Whirligig City

 As you long time readers know, I'm always intrigued by something I've never seen before.  Just typing that sentence brings several things to mind such as the caribou wandering down the center of a highway in New Foundland seemingly unconcerned with the cars; or the sand sculpture competition in California; my first exposure to the Metropolitan Art Museum; or living across the street from tidal pools and a seal colony in Oregon.  Eastern North Carolina has added another unique experience:  A whirligig park.

Welcome to Wilson, North Carolina, home of the Vollis Simpson Whirligig Park.  The only whirligigs most of us are acquainted with are either pinwheels, windmills, or weathervanes.  Vollis Simpson, a farmer, had a creative streak a mile wide.  He started designing and building gigantic, complicated whirligigs.  Unwittingly, he began  the resurrection of his small town, Wilson, North Carolina.

In it's heyday, this town was filled with tobacco warehouses (only two are left standing today - one of which is the home to the Whirligig Museum).  Brokers got rich being the middle men between the growers and the end users of the tobacco crop.  Wilson was their headquarters and they built fancy houses.  The town became extremely prosperous, and it was even electrified 1909.  Finally, the growers decided to cut out these brokers and began dealing directly with the end use buyers (RJ Reynolds, for example).  Wilson fell on hard times.  

This town decided not to die, and using Vollis Simpson's whirligig creations as its downtown centerpiece, it began to revitalize.  Restaurants and shops began to open.  The beautiful Edwardian houses started being restored, and artists began moving to town.  Tourists started arriving to see the whirligigs.  

We deliberately chose a windy day, so we could see these contraptions MOVING.  (Some of my pictures are videos that show the movement of the pieces.)  Simpson was a genius at construction, and these devices were meant to be outside in all weathers.  He often used reflective highway signage pieces.  Thus, the whirligig park looks 'lit up' at night. 

Pieces of reflective signage used in whirligig creations

  

The daytime version of 'the Big Star'

The night time version of 'the Big Star'

Wilson is also the home of the North Carolina Baseball Museum which is housed at Fleming Field, the college league baseball stadium.  I was pretty amazed at the number of famous players who were originally from North Carolina.  My favorite was Gaylord Perry, the famous 'spitball' pitcher, who I actually interviewed a few years ago during a Spring Training game in Arizona.  This museum is run by a bunch of retired guys who contact players, coaches, and anybody else who will give them memorabilia.  They have uniforms, gloves, autographed pictures, etc, etc, etc.  The museum is staffed haphazardly by these same guys.  

The one who was at the museum the day we visited followed us around telling the stories about the players he personally contacted or actually knew.  This museum is a labor of love, and falls into the category of quirky museums I love to visit.  Here I am with Babe Ruth followed by an example of one of their exhibits. (My face is still healing up from the tumble I took in NYC on Mother's Day.)

It's easy to see how much I enjoyed Wilson.  Unique things to see, interesting architecture, and cool small museums lovingly created and staffed by locals.  If you want to see more picture, click on the link.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/BmCFF7BJkRP8eqS7A

   

Greenville, North Carolina

 I can sum up Eastern North Carolina in one word:  Beautiful.  This place is wonderfully GREEN.  Mixed forests cover the landscape.  There are several kinds of oaks, maples, elms, sycamores, and all types of pines and cedars.  This is also the land of the giant magnolia trees.  This one is outside of the Greenville Museum of Art.

This tree was easily 30 feet tall, and it's not even the biggest one we've seen.  After getting my Greenville Library card, we took a tour of the art museum with a young woman who has all the degrees to become a curator.  Currently, she's doing educational outreach in the community - thus the tour.  

The collection of the museum tends to be an interesting blend of modern and primitive/folk art.  

I really liked the whimsical outdoor sculptures constructed of 'found materials'.

 What excited me the most about the Greenville Art Museum is I learned about a Seagrove, NC.   This is a town of 200 potters.  We are headed there for a quick overnight on the 16th of June.  The granddaddy of potters in this town is called Jugtown Pottery.  It's a family owned business which goes back to the turn of the century.  Mostly, they've produced utilitarian pottery (stuff you actually use), but like the Japanese, they also have produced 'art pieces'.  The pottery is instantly recognizable since it's this hideous orange color.  Gradually over the past thirty years, other potters have just gravitated to this town.  I can hardly wait to see what they have to offer.   Here's some Jugtown pottery in the art museum

Greenville isn't filled with 'attractions' like several of the other towns we've visited in the area.  There are two major inhabitants of this town:  East Carolina University (the Pirates), and Greenville is the medical center of Eastern North Carolina.  One-third of the town is hospitals and other medical facilities.  

Since the university is on summer break, the town feels a bit sleepy.  It's filled with restaurants, some locally owned, and others are the chains we all know.  Lots of fast food, catering to the student population.  There are no freeways in Greenville.  It feels like the Tulsa, Oklahoma of the 1950's (my hometown).  It's all about traffic lights.  Since, the town is only 88,000 people, it's still easy to move from one side of town to the other.  The people are quite friendly, in that Southern way, and the natives have the most charming accent.  

We have enjoyed our time here even with my accident recovery time.  However, this town lacks direct connection to NYC which is a must for a move to the Northeast.  I wish I could transplant it to the north of Richmond.

If you'd like to see more pictures, click the following link:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/tZkP6q8k2xvd6WzVA

Tip of the Day....

Here's my tip for the day:  Do not fall down in New York City. Our Mother's Day dinner. was completely spoiled because I tripped over a raised sidewalk edge, which had been pushed up by a tree root, as the family was walking to the restaurant for our special family dinner.   It took me 15 minutes to get up off the pavement, and I was bleeding from a head gash.  One of those cold, unfeeling New Yorkers came out of his house with a bottle of cold water, iodine, and a gauze bandage. He got the bleeding slowed on the head gash while Sarah got their new electric car and drove us to the Emergency Room. Let's just say, it was not pretty, and I scared the whole family.  Cedric took a proactive stance.  He went home and put a selection of band aids on his stuffed animals to show me my band aid choices.  

I was actually very lucky. My hard head hit the pavement first, then my hands, and my right knee.  When I finally sat up, I was bleeding (gash on my forehead), and the knuckle on my longest finger (yes, the 'fuck you finger') was sticking up and the finger was at a 45 degree angle.  I also did a number on my glasses. My left lens went skidding along the pavement; I was so MAD!  

Now I have been traveling for almost 15 years. I have never, ever, ever forgotten my extra pair of glasses. For some crazy reason I took my extra glasses out of my backpack when I returned to Sun City in August, and I forgot to repack them. In all that traveling, I've never even opened the extra glasses case. Now I'm inconveniencing my daughter to pick up my new lens ($475), and FedEx it to me in Greenville, NC, our first stop this summer.

Thanks to those titanium glasses nothing was broken. I have a skinned nose not a broken one, and black eyes instead of broken orbital bones.   I have seven stitches right above my eyebrow, and I have a sprained left wrist.  Worst of all, I dislocated the knuckle joint on my right hand, but at least I didn't break it. 

I never wanna see a dislocated bone ever again. Forget those TV shows and movies that depict the hero having some body part dislocated, popped back in, and he jumps up and runs right back out to fight.  Pure fiction.  So not happening. My hand looks like the top of a blueberry muffin with the swelling, the discoloration, and the bruising. 

 Feel sorry for Drake not me. He's reliving our days when I had back surgeries.  He has had to bathe me, and dress me as well as do 1003 other things for the past two weeks. I'm having trouble. picking anything up. Fortunately my sprained wrist isn't terrible. And I can take the brace off to eat with my left hand. I relearning how to write using my left hand, and its given me empathy for Cedric who is just learning how to write.  I'm getting better doing stuff with my left hand; maybe I'll be ambidextrous when this is all said and done. And believe me I am ready for it to be done, done, done.  Drake was ready for this to be over 13 days ago.

Other than the stupid fall and spending seven hours of Mother's Day in the emergency room, our trip to New York was wonderful. [Actually, the silver lining was we got Sarah Lynn all to ourselves at the hospital.  I enjoyed that even under a morphine haze.]  We saw ten one act ballets spread over four nights,  We to the Metropolitan Art Museum, my favorite place, as well as we ate dinner in the dining room one night. We also ate soft shell crabs at my favorite Italian restaurant in the Financial District. We went to a museum I've never been to called the New Museum. Of course I have pictures of all of it.

Here's one day post accident:

Fortunately, my right hand is now totally out of the ace bandage, and mostly out of the splint.  I'm only wearing the brace on my left hand a few hours a day.  My right hand is less functional than I'd like, but I'm getting better.  What would have been best would be not to have fallen.

 

Cowgirl Up!

Every year Wickenberg, Arizona, home of the Western Desert Museum (Smithsonian Affiliate Museum), prepares and displays a juried exhibition of Western women artists.  The title of these exhibitions is "Cowgirl Up".  We've been at least twice, if not three times over the years to the exhibition.  It's about an hour's drive from the house, so it's a nice little day trip which we usually take with some friends.  

Women artists, no matter their location, are woefully underrepresented in galleries and museums.  That's what makes this exhibition so special.  It's a chance to see new artists.  As always, the pictures are the proof.  My favorite is a bronze called "Distant Thunder".  It's a 3/4th life sized bronze which is beautifully cast.  It shows emotion as well as movement.  It depicts a native women who has been out gathering with her young child.  She's running to beat the storm - thus the name of the piece.

Another one of my faves uses found objects paired with ceramics:

Drake's favorite was also a bronze by Rebecca Tobey.  I also really liked this one.

This is called "Holding up the Sky".

Here's the best in show mixed media piece which is an interpretation of a totem.

It's called "High Country Totem" by Rosetta.

The two dimensional on paper best in show was this one:  

It's "Jicarilla Apache" by Stephanie Campos.

This is the kind of exhibition where I wish I had an extra 15K in my pocket. There were more than a dozen pieces I would happily display in my home. Here are my favorite paintings, both by the same artist - Linda Glover Gooch.  Her clouds were amazing as well as her understanding of the Arizona landscape.

"Out Wickenberg Way"

"Song of Sunset"

Now, that you've seen all our our favorites, check out the rest of the pictures:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/3ryYnxVS6W737nLbA

FYI - the 'red dots' are the pieces that have sold.

Lent: Drake's Favorite Season

 Easter is on its way.  For those of us who observe Lent, that season is coming to an end.  (FYI:  Lent is the 40 days prior to Easter Sunday.)  Since Lent/Easter is my least favorite part of the Christian calendar, and no, you do not want to know the reason why, I pretty much ignored the season and tolerated the hymns, scriptures, etc. for a long time.  I just didn't 'get it'. 

As a kid, Lent was the time you didn't want to eat dinner at your Catholic friend's.  Most likely, there wouldn't be any meat - heretical in meat hearty Oklahoma - and you couldn't count on mac and cheese being served.  There were always too many vegetables on a Catholic household dinner table during Lent.

Several years later as a mature adult, I studied more about what the observation of Lent really meant.  I found my attitude toward it changing.  For me the 40 days of Lent became less about 'giving something up' and more about self reflection.  Ironically, the first time got serious about observing Lent, I gave something up:  Cigarettes.  By the time I finally decided to turn this addiction over to God, I was so secretive about my dirty little habit many people I knew casually were surprised I even smoked.  I started smoking when I was 19.  I quit many times.  I even quit for three years (pregnancy, nursing), and I WENT BACK to smoking.  I tried tapering off.  I tried nicotine gum.  I tried willpower.  There's no such thing as one or two cigarettes for me; it's always been all or nothing.  It took the 40 days of Lent in 2000 for me to totally stop.  And, yes, I still want to smoke, but each day I choose not to.  I felt I had 40 days of support, and that support ultimately let me turn my back on the dreadful habit which was killing me.

Often, I find myself using Lent to 'gear myself up' to do something I dread.  The big one in this category which comes to mind was nursing a dying friend.  Another distasteful task one year was to offer forgiveness to someone who didn't deserve it.  That statement is why I spent Lent getting my head in the right mental space and losing the judgment, so I could offer true forgiveness.  

Another Lenten observation was also about 'giving up something'.  Guess what I gave up for 40 days?  Profanity.  Now, anyone who really knows me knows how profane my language can be.  Nowadays, it's nothing like it was before I gave up profanity for Lent.  During that particular Lenten observation, I discovered using profanity was less about temperament and more about habit.  I quickly realized it was a habit I neither needed nor wanted.  Originally, I used profanity as a way of notifying the male half of the world that I wasn't a sweet 'girl' who could be ignored.  Nice 'girls' didn't use profanity.  Women did.  In the last 50 years, profanity has become habitual language used by almost everyone.  I've never liked being everyone, so losing profane language as a habit became my new normal.

One year my Lenten task was not about 'giving up something'; it was about 'giving something'.  That Lent was the start of my weekly letter writing.  Initially, I wrote to a few people - an elderly person who was tremendously important to me while I was a teen, and a young person who needed adult encouragement, and answering a friend who was writing me.  Three letters have morphed into ten to twelve letters each week.  What started over Lent one year has become a weekly commitment.  My experience has been people are so starved for personal mail, no one wants me to stop writing even when the original reason for the letters has resolved.  Unfortunately, my letter writing has affected my blog writing time.

My discovery over the last 20+ years is Lenten observation is really about personal reflection.  I think of it as taking stock of who I am and where I am in the spiritual journey of life.  Some years it results in a direct 40 day action plan.  Other years it can be as simple as a daily reflection or prayer.  

This year I decided on doing something novel:  I decided to do a specific nice thing for Drake every day of Lent.  Aren't I always nice to him?  The knee jerk answer was 'yes'; the reality I've discovered over 30 plus days is I can be kinder and more thoughtful.  He has loved the attention, and I've learned even a 50+ year marriage can be rejuvenated with a bit of daily mindfulness.  I will say Drake has asked for a continuation of Lenten attention.  That's another thing I've learned from observing Lent:  Once called to do something, it's awfully hard to just suddenly stop.

Happy Easter.     

Texas Rangers Remade for 2023

This blog entry is for all of my Texas Ranger fans who are also readers.  Last season was an absolute MISERY, but according to my resident baseball expert: 

RANGERS’ EXPECTATIONS ARE RISING FAST

Spring training won and lost records don’t historically correlate with regular season results for a number of well-known reasons.  Some teams are so called  “set clubs” with most roster spots and roles already known by March 1.  These teams mainly focus on getting their players tuned up and minimizing injury risk.  Often their established guys work on improvements and adjustments, but are relieved for at least half the game action by youngsters destined for the minor leagues.  This scenario mostly applies to the Rangers this year.  

All the new Rangers’ high profile starting pitching signed during the off-season has been sparingly used in Cactus League games due to their injury history.  Thus, the Rangers have lost several games when their minor league level pitchers coughed up leads in the late innings.  This should not concern us as the regular season pitching role patterns will be very different from these meaningless exhibitions games.

The “everyday” position players have shown much to be encouraged about in the Spring Training games.  Offensive production has been good by the guys destined for the starting lineup.  This includes the rookie Josh Jung whose grasp of the third base position has been widely expected but delayed by injury for over a year.  The eye test for Jung suggests a breakout year for him in 2023 and big star status for years to come.

The only position player questions to make the Ranger's roster are bench / utility roles in both the outfield and infield.  The Rangers have lots of quality competitors for these spots, so disappointing assignments to AAA, or perhaps a trade or two, should be expected just before the season begins.  The challenge here is to capture as much of this talent as possible in AAA for depth in case of injury on the active 26-man roster.

The bullpen composition presents an interesting challenge.  The Rangers now have unusual starting pitcher depth resulting from General Manager, Chris Young's off-season moves.  There are several starters from last year and young MLB-ready guys who have been pushed aside by the new acquisitions (e.g. Dunning, Otto, Howard, Ragans).  This valuable depth will be needed during the season due to inevitable injuries in the starting pitching rotation.  Expect a mix of AAA and active roster bullpen assignments to store these assets to open the season.  The bullpen will be crowded with these multi-inning “just in case” starters as well as the more traditional one inning flame-throwing specialists.

It does seem to be the case this year that the Rangers have a surplus of talent overflowing the 26-man active roster.  Two years of good free agent signings, judicial trades, and continual “organic” young talent development are ready to pay off.  Having lots of difficult roster cut decisions are a clear measure of talent depth which, at least on paper, should translate into a much more competitive team this year. 

Of course, actual win/loss results also depend on intangibles like team chemistry injuries, and even luck.  A fast early start could be a big benefit to a team coming off a miserable season. My opinion is thanks to a confluence of talent, there should be a much more entertaining product on the field this year.  Enjoy.

Christmas Adventures in NYC

There's nothing like a Christmas in New York.  I had a wonderful time.  Of course, it's hard to have a bad time when the main attraction is a four year old and his six month old sister.  A big trip highlight was the family trip to Lincoln Center to see "The Nutcracker".  It was Cedric's first ballet, and I was amused that he found Act I to be too long with too little dancing - my exact take on the Nutcracker.  He was all attention during the second act which is all dancing.  It makes me think we might take him to a matinee of one act ballets this coming Spring.  He's loved ballet dancing for a couple of years.  (Thanks, YouTube.)  Ballet is a family interest, so we were all glad his indoctrination went well.  This was his first visit to a theater, and it also impressed him.  

We were staying in Manhattan this time in the Financial District (the most southern third of the island).  I love staying in a hotel, and this one was first class.  Plus, location in New York City means, "What is your subway access?"  This hotel was just one block from a major hub (Fulton) from which you can catch the A, C, 2, 3, 4, & 5.  You can go anywhere in NYC from those subway lines.  

Number one on my New York hit list this time was The Whitney.  This is a museum of American art founded by Gertrude Whitney, an American socialite with the money of the Vanderbilts and a thirst to buy American art.  Initially, the museum resided in her mansion, but recently, a brand new building at the foot of the Hi Line Park was constructed.  The major exhibition we were interested in was about Edward Hopper, arguably one of the most famous artists of the second half of the 20th century.  Here's my favorite picture from the exhibition

Sunday Morning - 1930

Edward Hopper, and his wife Jo, lived in the same apartment overlooking Washington Park from 1930 until his death in 1967, and her death in 1968.   He was the preeminent realist painter of the second half of the 20th century.  His wife, also a talented painter, married Hopper in 1924.  They had a tempestuous relationship.  He was shy and introverted while relying on her.  She managed him and his artwork at the cost of her talent.  Hopper's paintings are all about New York.  He didn't paint the famous buildings.  He painted ordinary streets; people in ordinary apartments going about the business of living.  He claimed his paintings were the startings of stories, or where the imagination of the viewer begins.  

To see more pictures, click on the link:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/2xroeN4btdBLgPCk8

New York City missed the snow from the storm that shut down Southwest Airlines, but we certainly got the bitter cold.  On our trips across the city, we were tramping around in weather which felt like -5 degrees with 25 mph winds.  Even I'm cold at those temps.  Brrrr.  I thought my ears were going to fall off while waiting for the bus to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  As always, the Met had several outstanding exhibitions.  One of my favorite New York traditions is the fantastic tree decorated with Baroque angels and nativity scenes.  It's about 50' tall.

After admiring the tree, we headed for our first exhibition.  It is the comparison of Cubism and Trompe 'l Oeil.  The school of Cubism was founded by Braque and Picasso.  They called it a different type of perspective.  Trompe 'l Oeil is a painting style called 'fool the eye'.  Items painted two dimensionally on canvas fool the viewer into thinking the items are three dimensional.  The exhibition compared and contrasted the two differing styles of painting.  There were some superb paintings.  Here's my favorite of each style:

Trompe 'l Oeil painting

Georges Braque - "Violin and Palette" - 1909

If you would like to see more of these paintings with explanations, click on the following link:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/og94Ehd4gPv2QJZP9

The second exhibition at the Met was Japanese Kimonos.  There were examples spanning several hundred years.  Of course, I'm always interested in anything to do with textiles or embroidery.  I kept seeing one stunning piece of clothing after another with wonderful embroidery.  Here's one of my favorites:

More kimonos anyone?  Click on the link:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/A96PqGjT2b75TbJs6

The surprising Met exhibition was about Mayan divinities.  Most of the pieces were between 700 and 1000 AD, and the sophistication of the art was unexpected.  I've been interested in the Mayan people since I was 24, and we took a 'shore excursion' during our first cruise to see the Mayan ruins at Tulum on the Yucatan peninsula.  Back in the early 70's there was little or no security around these priceless ruins.  You could climb the pyramid; you could pick up pieces of it lying around on the ground, and no one batted an eye.  Thank heaven for the jungles which sealed away most of the buildings and kept them from being pillaged further after the Spanish destruction.  The Spaniards (encouraged by the Catholic priests accompanying them) routinely destroyed every Mayan book they could find.  The Mayans were a lost people for hundreds of years.  Even today, there are 'digs' occurring in Mayan cities covered by the jungle.  Here's my favorite piece from the exhibition:

 

If you want to check out the other pictures of the Mayans, click on the link:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/5QDRMBZyMyaBKxBd7

And if you haven't seen enough pictures, there was a major exhibition of the Tudors (Henry VIII and Elizabeth I) in the European wing of the museum.  In addition to Henry's personal armor, there were tapestries, rugs, various doodads, and most importantly, the actual 'famous' paintings of the two monarchs.  There were other people represented in oil, but these two monarchs had so much historical impact, it's not surprising the majority of the exhibition would be about them.  Here's my favorite painting from the exhibition, and if you haven't see enough pictures.....well, you know the drill.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/86ZYk6JZmD39rPVq6

Other than the frigid weather, the only flies in the ointment of Christmas were both kids were sick (colds), and their health caused the family to cancel several pre-planned activities.  Cedric was at his best on Christmas morning as only a four year old can be.  He was max excited with all the presents and his Santa gift which was a 'dress up station' that Sarah MADE.  As part of that gift, there were headbands with unicorn horns which we all wore as we opened gifts.  

To round out the trip, we got caught in the great Southwest Airlines meltdown.  Fortunately, we weren't trapped at the airport, but we did have to stay an extra three days in NYC.  We finally got a non-stop flight to Phoenix, but it was 3 hours late leaving, so we drug into Sun City at 3:15am (that's 5:15am body time!!!) with both of us sick.  We assumed it was the children's cold, but instead it was COVID.  So now Drake and I have joined the ranks of Americans who have had the disease.  We got lucky.  While it took us a month to completely recover, neither of us have long-term COVID.  We did infect three members of our family, but they are all OK too.  Hmmmm.  I may have to reconsider my initial claim that it was a 'great' trip....