THE ROAD GOES EVER ON AND ON

The Road goes ever on and on ...

                  -- J.R.R. Tolkien

My daughter, who seems to have sprung out of childhood overnight,
in front of the Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia

As 2016 rolls around, I can't help but see Bilbo Baggins' eager feet on that Road stretching as far ahead as it does behind.

Wishing you all an extraordinary trek through 2016!

RORSCHACH AUTUMN

A Rorschach autumn by the water, taken during a walk last week.

Widewater on C&O Canal
Potomac, Maryland

(An old friend, who is in psychiatry, immediately asked, "So, what do you see???"  Of course, I've learned not to tell psychiatrist friends what I really think. One shouldn't bring up ailments with doctor friends either.)

I was taking a break from "heavy reading" in my nook last night and picked up one of Neil Gaiman's book/graphic novels, the kind that appeals to youth and adults simultaneously.  Gaiman weaves wonderful tales that seem to be suspended in time. This one is called, "The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains."

One paragraph struck me.

"I am old now, or at least, I am no longer young, and everything I see reminds me of something else I've seen, such that I see nothing for the first time... It is the curse of age, that all things are reflections of other things."

So, I paused and reflected.  It is true.  As time passes, the more we see the present mirror the past.  And I thought of how our identities are entwined in our memories - whether joyful events or incidents laced with pain.  We are what we remember to have done and experienced. Without the power to reflect, that inkblot view by the water is blurred by wind and waves.

Just a few days ago, I stumbled upon an article in Smithsonian Magazine on American Genius.  A duo of scientists had implanted a false memory in a mouse.  Whoa!  The science is certainly brilliant.  And there are many neurological applications for this type of breakthrough.  But some directions brought visions of "Total Recall" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" into view.  If we can't trust what we remember, can we know who we really are?  What then defines the "I" in Descartes' "I think, therefore I am"?  There are many who would support keeping painful recollections intact (rather than erasing them or making them falsely palatable) because there is value in what we learn through suffering.  Like many things, I sense this boils down to personal choice - just as some people opt for cosmetic surgery while others prefer to tell their story through the cumulative lines on their faces.

Autumn in the back woods, seen from our East Coast kitchen.
This is a new kind of view for us.

Memories are beautiful and necessary.  But the moment memories overtake active living, well, perhaps it's time to make new ones.  I admire artists - in any field - who break away from their successes in order to explore something different.  Beethoven, after criticism of his Wellington Symphony, charged back, "What I sh*t is better than anything you have ever thought." This was supported recently by two scholars. They put forward a novel view that Beethoven's creative development through the Wellington eventually led to some of the genius of the Ninth Symphony.

Change is rejuvenating, as our move from the West to the East Coast has been.  Last month's VelocityDC Dance Festival showcased the trajectory of dance from deep roots in classical ballet, modern dance, folk, Lindy hop, street dance and (human) percussion.  It was difficult to categorize what types of dance these energetic hybrids were.  Whatever they were, they were amazing!  Art forms would be dead if new creations weren't continually spawned from it.  Though one might love original stagings, we gain novel pleasure and enhanced insight from viewing a modern re-cast of a Shakespeare play or a Verdi opera.  Or take it further.  We've seen gifted writers fuse disparate genres into their own forms for which literary boxes haven't been constructed yet.

As I've participated in events in the DC metro area, I've noted an evolving engagement of young men & women in the cultural arts compared to what I remember from youth.  This milky (haired) canvas is now blended with espresso, russet and gold - perhaps a few blues, greens and purples too, but DC is still more conservative than London or New York.  Seasoned generations carry charm, grace and sprightliness.  And who else can we ply with questions about the past?  But the presence of the next generation adds the unexpected into the mix.  This constant swirl seems so vital in painting our future especially as our own color fades into milk.

So my musings end in colors of the past and colors of the future ... and as the paint swirls vanish, the Rorschach image I began with sharpens back into focus, saturated with autumn colors.

What do you see?

**********

I hadn't intended to write an essay here.  In fact, this was meant to be a brief photo sharing that glorious fall day by the water with its glassy reflection.  But, just as Miss Bates could not be constrained to saying only three dull things to Emma, I have my difficulties keeping a page blank!  I hope you are all having a lovely autumn.  

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD

Today, I awoke with a sense of purpose.  I was nearly 15 years old but had never attempted anything like this before.

My feet strode resolutely towards the Palace Green.  Papa had instructed me to sweep street corners with my eyes, searching for moving shadows.  A secret dispatch, in cipher, was tucked between my petticoat and navy Brunswick.  I scratched at it, wishing I had used it to line my straw hat instead.  The paper was folded and sealed.  Just this morning, Papa had impressed the wax with his twisted horn emblem -- the Unicorn's horn.  

I thought back to a week ago, when Papa had sat me at his desk. He had wanted a key for a cipher.  (He trusted no one else, and knew I had a head for puzzles.  He often said I was the best son he never had.)  

Papa had pulled out a Bible from the shelf.  But lo!  it was hollow, nesting another book within.  The binding read "Montesquieu."  Together, we had settled on a key based on the book.  My eyes had questioned Papa wordlessly:  Who is this for?  His only reply had been a stern shake of the head.

Now, I strolled to the Palace Green, forcing nonchalance into my steps.  I wondered if the Governor and his daughters were home. Perhaps they were in England?  I was lucky enough to have been invited to the Governor's Palace for tea by his daughter last summer.  

We'd had a lovely time losing ourselves in the labyrinth.  Tired of wandering, I had clambered up the hilltop, shouting to the girls "Left!  Right!" The governess had told me to shush, but the girls had giggled encouragingly.  That was long ago now.  Since then, Papa had told me not to get too friendly with the Governor's family.

My mind snapped back to my mission.  The instructions were to leave the secret dispatch with the basket maker, just off the Green, and so I did.  Someone else was supposed to retrieve it, but neither she nor Papa would tell me more.

The basket maker concealed the paper in the straw.  Ah, a needle in the hay stack, I thought.  But my eyes flew to a little fleur-de-lis etched into the wood next to the hearth, barely perceptible behind the straw.  The basket maker followed my gaze.  Had she been the recipient of the key last week?  ...  probably not.  Mixing keys and ciphers seemed awfully foolish, and Papa was never foolish.

Only two fortnights ago, he'd relayed the story of our neighbor's slave who had been thrown into the Public Gaol for treason. He'd gotten caught with both halves of a secret letter, to be delivered.  Papa knew not to make that mistake.

So, I casually went about my business, just as Papa had trained me.  I bade the basket maker good day.  Then, I checked my purse for the few shillings Mama had handed me for some fabric and ribbon,

and turned into Duke of Gloucester Street towards the Millinery.  

The Tailor was there.  Papa trusted him.  He not only made our gowns and Papa's coats.  The Tailor and the Milliner were secretly supplying shirts to the continental army!  

(Papa thinks I know nothing.  I was re-shaping Mama's wig one afternoon in the small room by Papa's study.  Low voices were murmuring about an army.  A quick peek through the keyhole revealed the back of a man in a powdered wig and General's uniform.  Fearing discovery, I ceased all motion until they had left.)

I supposed I could trust the Tailor as well.  He always showed me the latest in English and European fashions.  Occasionally, he'd even give me pretty feathers for my hat. 

This time, he generously offered up some bolts of fabric.  The linen was coarse to the touch.  But the watery silk felt smooth, bordered by nubs of embroidery.  The rhythmic nubs under my fingers suddenly unlatched a memory of keys and ciphers.  Startled, I looked up and found the Tailor eyeing me sideways.  A vague discomfort crept up behind my ears, so I excused myself quickly.

Back along Duke of Gloucester Street, everyone seemed rapt in conversation.  As I walked by, I heard snatches of names I'd heard from Papa before.  Montesquieu, Rousseau, Locke.  None of them sounded like anyone we knew from the colonies.  

Nervous whispers and furtive glances were thrown my way as I passed by.  An occasional gentleman tipped his tricorn hat.

The only smiles I received were from the sun-worn gardeners by the Church.  They offered me fresh herbs to take home to Mama.  

I suppose the old man driving the oxen had nothing to hide either.

I kept on course and swung by Mary Dickinson's shop.  Mama needed her frayed hat ribbon replaced.  

The luxurious scents of soap, freshly shipped from England, engulfed me as I swung the door open.  I took a delicious whiff, but Papa had warned me that all those goods were heavily taxed.  I didn't understand too well, but the taxes apparently gave us no equivalent voice in government.  So, ribbons in hand, I satisfied myself with the memory of gardenia and lavender for my next bath.

I had dawdled enough.  It was time to meet Papa behind Shield's Tavern.  I came upon him nervously pacing, jaw clenched.  He was about to confer with an important General inside the Tavern.  Tentatively, I mentioned my visit to the basket maker.  His brow immediately uncreased, and a soft twinkle returned to his eyes.  "That's my daughter," he said approvingly.

Then he was lost in thought again, rumbling about a "revolution", a transformation, a new government, a new life.  I shifted anxiously.  Brought back by my presence, he drew up to his full stature, planted a kiss on my head, then marched into Shield's.

Papa's mumblings frightened me.  I didn't want anything to change.  I thought of going home, to Mama, to our quiet house on Nicholson Street.  I wanted everything as it had been from the previous day.

And yet, my childhood prelude of games and puzzles stirred something inside me.  The uncharted future - a future I was now part of with my cryptographic work for Papa - was like gibberish waiting to be deciphered.  And I thought on the message I had cast in cipher, still a mystery to me.  Papa had said I would understand words like "Congress" in time.  (I shan't say any more or I would be undoing my own encryption.)

Despite myself, I was curious to see where this Revolutionary road might lead to.

-- Pages from a girl's diary in Williamsburg, VA.  The edges were smudged but revealed a period around the 1770s.

********************

This fanciful escapade was inspired by my recent trip to Virginia.  We visited Colonial Williamsburg, a place I hadn't explored since I was a young teenager.  It brought back memories of youth -- when I couldn't quite grasp the full context of history, but sensed the excitement and uncertainty leading to the Revolution, and the nervousness surrounding double agents loyal to the King.  

Caveat: These are loosely based on American colonial/revolutionary history.  All photos are mine, taken in Colonial Williamsburg.

SUMMER'S LEASE HATH ALL TOO SHORT A DATE

Do you sense it?  It's as if Summer's great balloon were slowly exhaling its remaining bits of warm air, deflating in a colorful mess on the grass.

Or maybe it was just the Olympics.  Two bleary-eyed weeks of athletic feats and global camaraderie, elevating ordinary humans to the extraordinary!  We soared, and the Union Jack soared with us.  (Where would the world be without James Bond, Monty Python and The Beatles!)  And then -- it was over.  We were released, tumbling earthbound, reluctantly deposited back into our daily routines. Whoosh!  All deflated.

What now?

Pacific Coast in Big Sur, CA
We heard seals barking, but only saw
the birds flying in formation above the rocks

Fortunately, we found ourselves airborne for one last time, clambering back into the balloon basket. Summer is never complete without an excursion to the Pacific Coast.

If I've disappeared from the virtual world this summer -- Olympics aside -- it has been in an effort to live in the moment.

Big Sur fog over a bridge from the 1930s

Nothing else quite forces this practice so beautifully than the Pacific Coast Highway.  I challenge you not to stop every ten minutes just to enjoy being exactly where you are!  I get so caught up in the journey, the destination seems irrelevant.  (And please excuse the photos -- they don't do it justice.)

Morning fog in Big Sur
You can barely make out the house perched on the hill overlooking the Pacific
Must be a spectacular place to live!

This entire summer, I've devoted to savoring each experience, even setting aside the camera in favor of being part of the conversation.  I have no photos of any social gatherings this summer.  Instead, I have vivid memories of lively discussions.  Just like the character from "Midnight in Paris," whose life was at its most real among writers and artists long dead, though he could furnish no proof of his midnight meanderings.

Speaking of being in-the-moment, take these elephant seals: lounging on the beach for hours, occasionally swishing sand on their skins.  I wonder what they're thinking -- aside from how nice and cool the sand feels?

Elephant Seal Rookery
Two seal pups lounge surrounded by lazily protective adults
Piedras Blancas, CA

For this trip, we drove South through Monterey, Carmel, Big Sur, through Piedras Blancas all the way to San Simeon to visit Hearst Castle.  It is a breathtaking drive hugging the rocky coast, without much traffic except for a few construction lane closures.

One-lane stop lights for Highway construction
I never minded sitting through those stop lights,
looking out over the Ocean!
Big Sur, CA

As I looked out over the Pacific gliding in my imaginary hot air balloon, I just marveled at this vast ocean with nothing, from our coast, for over 5,000 miles.  Nothing, but a few scattered islands until Asia.

Looking out over the Pacific Ocean
on the way back, in Big Sur

Then I remembered how, exactly two years ago, I was in Asia when my mother joined the angels.  Perhaps she has been piloting my balloon all along, ensuring a soft landing.

Thoughts of my mother somehow close the loop from this post's header:

But thy eternal summer shall not fade.
...
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

                     --- William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18

*****

This post somehow wrote itself in honor of my mother.  So I dedicate it to her, my mother, who loved the Bard of Avon and shared his magic with me.

WHAT IN THE WORLD?

When I was a little kid, I looked forward to my National Geographic Kids subscription with great anticipation every month.  My favorite part:  the "What in the World?" puzzles!  The page would be full of strange images, and my job as underage sleuth would be to figure out what it was.

I've felt like a kid all summer and seem to be seeing everything from the sand box eye view.  The following are my close encounters of the L.A. kind.




This zebra has opted to sit out extinction at the La Brea Tar Pits.

At the La Brea Tar Pits
Home of Ice Age fossil excavations.

If it rained golden, alien licorice, this might be what it would be like.

At the LACMA
(Los Angeles County Museum of Art)

Imagine Narnia with more than one of these, and Lucy Pevensie might have bumped into Mr. Tumnus in this forest.

In front of the LACMA
(Los Angeles County Museum of Art)

I was caught in this titanium vortex.  My experience inside was equally mind-blowing.

At the Walt Disney Concert Hall
Architect: Frank Gehry

I hope you view it with as much wonder as I did coming upon them.

I've been having a lovely summer spent mostly outdoors with family and friends.  As such, my computer keyboard has been missing my fingers.  But I do plan to pop into your blogs soon to say hello!

WOMEN ON THE VERGE

"Indeed, I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman."
                                                --- Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own

I am no scholar in women's studies, so the following are merely foolish observations.


My recent readings seem to be set in periods of great change for women. And so, my thoughts have been inching along that timeline, from the late 19th through the early 20th century:  a rather progressive period for women.  In part, propelled by men (thanks to Charles Dana Gibson's satirical illustrations).  And of course, in part, by women.

Where do we go from here?
Dress: Sugarlips

The 19th century Gibson Girls were a plucky bunch:  educated, athletic, dominant.  I could learn a thing or two!  The next generation did, and went beyond. Corsets were discarded. Victorian mores were questioned.  The movement for women's suffrage intensified.  By the 1920s, Flapper ladies had bared their limbs and declared: if men can do it, women can do it too.  (Quite to the horror of the traditional population.)

What are we reaching for now?
Dress: Sugarlips

So I was thrilled when Sugarlips sent me this delicate, crocheted dress above, reminiscent of a Jazz Age tea dress.  It seemed ready to step into a Gatsby garden party.  My hat is of the '70s floppy variety, but I had in mind the big, flowered hats from La Belle Époque, sliding time's ruler back on the outfit, if only in thought.  (I could have stretched it centuries forward with a Balenciaga Darth Vader hat if I had one.)

House of Lanvin
"Roseraie" dress
1923
Photo: The Met Museum

As I was trawling the web, I came upon this lovely "Roseraie" dress from the House of Lanvin in 1923.  It was inspired by Art Nouveau and the Paris Exposition latticework.  What better way to show that Change does not occur in isolation.  Historic developments are accompanied by tectonic shifts in art, architecture, literature, science, and so on.  This time span was seismically driven on various fronts by women such as Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf, Marie Curie, or Jeanne Lanvin and Coco Chanel ...  along with the great men who orbited their worlds.  

I can see now what Woolf meant about the prolific Anonymous being, perhaps, female throughout time.  What do you think?

***

Thank you to Sugarlips for the lovely gift.

Note to readers: I stand by the independence of this blog.  Any outfits featured are present because they somehow connect with me and my taste, not because I am paid to promote them.

DYSTOPIA

I've just closed the final book in the Hunger Games series ... and I pause.  This was no kids' storybook.  I can nearly taste the ashes mixed with blood-tinged roses.  Feel the confusion and terror.  Hear the crowds cheer the gladiatorial slaughter.  Panem et Circenses.

Rusty, mid-20th century iron bridge
against elegant, 19th Century building
San Antonio, Texas

Wow.

The dystopia is unnerving because it so resembles an absurdist reality:  the menacing undercurrent of a gleaming, frivolous Capitol.  Starvation and desolation elsewhere.  A subdued and mesmerized population.  History repeating itself.  Panem et Circenses.  As one of the protagonists desperately tries to grasp, "Real or not?"

I feel as disoriented as the characters in the book, with fiction mixing with recollections of my recent visit to San Antonio with my family.  After all, Texas was the seat of a bloody revolution which won itself -- at  great human cost -- a decade-long Republic in the mid-1800s.  

Rear face of The Alamo, viewed from its garden
San Antonio, Texas

The Alamo, beautiful today with its cactus-filled gardens, was the scene of a horrific massacre by Santa Anna's forces from Mexico in 1836. No survivors. Soldiers and farmers alike fell in valiant defense. But converse to Santa Anna's calculating plan of teaching the rebels a lesson, it turned the fortress into a rallying cry for a Texas Republic.  Remember The Alamo!  Heroism from characters, like the Tennessee sharpshooter, Davy Crockett, echoes through the walls.  Battle tales border on fiction.

Not too different from the Hunger Games.

The crumbling grandeur
of Victorian mansions in the
King William (Kaiser Wilhelm) district,
where German settlers stayed and prospered.
San Antonio, Texas

Fortunately, San Antonio wasn't really all disheartening.  Wandering the tree-lined streets of the old neighborhoods hinted at more hopeful times.  This is a city settled by hardy adventurers.  Europeans searching for better fortunes, where land was literally free.  It's such an American cliché -- a city built by immigrant go-getters.

Wildflowers by the Mission San José
founded by the Spanish in 1720
San Antonio, Texas

My visit was actually far happier than this post might convey.  My cousin's wedding was joyous, and my family lived up to its rowdy reputation.  I think we frightened my cousin's new wife's family with our vivaciousness on the dance floor.  The photo below best shows the bubbly mood we were all in.

Me and my cousin (the groom's sister)
Being silly at the wedding reception

Have you read the Hunger Games?  Or other novels on dystopian societies? 

STILL-NESS

"A great free joy surges through me when I work ... with tense slashes and a few thrusts, the beautiful white fields receive their color and the work is finished in a few minutes." 

                                                            -- Clyfford Still, Abstract Expressionist artist

Clyfford Still Museum
Colors, including this visitor's electric blue,
startled me out of my winter doldrums!

Clyfford Still Museum
You can sense the monumental scale of the art.
I love the sliver of red-orange, like sunset on the horizon,
struggling not to sink into the twilight

I'm finally back from the snow-laden slopes of Colorado.  A few hours before our flight home, we decided to swing by the new Clyfford Still Museum in Denver, housing roughly 95% of this reclusive artist's works.  Still was a force in the Abstract Expressionist Movement though he broke away from the art world at the height of his creativity.

Clyfford Still Museum
Color and texture via palette knife and trowel

Clyfford Still Museum
Colors and forms on white canvas

The Still Estate bequeathed nearly his entire oeuvre to Denver.  The lucky city had agreed to carry out the artist's stipulation to only show his works in its (near) entirety.  No competition from fellow abstract expressionists -- Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock, etc. -- to distract from his work!  Now I understand why the San Francisco MoMA had an entire gallery of Clyfford Still paintings.  He refused to share walls with his former friends!  

Clyfford Still Museum
The architecture was specifically designed to house Still's works

Clyfford Still Museum
Natural light through holes in the ceiling

We discovered more interesting objects in the basement, like his personal effects.  Still may have lived on a farm but his tastes in literature and music were quite sophisticated.

Clyfford Still Museum
Still's personal effects -- including LPs of opera and classical music,
his book collection and typewriter -- were in the basement

Clyfford Still Museum
I love the hint of cyan marching off the frame

It was marvelous to be enveloped by some of the most original art of the 20th century.  As Still himself said,  "It's intolerable to be stopped by a frame's edge."  Fortunately, we were engulfed by his colors!  

Interestingly, these eye-opening hues were the harbinger of springtime back in California.  Apple, plum and cherry blossoms greeted us upon our return.  Much like his splashes of color against a snowy canvas.

I hope you have all been well and I will catch up with you soon!

SMOOTH SAILING

I've logged many hours this week in excursions through Time.  I cast off in antiquity with texts by the famed architect, Vitruvius, and skimmed through to the 21st century's Deconstructivist forms.  Whilst docking in the post-modern world, my accessories reflected the titanium sails conceived by the architect, Frank Gehry.

"Wonder Woman" silver cuffs
My dinner companions drew comparisons
to the bullet-proof ones worn by the female superhero

Re-arranging the cuffs reminded me
of the various forms emerging from
Frank Gehry's architecture as I strolled around it

My tired, lack of imagination fell back on the associated deconstructionist theme -- fragmented fabric haphazardly gathered in external stitching visible around the cowl and torso.

Dress: Edun
Booties: Kork-Ease

This is Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall which I photographed in downtown LA last springtime.  Can you sense the billowing sails he envisioned when he sketched this out? Or the musicality in the structure? These titanium sails encapsulate one of the most sophisticated acoustical structures in the world.  Apparently, you can hear every instrument in the orchestra with clarity from any seat.  I would love to hear the LA Philharmonic here sometime!

Walt Disney Concert Hall
Architect: Frank Gehry
New positive and negative forms kept emerging
as I walked around its titanium skin

But now, I sail backwards towards the 19th Century, stopping to accompany favorite Dickensian characters in their peregrinations around London, Dover, Yarmouth ... Charles Dickens' 200th birthday has spurred me to pick up these beloved volumes -- some read, some yet unread, over the next several weeks.  All my other readings have been put on hold while I curl up to these affectionately penned characters, dear as old friends.  (I sense the adoption of velvet top coats and high, white collars in the following weeks.)

Is your style heavily influenced by your activities at the time?  For those in England, are you commemorating Charles Dickens in any way?