City Views, Country Dreams

Good afternoon from New York.

This St. Patrick's Day has been granted glorious late winter weather and I have walked across Central Park to view the traditional parade. The parade begins down in mid-town, but it is so much more pleasant to watch the marchers and musicians, and even the other watchers from the Park side of Fifth Avenue.

I took lots of photos.

Here are some bagpipers.



Here are some ladies whose contingent was a bit quieter.



More pipers quickly appeared.


I love these huge banners. It often takes quite a few folks, generally men, to keep them up and moving along.


This is a day that brings out head gear that rivals that worn on Easter.

Not all the marchers were from the United States or Ireland.

These serenading gentlemen came all the way from Spain.

Back to traditional marchers.

There were many, many firefighters marching today. The Mayor marched along with them. Then, he must have retraced his steps so that he could also march along with the police. I thought that the flags were beautiful.

This little fellow was a bit chilly when the warming sun began to drift to the west.

I think that these two were about to trade telephone numbers.

These boys accompanied their parents to the parade, but weren't really that interested.

Something about this young lady reminds me of Sally Bowles in Cabaret.

Now here is a frothy hat.

In this family, only dad held out against going green.

More head gear.

Here is a little princess with her favorite doll.

Chairs reserved for children, who have decided to stand a while and stretch their legs.

What a pretty smile on this very young lady.

More head gear, and a beautiful tartan.

Sorry that I shot this facing the sun, I wanted to catch the Kilkenny banner.

Perfect extensions for this day only.

There once was a banner from ....

Little sisters telling each other secrets.

More headgear.

Please also take note that these very well dressed horses are wearing green stockings.

I like the decorated drums as much as the large banners.

This little girl got lots of attention.

I saw many feather boas this afternoon, and many little errant green feathers along the sidewalk.

Someone made this hat with lots of care. The gentleman wears it well. On the left, you can see the edge of the very beautiful Frick Museum.

Another painted drum, and a gentleman who knows how to play.

Isn't she sweet in her tartan?

This little boy seemed to enjoy playing around with his plastic derby.

Good looking sweaters and kilts, and beautiful music, too.

Here is another majestic group of marchers.

These fellows were just too cool and required a photograph.

This little girl was enduring her tinsel antennae.

The parade goes on and on ... perhaps close to five hours. You all might now feel the same about this post!

I did not stay for the entire parade, but had a nice stroll back across Central Park, passing by beautiful Bethesda Fountain. You can see the lake and, just barely, the boat house in the background. When spring arrives, the Fountain's water will be turned back on.

At the edge of another part of the Lake, I saw lots of patches of these little white flowers. I am too ignorant to know what they are, but think that they are beautiful.

I hope that I have given you a taste of today's parade, and that each of you will some day be able to see it for yourself.

Happy St. Patrick's Day.

City Views, Country Dreams

Good morning from New York.


Tonight is the night that we are commanded to re-set our clocks. Daylight savings time will begin. I will doubly re-set my clock, since tomorrow is the day that I will return to work. Meanwhile, I will try to stretch this day to its limits.


Spring is toying with us today in New York. The warm temperature has already melted any traces of last week's snow, and by early afternoon we are promised a high around 65 degrees F. Wise readers can do the C conversion.

Yesterday was still a bit on the cool side, and I had the huge pleasure of spending the morning with a friend from my childhood and her husband, who were visiting from out of town. I was so lucky to have the day off, and to be able to join them for a tour of that remarkable Bonnard exhibit at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, followed by a leisurely and very chatty lunch.


Isn't it grand to reunite with friends after a long, long time, and find that you just pick up where you left off? That is exactly what I felt happened yesterday.

After reluctantly saying bye bye to my pals, I walked back across the Park, dodging the puddles that were accumulating as the snowy, icy edges of the meandering pathways melted. It was funny to see various red and yellow signs warning of icy situations on steps, and advising folks not to try to walk across the lake. The ducks who winter near the banks of the lake seemed very happy to have their waterworld back.


I will share a view across the lake with the towers of Central Park South in the distance. You can see how grey a day can be hereabouts.

Even so, this vista seems tranquil to me. No sounds of cars. Not too many sounds of people, either. Mainly just some bird chirps, and some squirrel scurrying. In another few weeks, if the weather gods favor us, the trees will begin to have that faint new leaf green haze and then ... leafing will really get underway.

I did see one forsythia bush in its startling yellow blaze. Just one. Its spot must be very sheltered and must catch lots of sun ... on a sunny day.

What were in bloom along many banks were snowdrops. I thought that you all might like to see some New York snowdrops. I cannot tell you which variety these might be.

Whatever their proper name, I just find them charming.

Back home again, I did manage to get out my sketchbook and did several drawings of the primulas I bought last week. It is a testimony to the posies' strength that so far they are surviving the testing environment that this apartment provides. I love drawing flowers while really, really examining them, and thereby truly learning how their petals are shaped, how those petals meet in the middle, how the flowers meet the stems, how a leaf meets the stem and the flower. It is a way to truly appreciate the grace that nature brings us.

It's fun to do some really careful drawings (not quite up to botanical studies ... not at all) and then to do other drawings that are looser, but still capture the character of that particular plant. Maybe I was drawing under the influence of seeing those Bonnard paintings at the Met.

Having explored primulas with eye and pencil, later yesterday afternoon I got out my watercolors and did a very improvised birthday card for my uncle. I always like to make cards, rather than buy them ... if time permits. This card was a jumble of watercolor and rubber stamping. I had no idea where the design was going, but the result did please me. Sort of crazy, but with a vaguely vintage look. I think that it will make my uncle smile.

Let's see, what else has been created around here. I finished the granny square afghan and think that I got the color distribution right. Even though I thought that project would use up lots of my leftover yarn, I find that there is still plenty, plenty of yarn in various baskets and bags.

And so I do near the time for that clock reset. Still have groceries to buy, a bit more housecleaning to do. Definitely plan to get that sketchbook out one more time this afternoon.

Hoping everyone will have a fine weekend.

City Views, Country Dreams

Good evening from New York.


How is it that my week of seven vacation days is more than half over? Once I begin to relax, and do what I want at a pace that I choose, the hours really do seem to move much more quickly on any clock in the house. This manifestation of the rules of physics will be given an additional push this Saturday/Sunday night when we folks in the States will be commanded to Spring forward. We will lose an hour's sleep.

I intend to get lots of hours of sleep stored up between now and then. Waking up on Sunday and motivating downtown to the shop should be easy. Ah, but that is a few days off.

Since I am not leaving my home town (big city) during this week off, I did want to treat myself to something extravagant. Today, I chose to take an early afternoon subway ride down to Times Square, and see if I might snag a ticket for a matinee performance of the revival of Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit. The play is currently in previews ... unfortunately ticket prices are not reduced during this final trial run. But ... the tickets are available to the last minute fan like myself.

So, I handed over my credit card to the rather flustered man in the ticket office, and got my admission card to a fine seat in the orchestra (stalls) seats.

I have always been a Noel Coward fan, but have never before seen this play as a play, though I know that I did see the film.

Drawing me to this afternoon at the Shubert Theatre was another chance to see the truly marvelous Angela Lansbury. On one of my very first visits to New York (I was still in school) I saw Ms Lansbury in the original Broadway production of Mame, and have quite enjoyed her performances in various media since then. Portrait of Dorian Gray, The Manchurian Candidate, and even her long-running whimsical tv series as amateur detective Jessica Fletcher.

Today's cast also include Rupert Everett, Christine Ebersole, and Simon Jones (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe) and others.

I love seeing revivals. It is fun to see how the wit holds up, how the modern director decides to honor the past, and usually one can count on the play being a well-crafted survivor.

I did quite enjoy this afternoon's performance, even it the critic who lives inside my head definitely notices a few technical glitches and a few flubbed ... but quickly recovered lines. If I were lucky enough to have access to the director, Michael Blakemore, I would also give him a few tips on getting some of the cast to be a bit warmer towards each other. I had the sense of some of them being a bit too much on their own individual spot of the turf.

Still. How lovely it is to live in this city, amongst all its challenges and problems to be solved, and still ... on a free Wednesday, to suddenly decide to go to see a fine bit of theatre, and to be able to be sitting in a fantastic seat an hour later.

I did take along a package of cough drops, and by repeatedly unwrapping a lozenge and popping it into my mouth, managed to keep my recovery from my cold to myself. I am a well-mannered audience member who loves to applaud the cast at the final curtain.

Sweet dreams to all.

City Views, Country Dreams

Good evening from New York.

Today was the first day of my seven days of vacation, or holiday time. I am delighted that the bad cold that gripped me for the past couple of weeks does seem to have pretty much drifted into history. So...I will be able to enjoy these days of freedom. I am going to try to not give the shop another thought, although this will be difficult for me.

I knew that I would be enjoying this week on a budget, courtesy of the financial crisis which has not drifted away like my cold. In the deepest part of my soul/brain, where I hold my fears, I do fear that the financial recovery will take a long, long time, and think that all my decades of financial planning for my old age have been thrown out the window. Realizing that others are in even worse shape that I am does not really calm me.

Yet, I won't let those worries mess with my time off.

The major news of today is once again courtesy of Mother Nature. We might actually have an overnight snowstorm here in New York. So far we have been graced with dainty snows that really didn't even produce proper slush.

Tonight may offer the real thing.

And so, after a slow, relaxing start to my morning, with real breakfast and the Sunday New York Times, I ventured out to obtain the tradition item required for impending snow, or hurricane. The fresh quart of milk.

Once that was taken care of, I took a bus across the Park to the wonderful little library that provides me with all sorts of reading treats. I needed to return my copy of The White Tiger, having finally finished that novel. Rather than checking out another new book, I decided to venture into the many layers of Stacks. It is such fun to roam freely through these shelves, with a list in hand, but also being prepared to be sidelined by a sighting of a book you never saw before, or a book that you always hoped to see.

Today's official mission was to find Emma Smith's The Great Western Beach. Found it. Then back into the funny little cage of an elevator to explore some other stack levels. Found 84, Charing Cross Road, which inexplicably, I have never read. Back into the cage for another ride.

And that was where I found a real gem, a 1986 large print re-publication of the original 1942 collaboration of author H.E. Bates and illustrator C.F. Tunnicliffe, In the Heart of the Country. It is an amazing book, very much reflecting the war in the countryside, but beautifully championing the strength of the countryside.

For this dreamer, the book will be a delight to savor.

Then leaving the library, I caught a west bound bus to take me back across the Park, and on my walk back home down Amsterdam Avenue, stopped into a tiny flower shop to pick up some paintbox primroses to cheer up my apartment, as the snow watch commences.

I so hope that the predicted 12 inches of snow does accumulate. If so, I will be out early with my camera, and will be back here soon with some urban snow scenes.

Meanwhile, I wish you all sweet dreams as this brand new month begins.

City Views, Country Dreams

Good evening from New York,

Quite a few weeks ago, and if I were being more precise, it might actually be more than a few weeks ago, the wonderful Cait O'Connor passed along to me a few interview questions. I have certainly taken my time in replying.


I am starting with a post of a painting I did many years ago, when I was a much younger person, and carried many dreams in my head. At that point in my life, I still thought that time went on forever, and that dreams would come true, if only one wished for them over and over.

Years later, I realized that more than wishes might be involved. I even began to enlarge my field of dreaming.

Back to Cait's interview questions.

1. Was I ever an art student. Oh yes. My college diploma says my major was in Economics, but I also took enough courses to qualify for a degree in Art Studio. I just, perhaps rightly...perhaps not, that Economics would grant me more employment possibilities.

2. If you had your life to live over again, what, if anything, would you do differently. Ah Cait, this is a tough one. At the end of every week, I have reasons to reconsider lots of what I did in the past bunch of hours.

I was raised in a totally different environment, am just a bit too old to be considered a baby boomer. I think that I was taught as a child to be seen and not heard, and as a female to also be more submissive than my inner nature told me. I turned down several marriage proposals, and wonder about one of those nays. It was ages ago, in the midst of the Vietnam War, and accepting would have set me on a totally different path. I was frightenened to take that path.

3. What do most look forward to when you retire. Ah, this is the joke question! Right now, at age 63, I already qualify for this country's Social Security benefits. These months monetary benefits are stated to increase the later once chooses to sign up for them. I will wait as long as possible, but really feel that the entire Social Security system is yet another Ponzi scheme, based upon the feeding of the base of its pyramid by increasing numbers of willing workers who are involuntarily made part of this system.

Gosh, I have so many interests, and so wish that I could spend every day on them, starting right now! Painting, drawing, printmaking, writing, sewing, knitting, crocheting, reading, gardening ... in my dreams-only garden. Seeing friends, traveling. Maybe I will eventually be able to have at least one blow out year!

4. Where is your favorite place in New York? Easy. Central Park, the very big back yard (garden) for all of us who live in Manhattan. It never lets you down. Just take a walk there ... 30 minutes are enough, longer is better, and your mind is refreshed. I saw a "host" of snowdrops in the Yoko-funded Strawberry Fields area today. And a host of tourists taking photos of the Imagine mosaic.

5. List your passions. Cait, this one is tricky, because it is the most revealing. I really do love kindness. Openness. Great art from all the cultures and centuries that have gone before us. The same is true of literature. Friends who cling together for many decades and let our ridges and splinters show. Fresh flowers, and fresh spring and summer fruits and vegetables. Learning anything new. Having my opinions tested and learning something new.

Thank you Cait, for the opportunity to answer your questions. If anyone reading this would also like to take the time to me interviewed, please do leave me a message. I will try to provide some questions as fine as those that Cait sent me.

Sweet dreams to all.

City Views, Country Dreams

Good evening from New York.

For some of you, it is already Friday the thirteenth. Here in New York, it is still the birthday of one of our better known Presidents, Abraham Lincoln, born on February 12.

Our current and still very new President Obama, is encountering the first turbulence sent towards him by the opposition party, the Republican Party. No damage to the hull of the new administration yet. I think that most of the population is still very much caught up in the financial crisis, and What It Might Still Mean to Each of Them.

In my micro land, I am delighted to have had my head pass recent inspection and even treatment by some very fine doctors. I am now in possession of a renovated back molar. It is now strengthened, and filled in, by a brand new inlay. Celebrating that, and having read about the study showing that eggs are good for us, I have wasted no time in getting an early start on the Easter season.

The gift-wrapped creme egg pictured above is now history. It was deliciously rich in the way that the first creme egg of the season always seems.

I came upon a very small display of the beloved creme eggs in a neighborhood drug store (chemist shop) this afternoon after a visit to my eye doc for a regular check of my glaucoma. All is well with my optic nerves, and I am instructed to continue on with the drop of the magic fluid in each eye every night. To properly check my eyes, inside out, my wonderful and informative doctor has to dilute my pupils. That part I hate, and it is so unpleasant to leave his office and come out into a bright early afternoon light.

All the same, I did squint my way a few blocks to the drug store to get some Valentine's Day candy that we can give to customers in the shop on Saturday.


That's it! And, right next to Cupid's mix was that tiny assortment of the creme eggs. Of course, I could not resist. And ... I also got myself some multi-vitamins. All in balance.

It was amazingly windy today, and I was very glad that the many tall construction projects still underway in the neighborhood all seemed to have all their various equipment and building materials all tied down. Safe journey on the sidewalks this afternoon.

When I got home, I returned to a new year's crochet project, which was started to used up a bunch of left over yarn in various shades of ivory, pink, red, rose, and some other pastels. Very much a Valentines Day shade card.


Of course, starting such a project always leads me to buying more yarns. That is why I will never, never get to the end of my left overs.

This afghan will probably be 10 by10 squares, with each square about 5", with some sort of lacy bit surrounding the squares, once I finally get them connected.

However, that connecting will have to wait, because tomorrow it is back to work. I will leave my television vigil over what this new government of ours might do to get our economy back into positive mode, and which local sports stars might be found out to be liars.

The not-so-new-now owners of this apartment building still are trying to get more than one of the three elevators to work. The ugly painting is still in the lobby.

It is very cosy here tonight, even with the wind blowing fiercely outside. I hope to finish that afghan before true springtime arrives.

May I wish all of my readers a very Happy Valentine's Day. It is a day for sweets, and a day to be sweet. I find it fun to practice being sweet.

Pleasant dreams to all.