts where she lived.

I always thought Lavetta was quite beautiful with her big dark eyes, short, always stylish dark hair and bright smile. She was also very athletic her entire life, who, like my Mom enjoyed playing softball when growing up.  She also was skilled on the tennis court, or at playing badminton or in the swimming pool. Later she took up bowling in which she regularly competed until back problems caused her to curtail those games.  I too have been athletic my entire life which may be one reason I always admired ‘Love’ as the family called her, and welcomed the chance to play a game of tennis with her whenever she visited.

Lavetta, with her first husband, Gene, and her daughters, as a young mother.

Lavetta began a career as a flight attendant, back in the days when they were referred as ‘stewardesses.’ She left that behind when she married my uncle Gene and started a family.  My family often travelled up to the Chicago area where they lived to visit them.  Together we’d go to the Lincoln Park Zoo, the Museum of Science and Industry, Marshall-Field’s big department store in downtown or once, made the trek together up to the scenic Wisconsin Dells.  I have fond memories of those visits.

She later remarried after her first husband died suddenly of a heart problem.  With her second husband, Lavetta attended the family reunions in Missouri’s Ozarks where they took part in the skits that my aunt Hazel had written, sometimes dressing up in hillbilly or sailor costumes as the part she played may have called for.  Her new husband, Del, was a vocal teacher who had a beautiful baritone voice and together they’d sing old songs to entertain those gathered for the reunion and dance to tunes that my mother’s generation loved.  Del even made a CD collection of those songs for us recording a personal introduction to each  track.

My aunts Lavetta, left, and Imogene wearing their warm, plush Mouton coats. I now own Lavetta’s coat and wear it whenever the weather is cold enough to do so.

Simply said, Love loved life and loved to laugh.  While she had her serious moments, it was her big laugh, along with that acquired Chicago-area accent that I recall best.  Now that laugh is silenced forever and I have only my memories, my photographs, the CD collection and a fabulous Mouton coat that once belonged to her to keep her close. She and my other aunts are no doubt having a wonderful time together again in their afterlives.

I miss all of them dearly, especially on days like this one when I would have popped five or six Mother’s Day cards into the mail.  Our time together now seems relatively short-lived but full and rich.  Happy Mother’s Day to my Mom and my dear aunts. You still live in my memory.

Picture Yourself Paddling

One of my great pleasures about living in the Pacific Northwest is the past time of paddling in my kayak.  It’s an activity that I took up many years ago now after moving to this area upon the encouragement of a friend.

When you live in the Puget Sound and Samish Sea area, you are surrounded by water.  I can’t imagine not taking advantage of the recreational opportunities to be enjoy the natural beauty of being on the water.  As I don’t own a sail or motor boat, kayaking is the way I do it.

These two geese were just taking off when I caught them with my camera. Wildlife in motion often produces more dramatic images than those that are still and lifeless.

For me, paddling provides time away from the distractions on land. There are no cell phones, no computers, no televisions, nothing to draw your attention from the task at hand, which is how it should be whenever you’re out there on the water.  Not paying attention to the currents, the wind, the waves and the weather can run you into trouble faster than you realize.

The reflection of light on the water always draws my eye. It’s always different and fascinating, truly a ‘watercolor.’

I often carry a camera in my boat with me, usually one of my point and shoots so that I don’t risk damaging my single-lens reflex digital cameras.  I’ve never invested in a watertight case for my SLRs, something that is on my equipment ‘wish list.’ Usually, I tuck my little compact camera safely inside my life vest (never go out without one) where I can yank it quickly out if I see something I want to try to capture.

One of the tricks of shooting on the water, especially in a kayak, is how to stay in place, bobbing up and down, in order to get the shot.  It’s not easy. That’s particularly true if you’re trying to photograph wildlife on the shore. Without a super long lens, I must quietly slip up close to whatever it is I want to photograph until I think I’m in a good range. Trust me, this is not the way the National Geographic shooters do it but it works for me most of the time. I’ve become pretty adept at handling my paddles.

The oyster catcher is one of a pair that makes their home on the island in Chuckanut Bay. This Oyster Catcher wasn’t disturbed by my efforts to photograph is against the evening sky so I managed to nab a nice profile of it surveying its nesting domain.

I like going out just before sunset. The water is generally smoother then, the light not so glaring and the colors can be stunning.  Early morning is a good time too, especially if there are nice clouds.

Even though I tend to paddle in the same waters here in my area, I never lack material to photograph.  The water, the shore, the sky seldom look the same. One day there’s a seal, the next there’s not. Some summers the oyster catchers are there with a new brood, sometimes they’re scare.  Sometimes that sunset you anticipate never materializes, sometimes it’s so saturate in color that you’d swear someone has “photoshopped” it onto the sky.

Paddling together on the water at sunset during the season of luminescence. It’s an especially magical time.

And never, never do I go out alone. That’s just asking for problems, no matter how expert a kayaker you are.  A paddle partner also gives me someone else to photograph against the vast, open scene.  My paddle partners have become quite accustomed to serving as models for my photographic expeditions.

Only two of the many photographs I’ve made while paddling appear in the show at Stone’s Throw Brewery, up through April.  I’ve shared with you here a few of the others.  Seeing these images in print, however, offers quite a different experience than viewing them here on-line so I hope that if you’re in the area you’ll stop by and have a look.

This is one of my friends with whom I frequently paddle, Its’ the same paddler as the one seen in the large print on display now at Stone’s Throw Brewery. I hope you’ll see it.

 

Sip a Brew, Have a View at Fairhaven Artwalk

March is Women’s History Month.  And while I’m not history yet, I  was invited by  Stone’s Throw Brewery to show some of my photographic art from my portfolio this month because I  am a woman photographer .

The collection on display at Stone’s Throw Brewery includes images taken at Mount Baker National Forest.

Brewery co-owners Tony Luciano and Jack Pfluege selected six images from my art portfolio to display on their walls in celebration of women, art and adventure. The two are alumni of Western Washington University who returned to Bellingham to follow their dream of creating a brewery that would truly capture the spirit of sustainability, community, and adventure.  It’s a cozy little place nestled in Bellingham’s historic Fairhaven district.  Over the past two years, Stone’s Throw has developed a steady clientele who  come to enjoy the friendly atmosphere, sit on the sunny upstairs deck, warm up by the fire pit in their beer garden or  listen to the music by played by locals in the evening while sipping a glass of their tasty beer accompanied by barbecue, pizza or sandwiches provided by nearby restaurants or visiting food trucks.

The Pacific Northwest is a paddler’s paradise precisely because of evening’s like this.

On March 31st, Stone’s Throw will host its second anniversary Block Party, a good way to kick off the spring.

But before then, this upcoming Friday, March 23, the brewery will be one of the stops on the Fairhaven Fourth Friday Art Walk from 5 to 8:30 p.m.  Yours truly will be there to welcome gallery strollers and to share stories about the prints in the show and about my photography art work.

One of six prints now on exhibit through April at the Stone’s Throw Brewery. The Tulip Truck was taken in the Skagit Valley tulip fields.

The six prints selected represent only a small portion of my portfolio some of which can be found on-line in my Art Prints album  or in my Beauty of Bellingham album. Some of the images in these albums you may have seen before on the programs, brochures or websites of the Bellingham Festival of Music or CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival.  The prints in the Stone’s Throw show are all available for purchase and are large, wall-sized art prints framed and ready to display in your business or home.  Some are available in other sizes so if you see one you like but need a different size to fit your space, let me know.

The beauty of Chuckanut Drive has long caught the eye of photographers, my own being no exception.

All the images were made here in Bellingham’s backyard: on the water, at the mountain, in town or in nearby Skagit Valley. They represent an aspect of my photography work that I don’t often publicly display, although it can be readily found on the Fine Art page of my website.  During the two months of the show, I thought it would be fun to share with you the stories behind each here on my blog.

I hope you’ll enjoy them as much as I do. Please stop by the Brewery on March 23rd during the Art Walk. for a brew and a view.

 

 

The Whitney Preserves the Darker Side of Southern U.S. History

We’re in the final days of Black History Month here in the U.S.  I don’t want it to end without writing about a  new destination I visited earlier this month while in New Orleans.

The last day of my annual retreat to New Orleans was spent visiting one of the many plantations open to tourists and school groups on what is known as River Road, the two-lane highway that winds north along the Mississippi on the opposite bank from the Crescent City. As the National Park Service says: “Although other states have their own River Roads, perhaps none is more evocative or famous than Louisiana’s. Here, the very name inspires a vision of white pillared houses standing amid lush gardens and trees dripping with Spanish moss.”

The Antioch Baptist Church is the first stop on the tour of The Whitney Plantation.

While that is true, River Road also represents a much darker, less charming story of our country’s history that is seldom told during the tours of these showy homes and that is the story of those who actually built these splendid structures, who worked the fields that stretched behind and who lived an existence of enslavement fearing that any day they could be sold off to another “master” and forced to leave their family.  Except at one of these historic plantations, the story of slavery is its entire focus.

Opened in 2014, the Whitney Plantation is one of the newer properties for public and educational tours.  During the many years that I have been going to New Orleans for a winter break, I have visited nearly all, if not all, the other plantation properties.  They have been interesting, to be sure, and wonderful places to photograph.  Last year, I went out the Destrehan Plantation, located just 22 miles west of downtown New Orleans.  I took my son, who had never visited a plantation, there this year.

The heads of the slaves executed for participating in the Slave Rebellion of 1811 were placed on stakes along River Road as warning to other slaves. These clay sculpture heads honor those executed in The Whitney’s Field of Angels.

Destrehan makes a point of talking and including some individual stories of the enslaved in its tours, unlike other plantations. To be honest, I had never heard about the Slave Revolt of 1811 until I visited Destrehan. It certainly wasn’t in any of the history books I had read in school.  I wrote a piece for this blog about Destrehan last year.  The plantation is one I’d highly recommend to you.

The Whitney, however, is solely dedicated to preserving the memory and history of the enslaved. The stories you’ll hear on your tour are not storybook sweet nor romanticized.  Life for those who were chained and brought to this country like cattle, or less, in the filthy holds of ships, was never romantic.  The Whitney seeks to basically tell it like it truly was, as accurately as possible, without sparing words for the way these hard-working, brutalized and largely disrespected people were treated by those who considered them as nothing but property found on their list of valuable belongings.

Cheryl, our Whitney docent and tour guide, takes the history of the plantation personally as she talks before the Wall of Honor.

As Cheryl, my guide for the tour who lives and grew up in the area, said:  “For me, this is not history, it’s personal.”  She quite likely had ancestors who were slaves, if not on the Whitney, somewhere else.  Her words and descriptions of what slave life was like were full of emotional fact.  And as she herself said: “Sometimes hard to hear or read.” Like the fact that no slave escaped the punishment of the slave driver’s rawhide whip. Even pregnant slaves who “misbehaved” were forced to lie face down, with he ground below dug out to accommodate their swollen belly, to receive their lashings.

In the Whitney’s museum you learn about Louisiana slave history.

The visit starts in the Whitney’s small museum while waiting for your tour time which start hourly from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. There you’ll read a little history about their journey from the Ivory to Gulf Coast, view the timeline of slavery throughout history worldwide and gain a little perspective as to how slavery in the U.S. contributed to this country’s disgraceful history.

Outside, on the plantation grounds, you’re first stop is at the picturesque Antioch Baptist Church, for many years the only African-American church in the area. The church was donated and moved to The Whitney from another location on the east bank.

The life-size clay sculptures of Woodrow Nash pay tribute to the children of Whitney.

Inside you’ll find beautiful, life-size clay sculptures of the children of the Whitney, created by artist Woodrow Nash.   Their individual stories and pictures are found on the laminated lanyards given to you when you begin the tour for you take home as a memento of the visit here.

There’s also a stop at The Wall of Honor and Field of Angels where those lived and died in slavery are remembered.  The original 22 cabins once that once housed the 61 slaves of the Haydel plantation, as it was then known, were torn down in the late 1970s. The ones that stand on the property today were moved there from other plantations.

The slaves lived a sparse hard life in cabins, such as this, on the plantation.

The “Big House”  is one of the earliest and finest examples Creole style plantation homes in Louisiana and is one of the best preserved.   Somewhat more modest than others found on River Road, it is, however, architecturally and historically significant. It provides visitors with a glimpse of how the plantation owner’s family enjoyed the comforts of life while those they depended upon to provide it lived in simple, crowded wooden quarters within view of the back gallery.

A family touring the Whitney poses for a photo outside the Big House.

The centerpiece on the property is the rusty-brown box-car shaped slave jail placed directly in line with the Big House. More like a cage, the ‘jail’ originally stood elsewhere and held slaves waiting to go on the auction block.  Step inside and you feel a chill of those who once were shackled and confined here.

The rusty iron doors of the slave jail locked in many an enslaved person before being moved to The Whitney’s property.

Walking around the Whitney was one of the most moving and educational experiences I’ve had in my years of going to the area.  I highly recommend it for anyone who’s headed there.  And if you’re not, take a few minutes to read more about The Whitney and its efforts to provide an honest historical perspective of slavery in the U.S. South. It’s sure to be  a story that sticks with you.

Ice Castle Brrrrrrings Fanciful Fun to Winter Weather

When you were a kid did you ever bundle up when the big snow hit, run outside and build a snowman, or a snow house or fort?  I did.  I don’t recall receiving the kind of heavy snows that hit much of the U.S. this week during my years growing up in the Midwest, but there were plenty of winter days that enough of the cold, white snow blanketed the ground to  build a couple of small walls in my aunt’s big vacant lot. We lobbed packed snowballs back and forth at each other by popping up and ducking behind these freezing fortresses until we were so cold and wet that a truce was called and we retreated indoors to warm up with steaming cups of hot chocolate with sticky sweet marshmallows floating on top.

An Ice Castle visitor emerges from the tunnel entry to the open cavern.

Our childhood’s frozen fortresses were fun but nowhere as fancy as the elaborate Ice Castle I visited last winter in Midway, Utah.  I was in Midway attending a film festival conference when, during one of the evening’s gatherings, everyone was invited to see the Ice Castle at the Homestead Resort where we were staying.  It was late, and cold, and I was tired from sitting in meetings all day.  But those who had been at the conference before told me that I must go out and see the castle.

The centerpiece of the castle was a giant birthday cake-like sculpture that inspired an uplifting response from this visitor.

Having no idea what exactly to expect, I grabbed my camera and carefully made my way down the snowy path behind the resort until I came to a lighted entrance. Even as I stepped past the attendants at the arched entry, I didn’t anticipate what was coming.  I walked through an illuminated blue tunnel of icy stalactites looming high above me that revealed at the end to a spectacular, snowy open cavern surrounded by 20 to 35-foot high and 10-foot thick walls of ice.  Sitting in the center was a towering singular free-form sculpture lit like a big birthday cake with light that changed color every few minutes.

People are literally on their hands and knees as they navigate through some of the ice castle’s tunnels.

Off on the sides and built into the walls were tunnels through which other conference attendees were carefully crawling or walking as they took in the beauty of the icy formation that encased them.  At the far end stood the slickest slipper slide I’d ever seen down which sliders sped on their tushes like two human toboggans. The dark silhouettes of bulky-clad visitors wandered the shimmering structure, disappearing in and out of the walls, convening in the center to look like eerie explorers in a strange frigid landscape.

Coming together in the open cavern, the silhouettes of castle visitors look like explorers in an eerie frigid world.

The Ice Castle is a man-made creation designed by a crew of artists who put it together by growing individual icicles and attaching them to one another until they are absorbed into the larger structure. Brent Christensen created the first ice castle creation for his daughter in his front yard of Alpine, Utah. Converting his hobby into a company, he founded the $2 million business, Ice Castles.  His first public installation was constructed in Midway in 2011 at the Zermatt Resort.  It was so popular that he expanded to include his four partners. Today, their company builds ice castles in six locations in the U.S. and Canada and attracts more than a million visitors.  A crew of 50 now do what Brent once did alone.

The water freezes into unpredictable shapes, like this ice feather.

More than just a wintry wonder, the Ice Castles are the setting for outdoor winter concerts, weddings, family outings and conference attractions, like the one I attended.  Of course, the success and the ability of the ice artists to come up with these  castles is weather-dependent.  They start in the fall spraying water through a system of sprinklers onto metal racks that grow the icicles harvested by Christensen’s team and attached to scaffolding that eventually becomes totally covered by ice and develops into unpredictable shapes.

Looking up when walking through one of the tunnels, stalactites stare perilously down upon you.

Yes, walking through a tunnel with thousands of pounds of ice hanging down above you is a bit disconcerting though Ice Castles assures you it’s safe because of the way it is constructed.  The longer you stay, however, the more you’re overcome by the sheer magic of the icy-blue beauty of the castle.  Trepidation is taken over the fascination for how the castle is created and how something so simple as water can transform itself into such an enchanting experience.  Although helped in the process by human touch, Christensen’s ice castles provide yet another reminder of nature’s amazing majesty, even when temperatures are well below freezing.

 

 

Everything’s Coming Up Roses

I switched on the television this morning and there it was, the 129th Annual Tournament of Roses Parade, already well underway.  This parade with its profusion of elaborately expensive flower-decked floats that glide down Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, Ca. while millions of spectators watch from both curbside and in the comfort of their homes via electronic broadcast, has become as much a New Year’s tradition in many American households as has popping a bottle of champagne the night before.

A gigantic orca made entirely of flower seeds leaps by spectators during the 100th Rose Parade. A palm tree, so exotic to me in my youth, frames the scene from our grandstand seats.

Watching the Rose Parade on television was a New Year’s Day tradition in my parents’ home when I was growing up in middle of the country.  Seeing tall palm trees on TV on January first was an exotic sight compared to the gray, bare-branched oaks, elms and maples shivering in the cold outside my hometown window.  Pasadena’s bright blue and sunny skies (it’s only rained 10 times on the parade and only twice in my lifetime), were a Chamber of Commerce advertising postcard that teased those of us stuck in frigid temperatures with winter’s white snow and ice often coating the ground.

That’s exactly why the Tournament of Roses was originated in 1890 by the city’s Valley Hunt Club. The men of this civic organization envisioned the tournament and established a parade of flower decorated horse-drawn carriages as a way to promote their little Southern California city.  Today, the event has developed into one of the biggest New Year’s Day celebrations in the country.  Millions of flowers, buds, seeds and grasses are used to create the floats and make the Rose Parade one of the most beautiful holiday events in the world.

My aunt and uncle with their special bumper sticker that they attached to their motor home for access to the Rose Parade.

When I moved to Los Angeles I wanted to experience the Rose Parade in person.  I never dreamed, as a kid back in Kansas, that one day I would actually huddle alongside all those other people to watch the big floats pass by within yards of where I stood.  I went three times to the parade while living in Southern California.  Veteran Rose Parade-goers will tell you tricks to preparing and staking out the best viewing positions.  For some that means setting up tents the day before and spending the night on the sidewalk along with thousands of other dedicated and determined folks.  The night takes on a festive atmosphere as people bring in the New Year together at their city campsites.

We never camped out choosing instead to arise well before dawn, load up the car with coats, camp stools, ladder, cameras, kids and provisions for the day then drive the 25 miles from our house in the San Fernando Valley to our friends’ home in South Pasadena.  We parked our car in their driveway (a primo place) and hiked towards our desired parade spot.  Experienced parade watchers have their favorite places from which to watch the two-hour moving spectacle.  The first year, we staked out a spot near the start of the parade on California Boulevard and set up a ladder so that we could see over the heads of those lining the street in front of us. Even from our higher elevation, the floats towered above us as they passed by.

My family sat together in the stands for the 100th Rose Parade in 1989.

For the 1989 Rose Parade Centennial,  we were treated to grandstand seats by my uncles and aunts from Phoenix and California who reserved overnight spots for their motor homes in a parking lot right off the parade route.  My parents, who I’m sure never imagined that they would see the Rose Parade firsthand, my brother, Richard, and his young family flew out for the special celebration.  We assembled early at the motor homes for a quick breakfast before the parade began then strolled together to our seats in the grandstand.  We bundled up as it was colder than usual that year and kept ourselves warm by drinking steaming hot cocoa poured from a thermos.  Everyone enjoyed the show except for my two-year-old son who cuddled in my husband’s arms and slept through the entire thing. Afterwards, we retreated to the motor home where we feasted on sandwiches while everyone else streamed out of the stands towards their cars and homes.

My mother, right, and aunt stand alongside a float following the Rose Parade in the post-parade area.

Following lunch, we headed over to where the floats were parked for post-parade viewing open to the public for  a close-up look at the intricate floral work.  Every inch on the floats must be concealed by the flowers or seeds. The colors are even more brilliant and breathtaking when you see each bloom that was painstakingly glued or stuck into place for the day’s parade by the countless volunteers who work through the night before to complete the decorating.  The floats remain in the post-parade viewing area for a few days before being pulled out and towed unceremoniously by tractor to the many warehouses where they are dissembled.

I went for one final Rose Parade with my three sons, then ages five, seven and nine-years-old, in 1995.  My husband chose to stay home. The rest of us arose pre-dawn, packed up the car, drove to Pasadena, parked and walked together up the street to our grandstand seats.  The parade rolled by as we watched live one final time.

In the post-parade viewing area, you get a close look at the flowers that decorate the floats.

Float after float went by interspersed by the marching bands that had come from all over the country to take part.  A little more than midway through the parade, one band in particular caught my eye.  It was the Golden Eagle Marching Band from Ferndale, WA.  Excitedly I pointed out to my sons that this band was from the little town we had visited near Bellingham, where we had vacationed the previous summer.   It had to be serendipitous that the band made its one and only appearance in that Rose Parade. Only two years later, we would be watching  the parade on television from our new home in Bellingham and recalling the New Year’s Days that we had gone to Pasadena to see the Rose Parade.

The 5 Ps For When You Must Leave Include Photos

I’ve been thinking a lot about all my family and friends in Southern California where some of the worst wildfires in the state’s history continue to burn out of control. (Hopefully by the time you read this firefighters will have gained the upper hand.)  Fortunately, the flames have missed most of my family and friends, but last week, two of my dearest friends had to flee their home in the middle of the night.

At the time, theirs was a voluntary evacuation, although the threat has crept ever closer until the fire line is now only a little more than a mile from their home.  They tried to return to their house yesterday to gather a few more belongings but their attempts were thwarted when the main freeway was closed between where they are now staying and their home.

Photos taken of me by my father for our annual Christmas card are among those that I prize now and wouldn’t want to lose in the event of a natural disaster.

They grabbed what they could last week as they quickly abandoned their house.  Among the things that went with them, were their priceless family photo albums and the external hard drives on which they had stored their digital images.

This was on my mind because I’m obviously very concerned and worried for my friends but also because I had heard a television news item earlier last week about the “5 Ps” to take in case you have to evacuate.  Photographs was on the list, along with pets, personal papers, prescriptions and your personal computer.  In a year when this country has seen devastating fires, hurricanes and floods, too many Americans (including those in Puerto Rico where they are still struggling), have had to decide what to take when suddenly told to leave their home.

I have had only one instance in my life when this happened to me. That was the year the 6.7 Northridge earthquake rocked our neighborhood.  When the shaking stopped, we gathered our sons, carried them out to our front lawn and told them not to move while my husband and I went back into the house to collect some items. Plumes of smoke were rising into the air from a nearby fire. We decided to prepare for the worse, not knowing whether another quake would follow or whether the fire would move to our house, pushed by the Santa Ana winds predicted for that day, the same winds driving the terrible fires in Southern California now.

I hadn’t quite learned to sit up in time for my first Christmas as you can see here in this snapshot with my cousins. I particularly love the hand on the right coming in to catch my cousin in case he toppled over.

Among the things I considered essential, were my family’s photo albums and the portraits hanging on my walls. I carried out armful after armful, nearly filling the family van. One reason I could do this was because I kept the albums in one spot and stored the boxes of photos not yet in albums in one place.  This is something I still practice although I now have many more albums, along with the boxes and the photos still to be sorted from my parents’ home.  Some of the photos I couldn’t stand to lose are those from Christmases when I was a kid.

I first wrote about this after the devastating tornado hit Moore, Oklahoma in 2013.  What I said then still goes: nearly everything else, with the exception of family heirlooms, can be covered by insurance or replaced  when destroyed by disaster. But a family’s photographs are truly priceless and often irreplaceable.  I offered then some tips for keeping your photos safe and encourage you to go back for a reminder by clicking here.

Digital photography has made it easier in many ways to archive your precious images by uploading them to a ‘cloud’ storage service, or burning them to CD or storing them on external hard drives, hopefully you do at least two of these.  In addition, make prints of the images that mean the most to you because as wonderful and convenient as ‘cloud’ and digital storage is, there’s still no guarantee that these systems are fail proof. And keep your prints somewhere where you can easily grab them in the event you are ordered to evacuate.

My friends are safe, for now, hoping and waiting for the winds to die down, for fire fighters to gain ground and for the fiery monster approaching their home to be stopped. There is much they will lose if the flames aren’t extinguished, but along with the family pet, their prescriptions, their personal computer they have their family photos.  I hope others who also have had to head for higher ground in rising water, hunker down against a hurricane or run from engulfing fires this year also had the chance to grab their own family’s photos.

None of this matters, of course, if lives are at stake.  There are ways to reconstruct your photographic history if it comes to that, even prior to digital technology.  You may lose some of your most meaningful visual memories, but nothing surmounts the loss of life.

 

A Legacy of Canned Love

This Tuesday,  Nov. 20th, would have been my Dad’s 98th birthday.  It doesn’t always fall this close to Thanksgiving but it did the year my Mother’s passed away.  That was an especially emotional Thanksgiving for all of us.  My family celebrated the holiday with my Dad at my brother’s home in Kansas just days after my Mother’s funeral and my Dad’s 93rd birthday.

My Dad died two years later.  Although he’s no longer here to eat Thanksgiving dinner with us, we still enjoy the fruits of gardening and cooking with the few remaining jars of canned food that he left us. It’s almost as if he’s still sharing a meal with us.

My Dad loved working in his garden and canned the bounty he harvested.

Canning the tomatoes, beets, green beans and cucumbers harvested from his garden brought him great pleasure.  Often, a jar of tomatoes, green relish, piccalilli or, his favorite, stickles would wind up under the Christmas tree as a holiday gift from my Dad.

My Dad’s gardening hat and his hand sickle along with the jars of canned vegetables he made are touching reminders of his love for growing his own food.

Sadly, I didn’t care for the stickles until  recently when I snapped open a jar sitting on my pantry shelf.  I taste tested a tiny bite to determine if the stickle was still safe to eat.  To my surprise, I found it deliciously sweet, not at all what I had expected.  For those of you unfamiliar with this down home delicacy, stickles are made from cucumbers with white vinegar, some drops of green food coloring, celery seed, sugar, some lime and salt. The cucumbers are cut lengthwise into strips and come out sweet and much different from traditional pickles.  My Dad had tried hard to convince me that I would like them but as I’m not a big fan of cucumbers I never did.

My Dad’s handwritten recipes along with the cookbook he liked to use when cooking.

Another favorite of his was pickalilli, a sort of relish made with tomatoes. I think I have only one jar of this remaining. I can remember my Dad saying “Um, that’s good!” when he’d eat a spoonful.

After adding some spoonfuls of his green relish (foreground jar), my Dad samples the filling for his deviled eggs for Thanksgiving.

He also made sweet green tomato relish that he’d mix into the filling for the deviled eggs that he made to that Thanksgiving dinner at my brother’s home.  I’m taking deviled eggs as an appetizer to my friends’ Thanksgiving dinner this year.  There’s a jar of that relish on my refrigerator shelf. I may add some to give the egg filling a little more zip.

Of all his canned creations that we still have, I love the ‘pear honey ‘ the best. I have only one jar left. It’s half empty now. I covet every single spoonful that I spread onto my warm toast, usually for Sunday morning brunch.

I have fond memories of my Dad associated with the pear jam.  It springs from the day that we were driving back to his home after a visit to my brother in Kansas City.  My Dad spotted an aged pear tree growing in a field alongside the highway. The tree obviously had not been pruned or tended for a long time. At my Dad’s request, I pulled over to the shoulder and parked.  He slid out, taking a plastic grocery bag with him as he headed for the tree. “Um boy,” he exclaimed. “Look at all these good pears. These will make some good pear honey.”  I could almost hear him smack his lips.

Spotted growing beside the road, my Dad picks pears from an old tree to take home for cooking and canning.

The few jars left on my shelf are each labeled with the contents in my Dad’s handwriting on a strip of masking tape. I think I’m not going to remove the label when the jar is finally empty because it will still be filled with memories .

 

Halloween Costume Challenges Treated with Homemade Love

I was riding in hired car to the airport yesterday when a young Spider-Man and Princess Jasmine from Disney’s Aladdin movie hopped in with their mother. They were on their way to a school Halloween fair.  Sharing the ride with me kept the fare cost low for us both. Spider-Man, whose name I soon learned was Julio, really wanted to dress as Mickey Mouse but as there were no Mickey Mouse costumes at the store, he had settled for Spider-Man until his mother could finish making him a Mickey Mouse suit.

Wearing their homemade turtle shells, my sons pose for a Halloween photo beside the street’s sewer opening, where the cartoon turtles lived.

The costumes were cute, in that commercial sort of way, but I know the one his mother is crafting will be much better simply because it is homemade and is assembled with love.

I recalled to the mother the year that I had created Ninja Turtle costumes for my three sons. The fact that I could stitch up turtle shells from felt was in itself a fabrication feat.  Now I wonder exactly how I managed it given my limited skills as a seamstress.  And yet, year after year, I seemed to pull together my sons’ costume choice for Halloween.

With Matthew dressed as “The President” my sons are ready to depart for trick-or-treating.

Some years were simpler than others, like the time my oldest son, Matthew, then seven, decided to masquerade as ‘the President.’ He wasn’t interested in impersonating any one particular person who had held our country’s highest office but rather as himself, dressed as, well, the President.

That meant pulling from his closet the one and only suit jacket and dress pants he owned–probably bought for another special holiday or celebration–shining up his shoes, putting on a white dress shirt and tie and handing him a trick or treat bag.  As a finishing touch, he also carried with him a copy of the Constitution.

A disposal painter’s suit, snow boots and Dad’s work gloves transformed my son into an astronaut one Halloween.

The year he landed on being an astronaut was a little more complicated.  We borrowed a helmet and had a big pair of snow boots and his Dad’s work gloves to wear, but what to do for the suit itself?  Finally, I figured  it out. I visited a paint store, picked up a disposal painters suit and stitched on the front and sleeve the Space Shuttle patches bought at NASA’s souvenir store at Edwards Air Force Base when I attended a Space Shuttle landing. The adult size even in small, swallowed my nine-year-old son, but hey, spacesuits aren’t skin tight. He was happy and looked very authentic.

That particular costume was much easier than the Halloween my son Tim chose to be a pumpkin. Fortunately, some bright orange shiny polyester fabric stitched pieces together into a rotund shape with openings for his arms and legs did the trick. We stuffed him with inflated balloons to plump him up and fill him out once he had slipped it on.

My son Tim strikes a Halloween pose in his pumpkin costume before leaving to trick-or-treat.

The pumpkin was less of a creative challenge than the Darkwing Duck request that came from my son, Marshall, one year.  That may have been my finest fitting.  Darkwing Duck was a heroic cartoon character that had captured five-year-old Marshall’s attention.  DD has long since faded into hero obscurity but he was a dapper masked defender dressed in a wide-brimmed hat, short, double-breasted purple jacket with big gold buttons and flowing purple cape. (Don’t ask me why a duck that can fly needed a cape.)

Darkwing Duck with his first-grade teacher at school on Halloween. See how my son’s chin is lifted so he can see out the mask?

In one of my most inspired design moments, I constructed a hat from felt that even a milliner could respect, stitched up a cape from purple fabric, cut big round buttons from bright yellow felt and tacked them on to a purple sweatshirt along with a makeshift collar, and tied a purple satin band that kept slipping out-of-place, over my son’s eyes so that he had to keep lifting his chin to look down through the holes.  He was a fine masked marauder that year. I was grateful when, in the years following, he was content to masquerade as a hockey player by wearing his own hockey sweater and carrying his stick.

Whatever happened to those Ninja Turtle shells I don’t know. I suspect they eventually fell apart with so many hours of play in the days after Halloween. So did the astronaut suit.  Darkwing Duck’s cape lasted longer but it too eventually disappeared.  I’m not completely certain but that pumpkin outfit may still be folded in the bottom of the ‘costume’ box waiting for another Halloween opportunity.

One of the few Halloween costumes that we purchased was the buckskins and coonskin hat for Matthew’s Meriwether Lewis outfit.

Certainly, there were Halloweens when we paid for costumes, the year they went as the Ghost Busters for example, or when Matthew required buckskins and a coonskin cap to become Meriwether Lewis (of Lewis & Clark).  For most Halloween holidays it took a trip to the fabric store or rummaging through our own closets to come up with what I regard as their most memorable masquerade outfits.

I hope Julio’s mother finishes his Mickey Mouse costume in time for trick or treating this upcoming Tuesday night. If she does, I’ll bet that’s the one both she and her son will remember when Halloween comes around in the years ahead.

Celebrating Autumn’s Bounty at Cloud Mountain

Cloud Mountain Farm Center’s Fruit Festival celebrates the bounty of fall.

Fall was in full season at the Fruit Festival this past weekend at the Cloud Mountain Farm Center in Everson, a small town that lies right on the Canadian border.  Until a few years ago, the festival was known as the Harvest Festival and the place was a working farm and native plant nursery known as Cloud Mountain Farm.

My friends, Cheryl and Tom Thornton, owned and operated the farm for 33 years. Seven years ago, the farm was converted into a non-profit learning center dedicated to providing hands-on learning experiences to aspiring farmers, experienced farmers, and home gardeners, continuing the work the Thorntons have always done through the years.

A volunteer shows two youngsters how to press apples for cider.

The Thorntons still live at the farm but now they are joined everyday by as many as eight paid interns who participate in an eight-month educational program to learn the practices of good, sustainable farm techniques. They study plant propagation, tree fruit production, viticulture, market development, and vegetable production to prepare them to be farm owners, key farm employees or entrepreneurs and professionals involved in the agricultural industry or advocacy.

People from all over the region seek out Tom’s advice and expertise.

At the heart of it, of course, are my friends, Cheryl and Tom.  Cheryl handles most of the business and marketing side of the farm, as she has done for years.  Tom oversees the hands-on educational side, as he has done for years becoming one of, if not the apple expert in Washington state and maybe the region.  People from all over have brought their fruit and vegetable-growing questions to Tom and learned from his expertise through the hundreds of workshops he’s conducted for weekend gardeners and industry professionals.

My husband and I headed out to the farm yesterday morning, as we have done in many years past but not recently, to see what was going on. Although the day was cloudy (it is Cloud Mountain remember?) and chilly, the back field by the grape vines were already full of cars when we arrived shortly after it opened. Little kids were scampering down the road from the field to the festival area with their parents close behind.  Lines were already formed at the tasting tent where visitors could sample all the different types of apples, pears, cherries, grapes grown on the farm.

I stopped off first at the farm’s main barn to say ‘Hello’ to Cheryl, who was at the register checking out festival goers purchasing  five-pound bags of apples and pears. As she became busier, I wandered off to a hot-house where the band, Bridge, had begun to play.

The band, Bridge, entertained while festival goers sampled fruit.

Music has always been part of the festival and listening to Bridge reminded of the year that the band in which my sons and Thorntons’ daughter, Julia, performed at the festival. They were middle-schoolers at the time, all students of musician Ginny Snowe, a wonderful piano teacher who had put the band together in a summer music camp. The kids turned out to be so enthusiastic and good that they stayed together long after the camp to write music and play gigs at schools, festivals and other events.

While still middle schoolers, the band Switch played at Cloud Mountain’s Harvest Festival.

Known as Switch, their little band actually launched the music careers of some of the band members, including Julia who’s now a professional musical director and pianist; Jeff, who’s rapidly becoming one of the country’s best classical saxophonists and finishing up a PhD at the University of Michigan; and my son, Marshall, a drummer who’s plays professionally with several bands in Seattle one of them being, until recently the funk band, The Fabulous Party Boys.  (The band was a subject of another of my blog posts.)

Take a guess at the weight of the pumpkin and win a prize if you’re right.

Julia also grew pumpkins that she harvested each fall and sold at the festival to earn money for college. The pile of pumpkins is still there but Julia no longer grows them. Her sister, Cara, however, had brought her young daughters from Seattle for the day to help out and perhaps start another family tradition at the festival.

Sue swirls caramel onto an apple during the Fruit Festival.

As Bridge played, volunteers Sue and Burt Weber, twirled thick, yummy caramel around Cloud Mountain apples to hand to young customers. Cooks from Bellingham’s restaurant, Keenan’s, was serving up tasty snack dishes made from local products at the farm at another table. And another volunteer was answering questions and sharing material about the farm center at a third table.

I headed over to the tasting tent where Tom was slicing up pieces of pears for people. He handed me a slice of Rescue, a pair so named because, as he explained, a nursery grower near Vancouver, Washington (Buckley, WA. to be exact) found the species and saved the tree from being destroyed.  The fruit was sweet and buttery and nearly melted in my mouth.  Next, Tom gave me sample of the Seckel pear,that Tom said is considered native to Pennsylvania, maybe the only true American pears. It’s said to be named after a local farmer who found a “wild sapling” growing on a farm just outside Philadelphia late 1700’s, according to some accounts.  The small, reddish-brown pear has a creamy texture and a sweet taste.

Considered the only true American pear, the Seckel was found growing wild on a farm in Pennsylvania in the late 1700s.

My taste tests were interrupted by another pear sampler who had questions for Tom about her own pear trees. This is the kind of thing that happens to Tom all the time, no matter where he is because gardeners and growers locally know that he carries a wealth of agricultural information in his head.

I moved on to the cherry and grape tables before calling it a morning.  People were still arriving as we climbed back into our car with the carton of Cloud Mountain cider and a bag of  apples.  A visit to their farm is always special and welcome, but particularly went the Fall Fruit Festival is underway.  If you missed it this year, there will be another next year.  It’s a great way to start the season and to celebrate the beauty and bounty of this fabulous farm.

Parting Shots to Last a Lifetime

Western Washington University here in Bellingham welcomed back its 14,000 students this week as classes for the fall quarter got underway.  Hundreds of students, faculty and staff, led by WWU President Sabah Randwana, walked together from the hilltop campus to downtown for the Paint B’Ham Blue celebration, now in its second year. But before the evening procession, students and parents went through their own ritual of saying good-by to one another.

My son, center, was busily making new friends before the traditional procession through the streets of the campus and too busy to notice that I was capturing the moment.

A week or two earlier, I watched as my neighbor’s son packed his car up to head back to college and as his parents followed as he pulled out the drive, his mother, camera in hand, snapping a few last photos as he drove off.  I was enjoying the moment and reliving in my own mind the same experience when my own sons left home and I said good-by knowing that life at home would never be the same.

Like my neighbors, I too snapped photos of my sons as they either packed up, unpacked or departed for their years away at college.  With each one, the last good-by was a little different and full of mixed emotions.  I’m sure those of you who’ve had children can vividly recall that day of departure, whether it was heading off to college or to living on their own.

During a visit to University of Oregon, my son Matthew consented to a photo at the main gate of the campus. Doesn’t he look thrilled? Still, I love this photo.

I’m glad to have the photos I took on those memorable days.  When I look back at them, the memories come rushing back as fresh as the day it happened.  Those snapshots give me a tangible tie to that moment in time and I was heartened to see my neighbor going through the same motions that I had gone through 10 years ago.  I first wrote about those good-byes four years ago in my blog post “Autumn’s First Day Moves In.”

Before moving in to his dorm behind him, Marshall let me grab this photo of him, suitcase in hand.

No doubt my sons were a little embarrassed by their mother clicking away when they arrived on campus although I certainly was not alone in insisting I take one more photo before leaving them. It is heartening to me to see parents still repeating those same actions, capturing images, now on their phones as well as with cameras, so that they’ll have them to look back upon later.  I hope they download and print out these precious memories so that they’ll truly have them forever and not lose them to a mishap with the ‘cloud’ or computer or phone.  If they do, they’ll have them for their sons or daughters long after college graduation.

I am grateful to my sons who allowed me, and continue to allow me, to photograph them during these life events and everyday moments, particularly at times when it might not otherwise have seemed ‘cool’ to do so.

My son indulged me in a photo together before we said good-by on his college move-in day.

Every fall, when I watch the new students and their parents arrive at the neighboring university, their cars pulling one after another into the dormitory parking lots, the boxes and duffles and suitcases being carried up to the rooms where they will live for the next several months, I am genuinely pleased as parents pose their freshman for one last parting shot so that they too will have the image to reflect upon when they go home alone.  The scene brings a small smile to my face, a tiny tear to my eye and the tug on my heart.

 

Battling It Out on the Court

A new movie comes out this week based on the 1973 tennis match between women’s tennis legend Billie Jean King and former men’s pro player, Bobby Riggs.  Both the movie and the now historic match is known as the “Battle of the Sexes” that pitted the athletic talents and skill of a woman, Billie Jean, against those of her male competitor.

Billie Jean King at Virginia Slims Tennis Tournament, 1975

But before Billie Jean and Bobby played took to the court on Sept. 20, 1973 for their televised match before 30,000 live spectators, there had been a far lesser known, less viewed such match in my small Kansas hometown.  I know because I was one of the two on the court facing across the net my high school’s boy’s tennis champ, John Hoffman.  John probably doesn’t even remember this less publicized event. Neither did I until I heard an interview on television’s CBS Sunday Morning with King.

I started playing tennis in junior high school, learning to swing a racquet and hit a ball by batting it against the concrete block wall of the gas station next door to my parent’s motel with a chalk mark indicating the height of the net.  To practice my serves, I’d go to the high school tennis courts and hit ball after ball over the net into the service court on the opposite side. On one of these occasions, I noticed an older, thin, almost gaunt gray-haired man, leaning against a black Cougar car with hounds-tooth checked rag top, watching me practice.

One of the few photos of me competing on the court was taken during a tournament in Scottsdale, Az. in 1974.

The man introduced himself as Jimmy Dodds. And Jimmy, formerly a tennis pro and coach in Los Angeles (Beverly Hills to be specific), took me on as one of his protégés. I will write another future blog post about him.

Under Jimmy’s tutelage and inspired by women tennis stars of the day, especially Billie Jean, I became a better and better player until I was competing in and winning local tournaments. I would have been on the high school girls’ tennis team but there were no girls sports teams then in that pre-Title IX era. Instead, I had to play for the local community college whenever I could or play against the boys, which I often did.

Women were making their voices heard about wanting the same recognition and opportunities men received in the workplace as well as everywhere else. And none of them were stronger on the tennis court than Billie Jean King. Billie Jean campaigned for equal prize money for women in the pro tournaments and led the efforts to establish a women’s pro tour.  She became the first President of the women player’s tennis union when it was founded in 1973.  And, with her then husband Larry King, created the Women’s Sports Foundation and launched the magazine, womenSports, for which I would later submit and write a feature or two.

Billie Jean King and Margaret Court head back to the court after a brief court side breather between games at a Virginia Slims Tennis Tournament, 1975 in Phoenix.

So it was against this early 1970s background that I stepped onto the court with my Wilson aluminum frame racquet to play a match against John.  The challenge came as the result of a friendly feud between the high school’s two gym teachers, Coach Martin and Ms. Stokes.  Ms. Stokes had compete confidence in my tennis talents and I don’t think cared much for Coach Martin. The exact details now escape me but at some juncture, Ms. Stokes told Coach Martin that she thought I could beat John on the court. Martin, being a bit of a sexist himself, of course scoffed at the idea. But when it was suggested that the two of us duel in a tennis match, Coach Martin accepted. I don’t remember that John and I had much to say about it except to agree to participate. I had, after all, played a lot with and against John at the City Park tournaments and open court nights.

The match took place one afternoon after school, I remember. Few, if anyone was there to watch except Janine and Coach Martin. John had a strong, fast serve and I always felt fortunate to be able to return it, let alone place the return shot somewhere strategically on the court.  He had a lanky body that disguised his muscle strength but was perfectly suited for tennis, and golf, the other sport he enjoyed.  Plus he was smart, (he was one of our two class valedictorians) and understood game strategy so that his was not just a game of power.

Billie Jean King returns a shot at the Virginia Slims Tennis Tournament which I covered as a young reporter in 1975.

We both played hard.  I honestly don’t remember much about the game itself except that it was hot.  I lost. I don’t recall the game score or whether we went three sets or not. There was no press coverage, no cheering crowd, no book deals afterwards. Women’s lib gained no victory that afternoon. I’m sure Coach Martin gloated but I didn’t feel that I had let anyone down. I had played my best although when it came to tennis, I was pretty hard on myself when defeated.

John and I remained friends. He went on to become an attorney.  I became a journalist and worked for a couple of metropolitan newspapers in Phoenix.  Phoenix is and was a mecca for tennis. I continued to play while living there. Occasionally, I covered women’s tennis for the suburban daily that I was writing for at the time. One day, the Virginia Slims women’s pro tennis tour came to town with, you guessed it, Billie Jean King. I was sitting court side to report on the action. Billie Jean had already played and won her big match against Bobby Riggs.  Women’s tennis was taking off at lightening speed.  After her match against Margaret Court, I snagged an interview for the paper with Billie Jean.

Billie Jean King and Margaret Court Smith shake hands following their match at the Virginia Slims Tennis Tournament in Phoenix in 1975.

Even before The Battle of the Sexes, Billie Jean was winning as many battles in women’s tennis as she was trophies. Her willingness and courage to demand that women be treated equal to men in the sport encouraged others of us facing similar challenges in our own careers. So while the movie about her famous match and endeavors off the court is just now coming out, her story inspired a generation of women, young women then, to stand up and speak out on and off the tennis court.

Kicking Off Super Bowl Sunday with Commander’s

Yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday.  Usually on this day, I find myself in New Orleans huddled around the television of our apartment watching the game with family or friends.

A tour carriage stops at the landmark Commander’s Palace in New Orleans’ Garden District.

Our Super Bowl Bowl Sunday in New Orleans kicks off with jazz brunch at the legendary Commander’s Palace restaurant in the city’s Garden District. The restaurant has been a New Orleans landmark since opening in 1893 but it became an culinary institution under the exacting ownership of Ella Brennan who took over the operation in 1974 along with her siblings, Dottie, Dick and John Brennan.  Ella, who became respectfully known as the Grand Dame of New Orleans restaurants passed away in 2018. (read Culinary Matriarch Commanded Legendary NOLA Restaurant, June 5, 2018).  Commander’s Palace continues to be one of the city’s finest dining establishments and is now operated by Brennan’s daughter and niece, Ti Adelaide Martin and Lally Brennan.

The elegant dining rooms of Commander’s Palace are festive and fun during jazz brunch with tables decorated with balloons in Mardi Gras colors.

The traditions and attention to detail that Ella introduced at Commander’s are still followed today.  The service is unsurpassed with a wait staff that is skilled and attentive so that water glasses and coffee cups are refilled as soon as they are half empty, piping hot plates are placed before the diner in synchronized fashion and the white tablecloths are quickly cleaned between courses of the crumbs that fall from the fresh baguettes of French bread. Just to be sure they don’t miss anything, the staff is watched by a wait captain in each room who monitors their  every move.

The musicians who play at Commander’s Palace are as much a part of the restaurant’s tradition as its excellent service and tasty food.

It wouldn’t be brunch at Commander’s Palace without the jazz musicians who wander from room to room in the century old house playing the jazz standards requested by diners.  As Ella herself wrote in her autobiography: “I’ve got to tell you, I don’t want a restaurant where a jazz band can’t come marching through.” Not only do they march through, but they invite diners to join them in a second line waving their napkins while they wind through the tables.

The entire experience puts you in the mood to celebrate, whether you leave afterwards to stroll through the neighborhood to admire the Garden District‘s historic homes (including one owned and occupied by Archie and Olivia Manning, parents of the famous football quarterbacks), head up the street to St. Charles to catch the

The oldest cemetery in New Orleans is located across the street from Commander’s Palace and a popular place for people to walk after brunch.

trolley or watch one of the many parades that roll down the avenue during Carnival or step directly across the street into the Lafayette Cemetery #1, the oldest cemetery in New Orleans. (The cemetery is currently closed due to damage from Hurricane Ida.) I’ve done all of these; it’s become our Super Bowl tradition.

New Orleanians expressed their displeasure with the outcome of the Saints 2019 playoff game.

I was in New Orleans in 2009 when the city’s hometown team, the Saints, played in the championship game.  That year, the city was especially excited and dressed out in the team’s black and gold colors. Everywhere could be heard the team chant of  Who Dat?as people greeted each other on the  street.  Likewise, in 2019 when the team lost their chance to advance to the Super Bowl after a referee missed calling interference on a key play, people took to the street to express their anger and disappointment in the outcome.

Before returning to the apartment where we stay in the French Quarter, we stop at a Garden District market to pick up provisions for the week and snacks to munch on during the game.  For me, the actual game is secondary to the set up. I missed all of it this year– the delicious dishes at Commander’s, the toe-tapping music, the leisurely walk in the neighborhood after brunch before settling in for the rest of the day to watch two teams battle it out on the gridiron.  I hope next year will be different.

One Super Bowl Sunday past, I stopped at the parents’ home of football greats Peyton and Eli Manning during my post-brunch walk through the Garden District.

 

 

Film Road Trip Recalls My Own

 

This has been an incredibly busy past couple of months as I finalize details for the 2021 film festival in my role as executive director of CASCADIA International Women’s Film Festival.  Yesterday we recorded a discussion with the directors of the film, “Drought,” one of the features selected for this year’s festival.  (In case you aren’t aware, CASCADIA, now about to present its fifth festival, exclusively showcases films directed by women and is one of only a handful of festivals in the U.S. to do so.)

The film by directors Hannah Black and Megan Petersen, is a coming of age story about two sisters who make a road trip with their brother. Virginia Bogert, a film festival buddy and president emertia of Women in Film Seattle, asked where they found the ice cream truck used in the film.  As they answered, a flood of memories about a road trip I made in my 20s in a similar delivery truck came back to me.

In a scene from “Drought” you can see the ice cream truck parked in the background that ‘stars in the film.

I hadn’t thought about that trip in a long time.  I was living in Phoenix, an eager, enthusiastic young college student who had secured a summer journalism internship with the Arizona Republic’s Arts section.  It had been a great summer full of covering theatre openings, music concerts, art exhibits and dance performances.  The experience was an education itself and prepared me for my first full time journalism job that followed as an arts editor for a suburban Phoenix newspaper.

Greg stands alongside the ‘golden guys’ during a visit to the Phoenix Art Museum.

Near the end of my summer internship Greg Ayers, a friend from college, arrived in Phoenix touring with his rock band. I hadn’t seen Greg for nearly a year when I went to hear his band play at a local club. Greg was the trombonist, a tall, lanky guy with a walrus style mustache and handsome curly black hair. He was one of my music major buddies who spent long hours in the practice rooms and hung out together at Friendly’s Tavern playing pool and drinking beer on Friday nights. He always had a big toothy grin on his face with a big laugh to go with it.

Greg, as it turned out, was heading back to Kansas after the Phoenix gig, the last on the tour.  Although I had decided to stay in Phoenix after my internship, I wanted to go home to visit my parents and collect some belongings. I asked Greg if I could hitch a ride and keep him company on the drive back. He said, ‘Sure.’

He showed up on the day we were to leave driving a white, slightly dinged up delivery truck, just like the one in the ‘Drought’ film. Greg hopped out and, after saying good-bye to my aunt and uncle, with whom I was living, tossed my bag in and we took off. The back end of truck was loaded with gear from the band that shifted whenever we rounded a curve.

Greg decided to stroll down the freeway to check out what was causing the traffic jam.

On our way out of Phoenix, we became stuck in a traffic jam. Greg jumped out, strolled down the highway to see where and what the problem was. Eventually we were moving again, taking turns in the driver’s seat on the 1,177 mile journey. We drove day and night, stopping only for food and bathroom breaks with one of us grabbing a nap in the makeshift loft bed built behind the seats while the other stayed at the wheel. Along the way, Greg and I shared a lot of memories about college and friends, stories and laughs while sipping sodas from big paper cups. Neither of us had really begun our careers although I was certain that with his band having just completed a big tour that he on his way to rock band stardom. We were full of big dreams and big ideas.

Greg, me and the dinged up white delivery truck we drove during our 17-hour trip from Phoenix, Az. to southeast Kansas.

 

The truck was not air conditioned. We sweated our way across the Southwest. In an attempt to keep cool,  the sliding door next to my passenger seat was left open as we drove. Although strapped in with my seat belt, it’s surprising I didn’t fall out as we rolled down the road.

When we arrived in Kansas, Greg dropped me off at my parents home and said ‘Good bye.’ It was the last time I saw him. I returned to Phoenix to launch my journalism career. I  lost touch with Greg but never forgot him. (He recently turned up at the home of a mutual friend.) I had forgotten that trip together until reminded by the directors’ conversation about their film.  Films like “Drought’ tell stories that reflect and reveal their character’s life, but our lives and our life stories. That’s the beauty of films like those you’ll find in CASCADIA, the festival I work with now.  If you attend (it’s online May 13-22), I’m sure the films may prompt memories for you too of old friends, good times and young adventures.

My music major buddies gathered together on the steps of the music building. Greg is in the maroon t-shirt on the top left. I’ve stayed in touch with most of these friends and have connected with more since the advent of social media.

School for Sale, Memories Included

“This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for an investor!!! This building could be anything you imagine it to be… A huge building with such great potential!!! …It includes the whole city block! “

This advertisement popped up on social media the other day and caught my eye because the building for sale located in my hometown of Parsons, Ks., is my old elementary school, McKinley School. Like many who attended school there from kindergarten through sixth grade, I have lots of memories attached to that big brown brick building. When I read that it was for sale, those memories came flooding back

The old McKinley School is up for sale. The sign for the church that last occupied the building stands outside the main entrance where the school’s flag pole once was placed.

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McKinley School was named for President William McKinley who was assassinated in office in 1901.  Four of the five elementary schools that existed in my hometown when I was school-age were named after presidents: Washington, Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley.

The two-story, 19,000 square foot school was built in 1937 for $91,315; the federal government chipped in $27,000 as a WPA project. The doors opened for students in 1938. It had 12 classrooms, an auditorium with a small stage that also served as the cafeteria,  a kitchen located directly behind the stage in a separate room and a library.  Outside were two playgrounds, one for kindergarten through third grade and one for the older kids in grades four through six.  Both playgrounds had asphalt covered play areas marked off for different games and two baseball fields with backstops where we played abbreviated games during our 15-minute morning and afternoon recesses.  Connecting the two playgrounds was another asphalted area where kids tossed balls into the hoops erected there.

Future students stand before the new McKinley School under construction in 1937.

It was a solidly built structure constructed of brick exterior with wide hallways lined with ceramic block tile and terrazzo floors that was cool to the touch whenever we students huddled together there during atomic bomb drills. The school janitor, Raymond Smith,  who started when the school opened, kept these floors beautifully buffed and polished until 1969 when he took a job with the district’s maintenance department.

Raymond Smith was McKinley’s first janitor who cared for the school until 1969. He stands here on the school sidewalk.

Classrooms had high ceilings with big double-pane windows that opened during warm months for ventilation and ‘cloak closets’ with folding doors tucked into one wall where we hung our coats and stowed our lunchboxes. At the front and back of every room were blackboards with portraits of U.S. Presidents hung above along with the round classroom clock that slowly ticked off the minutes until recess. Rows of lift-top wooden desks were screwed to the hardwood floors until they were eventually replaced by movable desks and chairs. Natural light streamed into the classrooms most of the time but when the skies blackened as a thunderstorm approached the warm incandescent glow from the pendant lights hanging overhead brightened the rooms.

The auditorium also doubled as the cafeteria at lunch time with hot meals served up by the cooks who prepared it in the little kitchen.  The 25-cent lunches included little cartons of Meadow Gold milk sipped from paper straws and cookies for dessert. After lunch, the long folding tables and chairs were put away so that the space could be used for voting during elections, school assemblies,band practice, school carnivals, Girl Scout box suppers, or, when the weather outside was wet or too cold for recesses. At one of those school programs, I showed slides taken on the trip made with my parents to New York where we visited the World’s Fair. It was in the auditorium too where, at the beginning of each year, we’d file in class by class for our group pictures, taken by my father.

Wilma Jean Cunningham with one of my classmates on the school grounds. Miss Cunningham shared her vacation photos with her students on her classroom bulletin board.

I remember well my teachers who spent their careers at McKinley. Wilma Jean Cunningham’s fifth grade classroom was located at the top of the stairs on the upper grade side. Miss Cunningham was an avid photographer who displayed 8×10 prints of the places she visited on her classroom bulletin board. Her photographs took many students who otherwise might not leave our small town’s borders to historic and cultural locations all over the country.

My fourth grade teacher, Mildred Curtis, kept her room at the end of the short hall from Miss Cunningham. Her head shook slightly, likely due to some medical condition.  She drove to school in a melon and white two-toned Edsel. It must have been the only car like it in town.

Joella Regan stands at the back of her classroom with her student teacher.

Adjacent to Miss Cunningham was Mrs. Fultz’ sixth grade classroom and next to hers, in the middle of the long hall was Grace Powell’s fifth grade room. Miss Powell was a student favorite who won bowling tournaments.  She was also a Cincinnati Reds baseball fan and won the attention of the boys in her class, remembers her student Lynn Smith, when she played the radio broadcast of the World Series. Then came the third grade room of the soft-spoken Joella Ragan who owned more dresses with bows at the collar than anyone I knew.

Next door was my third grade teacher, Verna Fish.  Mrs. Fish was not much taller than some of the older students and often arrived at school wearing one her many hats, some with netting arranged over the top.

One of McKinley’s third grade teachers Verna Fish standing outside her classroom door. The folding doors to the cloak room can be seen on left.

Down the short hall from Mrs. Fish could be found Louise Strecker’s second grade.  Mrs. Strecker had a well-earned reputation of being a strict teacher but she was married to Dan, a graphics artist, that delighted us with caricatures of townspeople we knew. He sometimes set up a booth at our school carnivals where he would draw profiles for a small donation.

The lucky ones, we kids thought, were assigned to Elenora Allen’s first floor class.  Miss Allen looked to me like  Popeye’s cartoon girlfriend, Olive Oyl only older.

Directly underneath Mrs. Strecker’s classroom was where I spent first grade with Naomi Heinbaugh learning to read from our Tip and Mitten books. Miss Heinbaugh was a stout, cheery older woman with rosy cheeks whose appearance disguised her disciplinarian classroom demeanor. We kids nicknamed her “Miss Heinie-ball” but wouldn’t dare be caught calling her by that name.

My classmates gather around teachers Louise Strecker, left and Verna Fish ,right, on a cold day during recess.

At the bottom of the south staircase, near the door, was the school’s only kindergarten room where Joyce Hudiberg taught both morning and afternoon classes. Mrs. Hudiberg was the youngest member of the McKinley faculty which was a good thing. She had 25-30 energetic five-year-olds to manage in each session. I was in the morning class and fondly remember coloring and practicing writing my letters using the fat black pencils and blue-lined tablet paper. In the little play kitchen we cooked up all sorts of imaginary dishes.  Seated at low, kindergarten-sized tables we’d brush sticky white glue onto construction paper cut outs to paste them onto big sheets of newsprint. At rest time, I unfolded my red and blue plastic-covered foam floor mat and sat upon it for story time. During one of these sessions Jeff, one of my classmates, crawled quietly up behind me and kissed me on the cheek. Poor Jeff was punished for his show of affection (if that’s what it was) by having to sit in the corner.

The main entrance to the school has changed since it was purchased by the church. The door on the left was the school’s original office door.

On the opposite side of the school, down from double-door main entrance, was the sixth grade classroom shared by Norine Underwood and the school’s principal, Gordon Huggins. Mrs. Understood was a busty woman with a big laugh who sniffled a lot and tucked her tissues into her bra.  She traded off classroom duties with Mr. Huggins, whose office was right next to the classroom and right inside the main entrance.  It was said that Mr. Huggins, a World War II veteran who had lost one hand and earned the Distinguished Service Cross, kept an electric paddle machine in his office to be used on misbehaving students sent to him for discipline. It wasn’t true, of course, but no one dared to find out firsthand. Although he could be stern, Mr. Huggins’ nature was gentle and bighearted.  He had the difficult task of announcing to students over the classroom loudspeakers that President Kennedy had been shot the day it happened.

My friend, Janie, and myself (right) pose for a photo on the playground during recess.

The school was closed in 1983 and with it was silenced the sounds of children’s voices echoing down the hall and across its playgrounds.  But within its walls are stored the memories of all those who once walked through the its hallways going to and from the classrooms. Since its closure, the town’s Recreation Department occupied it for a number of years before selling it to a church for $10,000.  Asking price today is $185,000.  Whether or not the purchaser preserves the landmark of local history in a way that recalls its role as an educational institution remains to be seen.  One thing that is for sure, whoever purchases the school will be buying much more than a building. Countless memories of those who learned to write and read and add and subtract there are included in the deal and those are  priceless.