My (current) profile photo was taken at Myrtle Beach the morning after prom night. The day was cloudy and the rose was being rolled across the sand by a damp wind. It was a poem all by itself, a metaphor, I couldn't tell if it was sad or lovely, so I took its picture.
Some of the most perfect moments in my life have taken place in or on the ocean. Standing in the surf in the sun, speckle-blinded by floating diamonds of light, pulled, oh pulled by water. Walking stung by sand into cold wind, pulled into the cloud-colored water, dancing with surf. We used to play sandpiper, advancing and retreating, digging for sand crabs then running for our lives. Ocean, mother, lover, killer, mesmerizing in all her colors and moods, a flagrant caster of riches on sand. I pored over the sand as a child, searching for completion in shape and color - only the most perfect shell would do. The search is now the same, but the standard of perfection is not. The most beautiful are twisted and pocked by age and adversity, or polished to reveal color and grain. But the pebbles, the beach stones, they have to be perfect. Still.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
plum pudding, plum lines, plum nuts, no Bs
I constructed a plum pudding or three, and have been sharing them with friends. Some of them like it. The tangerine sauce with Grand Marnier probably doesn't hurt, as long as you have a designated driver. You're supposed to let it age for a year, instead of two weeks, so next year's is going to be constructed in January.
A spiral stairway is being shoehorned into the entry rotunda in our museum, so the halls have been resounding with jackhammers and hammer hammers and saws and scrapers. Fountains of sparks from welding and from the sawing and smoothing of steel of concrete. I can't hear most of it from my office, but this morning there's a particularly loud shrill sound of some oversized dentistry going on. It's been fun watching all of this, and several new concepts have been entered into my mental vocabulary. The electricians repairing the lines cut by the construction crew used rats to slurp wires through conduit. There is much visual poetry in spiral staircases, and having watched the crew cut their way into the building's foundations to pour their concrete footings, I'll never look at a building the same way again. And the lovely tools they use. A sort of powered painter's chisel with teeth looks oh so useful, and then there's the little portable band saw, and a small power saw with a disc that can cut concrete or steel, or be used sideways to scrape welds smooth - now that's a tasty little device.
A spiral stairway is being shoehorned into the entry rotunda in our museum, so the halls have been resounding with jackhammers and hammer hammers and saws and scrapers. Fountains of sparks from welding and from the sawing and smoothing of steel of concrete. I can't hear most of it from my office, but this morning there's a particularly loud shrill sound of some oversized dentistry going on. It's been fun watching all of this, and several new concepts have been entered into my mental vocabulary. The electricians repairing the lines cut by the construction crew used rats to slurp wires through conduit. There is much visual poetry in spiral staircases, and having watched the crew cut their way into the building's foundations to pour their concrete footings, I'll never look at a building the same way again. And the lovely tools they use. A sort of powered painter's chisel with teeth looks oh so useful, and then there's the little portable band saw, and a small power saw with a disc that can cut concrete or steel, or be used sideways to scrape welds smooth - now that's a tasty little device.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
