187 Chestnut

Nothing like a winter's day at Mom's house. Bougainvillea blooming like it's in the tropics, bulbs in full bloom, child's table at the ready for a snack or art project. Copper pitcher to water plants and a multi-paned mirror made out of a window from Potton hilltop. Just add piano music and the artist just coming up from her basement studio, wiping her hands on her apron and glad to see you.

lovely

"May the dove of peace enlighten our troubled world."

I received two e-cards for Christmas this year. This drawing was done by one of my writing students, Juliet Rago.

I think it interesting to note that she is in her 80's and is so up to date with technology.

Merry Christmas!

Winter Solstice

When I was a school librarian and read to groups of children every day, the second and third graders would race in the door with this beseeching question, "are you going to read us a folk tale? please!!!"

Together we explored the questions asked over the centuries by people all over the world. These stories are filled with drama, deceit, tricksters and kindness in full measure and overflowing. All are filled with truth about human nature. I have begun to see the workings of the natural world to be a kind of story. I feel connected to all those who have gone before us and who have noticed the shortening of days at this time of year. As the story goes, in the American Southwest, Coyote steals the sun. In South America, Papagayo, the parrot, takes big bites out of the moon until it disappears. In the Pacific Northwest, Raven is the culprit, carrying the sun away in a box.

Below is a poem written by Susan Cooper, a noted children's author. I took the above photos in Glover, Vermont- the home of Bread and Puppet Theater.

Light candles today! Tell stories to keep the dark away.

The Shortest Day

So the shortest day came, and the year died

And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world

Came people singing, dancing,

To drive the dark away.

They lighted candles in the winter trees;

They hung their homes with evergreen;

They burned beseeching fires all night long

To keep the year alive,

And when the new year's sunshine blazed awake

They shouted, reveling.

Through all the frosty ages you can hear them

Echoing behind us - Listen!!

All the long echoes sing the same song,

This shortest day,

As promise wakens in the sleeping land:

They carol, feast, give thanks,

And dearly love their friends,

And hope for peace.

And so do we, here, now,

This year and every year.

Welcome Yule!

(posted by Barbara)

Art in New Mexico

Navajo art in Santa Fe

Spanish art. This is St. Barbara for those who don't recognize her by now. She holds a torch and branch, has a three tiered skirt and is always next to or holding or in a small tower. She is the patron saint of architects, lightning, fire and war. They love her in New Mexico. Her image is everywhere!

Taos Indian wall art

My art. I love the shadows created by the strong morning light shining through stick fences.

Anglo art. This doorway leads to a courtyard which then leads to the real front door.

One of the things I love about New Mexico is that there is art everywhere and three cultures are represented: Indian (native), Spanish and Anglo. During the Great Depression, New Mexico was granted large amounts of money through the WPA, which supported many struggling artists. It didn't hurt that the governor at the time had gone to boarding school with FDR! Old chums. There are still signs of this commitment to things made by hand today in murals, hand hewn decorative rafters in buildings and lovely art. Imagine supporting artists in this way!

By the way, I am home now, just still dreaming of the west.

Coastal Studies for Girls

Now this just makes me smile.

Here is Eliza with her students on an ice skating trip.

Red in Taos

Late afternoon in Taos

New Mexico morning

Hi All,

I am here in Taos at a writing/meditation retreat with Natalie Goldberg. This landscape is lovely at all times of year. Laura and I drove up from Santa Fe just ahead of the storm and are now hunkered down to write and read and go to class. After blustery wind and rattling windows in the old Adobe house where we are staying, the weather has settled and the sky is the familiar New Mexico deep blue. I will post pictures over the next few days as time allows.

And maybe some writing.

For you writers out there, todays prompts so far have been:

I remember

I feel through my feet

I don't remember.

It only takes ten minutes to trust first thoughts and

write down what comes to mind.

Those of you who have studied with Nat or with me, there

is no excuse. Get writing! I traveled this far so you could have

some fresh (or old familiar) prompts.

Keep your hand moving across the page!

You'll be glad you did.

Love to all,

me

1000 Paper Cranes

Hey Fam!

I wanted to let everyone know that we are going to fold 1000 paper cranes for the wedding in May and we need help! If you know how to fold paper cranes, want to learn, and have some extra minutes around the edges, we'd love for you to get a pack of origami paper (any color, hopefully standard size) and fold some cranes and send them our way!

1000 paper cranes means luck and longevity and life and love and apparently all things good. We'd love your help! Since we are doing the decorations ourselves, we thought this would be a cool addition.

Love, C

Cape Town

This is going to be a quick post as we just got off a 16 hour flight and I'm playing major catch up. Tim and I just got back from Cape Town where I was sent to run a workshop for three days and I craftily convinced (he didn't need convincing luckily) to play hooky from school and come with me. He surfed in both the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean in one day (and didn't get eaten by a shark), my workshop went really well- we brought together peacebuilding practitioners from all over the region to talk about best practices, and we had a wonderful few days to wonder around the country after that. It's an extraordinarily beautiful place. Mountains and sea! This post won't describe how complicated a place it is beyond it's breathtaking scenery, and we are both left with a lot of questions and feelings of discomfort regarding how little the lives of black South Africans seem to have really changed since Apartheid ended. We also went on a township tour (apartheid-era slums where the majority of black South Africans still live) which was very powerful. But for now, just some highlights -

The Cape of Good Hope! We hiked out as far as we could, leaving crowds and tour buses behind. This is the most powerful lighthouse in South Africa. The Lucitania went down on Bellows Rock, right out of the picture frame. It was pretty dramatic to be at the southern most tip of Africa.

South African Penguins!

Eating dinner outside in Hermanus by the light of an oil lamp. Earlier we watched Southern Right Whales from the shore with their young. Land-based whale watching!

Cold!

Wine will fix it!

The workshop I ran was held in Stellenbosch, the wine country about 20 minutes outside of Cape Town. Pretty much vineyards and wineries as far as the eye could see. Just like this.

Top of Table Mountain! We took the cable car up. Robben Island is just out of the frame to the left, all of Cape Town right below Tim.

Nature! We didn't quite make it to a safari so this is as close as we could get. This is an eland on a farm where we stayed for a night.

Typical sunset from the road along the coast.

The world is beautiful! I feel so lucky! Love, Carrie

Wolf Neck. Freeport, Maine

Sunset on Thanksgiving.

Sent by Eliza.

The Turkey

As the late fall light slanted through the window of my third grade classroom at The Brayton School, I placed my left hand on brown construction paper, splayed my fingers out as wide as they would go and traced my hand, bumping over each finger tip and then around the curve of the thumb. I cut along the outline with scissors and reached into the back of my desk for my small box of Crayola Crayons. I chose a different color for each finger - crimson red, burnt orange, canary yellow, forest green - and put a smiling face on the thumb. My Thanksgiving turkey was done.

Ben Franklin wanted the national bird to be a turkey. He felt the predatory nature of an eagle to be an unsuitable symbol for America. An eagle will grab prey right out of the mouth of another bird while in flight. It is an aggressive predator.

Turkeys are peaceful, they gather in groups and when roosting, sit in the lowest branches of a tree. Eagles choose the highest point of a tree for their nests. I stood under an eagle's nest on an island in Maine and was amazed by the detritus piled on the ground below - small carcasses, bones, muscle shells, twigs gathered and never used, white droppings. The eagle is a slob! The vegetarian turkey is communal and resourceful, grazing for food on the ground. A locavore.

Ben Franklin had a point. The way we begin can determine how we continue. Perhaps the history of this country would be a little different if there had been a golden turkey at the top of every flag pole rather than an eagle. School children would imagine peace as they saluted the American flag. Instead of eating it on Thanksgiving, perhaps we should be honoring the most peaceful of creatures; the wild turkey.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Postscript: while looking for a graphic to go with this post, I came across a drawing that I had done a few years ago. I guess that most earliest of art projects, the turkey, made a lasting impression on me.

today

And And And....

Today's POST card is from Switzerland with a reference to a Museum of Contemporary Art. The more I look at it, the more I see. Are the yellow and blue objects and red splash of paint intentional or random? I wonder.

Thanks for sending this, Don. Welcome home!

Portland artist

The fairy house is complete. Now to wait for the residents to move in.

General Store. Danville, Vermont

Mail Outside

Mail Inside

Gas next door.

Note the red funnel. The nozzle on the diesel tank is made for trucks, too large for cars. We had to move on, almost running out of gas on the lovely back roads of Vermont.

Portland, Oregon

August creates a still life with materials that he collected on a walk with his grandmother.

contrast

The pictures will have to speak here. Suffice it to say that in Switzerland everything works! Trains run on time, bells chime on the hour, and mail is delivered to lovely boxes with top hats. Not so in Lincoln. We are indeed still living on the frontier!

Wolf Neck. Freeport, Maine

Eliza with her students at Coastal Studies for Girls.

Postcards from the edge

Welcome to a new feature on my blog. As more and more people have phones that are also cameras, I receive many great photos from far and wide. I hear a short *ding* coming from my computer and I know that someone is sending me a missive or photo often from distant lands. Call it a present day postcard, without the stamp.

My brother travels to Switzerland and finds the perfect car.

end of the season

visitors

We don't get many trick or treaters here in the dark woods of Lincoln but the bonfire may have attracted them. This was quite a trio.

From left to right: Alice in Wonderland, a Firefly (with the oh so familiar New England Halloween phenomenon...the jacket over the costume!) and Poseidon, Greek King of the Sea.

Before leaving, Alice asked if I would like to hear a poem.

Did she KNOW who she was talking to? What could make

me happier? She recited this from the book by Lewis Carroll.

How doth the little crocodile

Improve upon his shining tail,

And pour the waters of the Nile

On every golden scale!

How cheerfully he seems to grin,

How neatly spreads his claws,

And welcomes little fishes in

With gently smiling jaws!

Full disclosure; turns out the two girls were from Cambridge, just here

visiting their friend, Poseidon. This must have been their second

time out, since trick or treating in Lincoln was postponed until last night due to the storm.

Cambridge was unscathed. Alice had already had a trial run. Very Lewis Carroll.

thirty years!

Carrie turns thirty!

The Party:

Fire outside

Fire in the barn woodstove

Clear night, half moon, stars and good company

Jeff and Jenn. Jeff is a friend from college.

Abid and Alia. Alia attended Columbia with Carrie and is now living in Boston.

The Cooks:

Eliza made two loaves of sesame topped braided challah bread.

Suzanne beginning the butternut squash soup with coconut and spinach and tofu.

Kate checking Epicurious on her ipad for lasagna recipes, stuffed dates and more.

Sisters!

Suzanne is from Austin, TX. Carrie and Suzanne met in Biloxi, MI working for Hands ON USA.

Carrie and Kate are friends for college. They drove down to Biloxi together to volunteer right after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Apple Crisp and ice cream. The end to a perfect birthday meal.

Twenty five of us gathered in Lincoln to celebrate Carrie's thirtieth birthday. Carrie, Suzanne, Kate and Eliza showed up around two o'clock after stopping at Whole Foods on the way to gather ingredients and began cooking up a storm. I joined in for the apple crisp part of the menu. Now this is the way to give a party. Many cooks!

Guests arrived as it was getting dark. Friends had traveled from as far as New York City, Washington D.C., Freeport, Maine and North Carolina and from nearby Cambridge. David lit a fire in the courtyard and in the barn woodstove. Guests migrated from barn to house and back again. The moon was bright and I realized how we all love to stand around a fire, drinking mulled cider, talking and occasionally just staring at the flames. The piñata in the barn topped off the party. Nothing like blindfolded revelers swinging baseball bats! It was a great evening.

Happy Birthday, Carrie!