Life/Boat
Fernandina Beach Marina
As I’ve aged I have become more cautious. Experience has given me good judgment. Good judgment often came as the result of bad judgment. My life has been in a very comfortable place for the past few years and continues to be in that space despite all that happened last year. It would be very easy to develop a “don’t rock the boat” philosophy. Still, the wisdom I’ve gained over the years tells me that I did not get to where I am by being overly cautious. The only time you are truly safe in a boat is when it’s in dry dock or beached like the one in the photo. Real boats rock.
Each of us has to figure out how much movement we can tolerate. I intend to keep rocking as long as I can. That’s where the enjoyment is.
Up the Stairs
The National Building Museum is one of my favorite places to visit when in Washington, D.C. Originally the headquarters of the U.S. Pension Bureau it also served a dual purpose as space for grand social functions including presidential Inaugural Balls. Once inside the Great Hall, you will quickly see why. It is 15 stories tall at its highest point with columns 75 feet high and 8 feet in diameter. Each of the columns was constructed from 70,000 bricks then painted to resemble marble. It would never do to have an ordinary looking stairwell in such a grand building and the architects did not disappoint.
The Cost of Being Colorful
Many family trees have at least one branch labeled as “colorful” and that certainly applies to the Richardsons. Sometimes people who don't conform to social norms get labeled with terms like "eccentric" or "character." Though I never met him, I feel colorful is the right descriptor for my Grandpa Joe.
Joseph Leonard Richardson was born near Oakland City, Indiana in 1892 and lived there all his life. He married Minnie Upton and they had one child, John. Joe had success as a farmer but was probably best known for his small construction business that did a lot of work in the agricultural community building ponds and cleaning out ditches. He was good enough at that to own two small draglines and keep them busy during the challenging economic times of the 20’s through the 40’s. When my dad was old enough, he joined the family business as a dragline operator. The sign on Joe’s pickup read, “Richardson & Son Contracting – We Move The Earth.”
I can only speculate on how successful Joe could have been if he had been more focused on work and less on his other interests. Those interests were gambling, liquor, and women in no particular order. Joe also liked nice clothes and I've seen a couple of photos where he's wearing a straw boater and spats.
He found policies quite constraining and had no use for regulations that might interfere with what he wanted to do at the time. Joe’s mantra might as well have been, “Rules are for fools.”
This was particularly true when it came to hunting and fishing licenses. Joe viewed those as a huge overreach by the government to keep him from the pursuit of happiness. In the local game warden’s eyes, Joe was Public Enemy #1. Opportunity came his way one summer day when he spotted Joe fishing at a local lake. The game warden attempted to sneak up on Joe but was spotted and a foot race ensued. Joe jumped in his car, took off slinging gravel, and was able to get about a quarter mile ahead of the game warden as they sped along the rock roads over the rolling hills of Gibson county. At some point in the chase, Joe crested a hill, noticed an open garage door ahead, whipped off the road, slid into the garage, and closed the door. As soon as the game warden’s car roared by, Joe threw open the garage door and headed for home. I think he and the game warden might have been the inspiration for the Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote cartoons.
Despite clashes with the game warden, Joe likely saw himself as a law-abiding citizen. He just happened to be particular about which laws he would abide. When Joe became too impaired to drive, he would pay local high school boys to chauffeur him to his next misadventure. Joe found the bonds of matrimony too restrictive and opted for companionship with women of easy virtue, enticing them with new shoes. That and his other vices accelerated the fracture of his marriage to Minnie. Though never divorced, they lived separately for years. While there may have been some happy years in the marriage, Minnie got wise to his ways and knew Joe was too self-absorbed and compulsion-driven to ever change.
Joe would bet on anything. If there were two birds on a power line, he would wager on which would fly off first. He kept a silver dollar in his pocket and would often challenge his customers to bet him “double or nothing” on the flip of that coin after the completion of a job. Sometimes Joe came home flush with money and other times he had worked a week or two for free. Joe would tell you he never had a losing streak but admitted there were periods where it was quite a while between wins. By the time Dad married Mom in 1948, Joe’s gambling and drinking were so out of control Dad paid Joe to stay home rather than come to any job they were working on.
Joe’s response to that was to catch a bus for Hot Springs, Arkansas and gamble his way back to happiness. One day while at the bank, Dad was talking to the president who commented, “Well, Joe sure is living it up in Hot Springs! He’s having us wire him money every few days.” Dad nearly fainted. He told the banker, “Send him enough for bus fare and tell him he can use it any way he wants, but there isn’t any more coming after that.” Joe returned to Oakland City shortly after.
Joe was known and liked by almost everyone in and around Oakland City. He had a pirate’s smile and a good sense of humor. He passed out candy to the kids he met on the street. Dad and Mom told me that he was really looking forward to my birth but died two days before. I arrived on the day of his funeral, so Minnie and Dad were running between the funeral home, cemetery, and the hospital.
I’m sure my upbringing would have been different with Grandpa Joe in it. Subconsciously, I have probably used his life as a cautionary tale. Though some of the stories about him are sidesplittingly funny, the price of being colorful was awfully high and everyone in the family ended up paying Joe’s tab.
The Fishermen
The pandemic has wreaked havoc on the world. For some it has created sorrow, stress, uncertainty, and fear. I certainly have experienced those emotions. When I've been able to recenter, it is clear there are opportunities in the midst of all this. It's like the aphorism, "The sun is always out. It is I who must come from behind the clouds."
Coming from behind the clouds for me means slowing down and experiencing things more deeply. I get to see little stories I would normally miss...like this one. All it took was for me to be relatively still for about 30 minutes.
One the characters in this drama lives to fish. We'll call him Carl. The other, Ed the egret, fishes to live. He wades close to the shore biding his time until something tasty comes within reach. Patience is a virtue. Accuracy is a necessity. I've never seen a fat egret.
Carl has options. He can fish close to the bank or as far out as he can cast. If his bait isn't attractive and the fish aren't biting, Carl is probably still happy that he spent a pleasant morning near the water. There are always fish to be purchased from the store on the way home.
Ed and Carl don't usually hang out together. I don't know Carl at all, so I can't say if he has any fishing buddies, but I've been around Ed and his relatives enough to say they like to keep their distance when fishing. That is different today. Ed has decided that social distancing will be damned and he is going to stick uncomfortably close to Carl; less than ten feet. What would embolden him to take that kind of risk? It is something unseen in the photo.
At Carl's feet is a line descending into the water. On the end of that line is a mesh bag containing a half dozen silvery fish about 10-12 inches long. Each time Carl moves to a new position on the waterfront the bag gets drawn from the water, the fish flop, and Ed, mesmerized by the sight, follows Carl like a puppy. He has stopped fishing in the hope that bag will pop open delivering a free meal. While Carl is willing to share his fishing spot with Ed, I sensed no inclination on his part to do the same with his catch. Perhaps it happened after I left.
Little stories. Little mysteries. Another day, another adventure.
Great Egret
Egrets are fairly common in Florida with the three primary varieties being the great egret, snowy egret, and cattle egret. The great egrets are the largest with yellow-orange bills and black legs. During the mating season the area around the eye turns green. Unless you are watching a matched pair, it can be difficult to discern the male from the female because there are no visible physical differences except males are slightly larger.
At one time there were almost hunted to extinction for their delicate feathers and eggs, but they have made a comeback. The reduction of wetlands areas is still a concern. Great egrets are graceful in the air and when landing. Unlike a lot of other large birds, they fly with their necks in an S-curve.
Nails on the March
For me, part of learning how to see more deeply is to challenge myself to observe everyday things in new ways. I really liked the finish on these nails and was able to create an arrangement that I found appealing.
Thanks to the nice people at Eco Relics in Jacksonville for letting me play in their really cool store.
You Must Choose Between Me and Your Cigar
In his poem “The Betrothed,” Rudyard Kipling speaks from the point of view of a bachelor contemplating the benefits of his fiance’, Maggie, versus the pleasures of a good cigar. What follows are a few lines to provide a flavor for the writer’s dilemma.
“Open the old cigar-box, get me a Cuba stout, For things are running crossways, and Maggie and I are out. We quarreled about Havanas—we fought o’er a good cheroot, And I know she is exacting, and she says I am a brute.”
“Maggie is pretty to look at—Maggie’s a loving lass, But the prettiest cheeks must wrinkle, the truest of loves must pass.”
“For Maggie has written a letter to give me my choice between, The wee little whimpering Love and the great god Nick o’Teen. And I have been servant of Love for barely a twelvemonth clear, But I have been Priest of Cabanas a matter of seven year;
“Open the old cigar-box—let me consider anew—Old friends, and who is Maggie that I should abandon you? A million surplus Maggies are willing to bear the yoke; And a woman is only a woman, but a good Cigar is a smoke.”
One Person's Junk is Another Person's Treasure
My experience with salvage yards is mixed and I bear the responsibility for most of the negative outcomes. As a teenager, I ignorantly shot a number of wrecked car windshields and rear windows at our neighbor’s salvage yard. I did not know that he sold them. That bit of learning cost my parents $600 in 1964, which was a considerable amount of money back then. At $1 per hour, it took me a long time and lots of unpleasant work to repay my folks. Recently I sought permission to make some images in a salvage yard, got the approval, and then had it revoked before I could get my camera gear from the car. I’m pretty sure the owner had a change of heart and it had nothing to do with anything I said or did.
In between those unfortunate bookends of experiences, my time in junkyards has been quite pleasant. It’s there I was able to find replacement items for a few of my cars at a price friendly to my budget. I’ve also met some really nice people who work in the recycling business. It’s also a place that is teeming with possibilities for interesting images.
The Value of Design
As a rule, parking garages are utilitarian structures and there is little attempt to make them anything more than that. Once in a while, an architect decides to spice things up a little and that’s what happened to this structure in Birmingham, AL, not far from Children’s Hospital. Thin perforated metal sheets bent slightly at one edge offer an element that is both decorative and functional. At certain times of the day light dances off the semi-reflective pieces. The perforations and lifted edge allow filtered light to pass through into the garage while helping to keep the temperature lower in the garage than on the street.
MoPOP
Designed by famed architect Frank Gehry and commissioned by Paul Allen as a tribute to Jimi Hendrix, the Museum of Pop Culture is a fascinating structure. The building typically elicits one of two responses from viewers: like or dislike. While I wouldn’t want it close to my home, I really like the creativity of the design and use of materials. At certain angles it looks like an alien spacecraft and its metal skin takes on different tones as the sun changes positions in the sky.
During our visit to MoPOP there were excellent exhibitions on Jimi Hendrix, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, and Prince as well as an interactive exhibit on Minecraft. If you plan to visit the Space Needle, MoPop is right next door and definitely worth a visit if you enjoy music and popular culture.
Columns and Arches
Some things are very difficult for me to resist photographically and repeating patterns would be near the top of the list. Add some interesting shadows and they move to #1. I found these while walking on the campus of Rice University in Houston.
The Individual
This black iron fence not far from Rice University in Houston ran almost a half block. All the decorative toppers on the post were perfect…except for this one. :-)
Urban Bar Graph
The reflective windows used on many modern buildings often create interesting patterns. This one in downtown Houston reminded me of a bar graph.
Beauty in the Mundane
The tire these chains are wrapped around is about four feet tall and goes on a piece of heavy equipment weighing about ten tons. It would be normal to assume that tires that large on something that heavy would not require any help in getting traction, but that assumption would be incorrect. This equipment operates in quite a bit of mud and water on slippery rock. The chains provide the grip needed to keep the equipment moving and they can be heard from quite a distance. I like the patterns made by the interlocking links.
The Power of Attraction
This composition caught my eye for several reasons: the silver and blue of the phones against the yellow wall, the angling shadows from the beams above, and the fact there were actually four functional pay phones next to each other.
Formation
January and February are a bit iffy on days warm enough to catch rays on the chaise lounge in Florida, but that doesn’t keep the hotel staff from having things ready just in case.
Memories
During my junior high and high school years I spent a lot of time on barstools. The ones I used to spin around on were located in Dale’s, a lunch counter and teen hangout. I’d stop by in the morning for a balanced breakfast of a vanilla Pepsi and a donut, then again at lunch for a lemon Pepsi and a hamburger or hot dog. A few stools were well worn and some wobbled, but all of them spun well. Sometimes at lunch I would drop a quarter in the jukebox and play my three favorite songs, though I might also wolf down my food and hustle down to Nip’s Pool Room to play a couple of games of rotation or eight ball before I had to get back to class.
Lunch counters with barstools are pretty much a thing of the past, but I’ll find one every now and then. At some point I may be able to resist the temptation to spin around on one for fear of falling, but I’m still doing it at 70. I’ve also been seen riding a shopping cart through the grocery parking lot. Is there a better cheap thrill?
St. Augustine, FL
