The Things You Save...
"The things that you save—you save them, I suppose, so that when you're old, you can fondle and caress them and feel the breeze of nostalgia brushing your face. "
The Indian Clerk David Leavitt
Inclement weather lends itself to nostalgia. Yesterday I dusted bookshelves, pictures and what some people call knickknacks —stopping often to recall the circumstances and history of several pieces.
A mauve glass vase, hand blown, pinched in the middle, with a heft that belies its size came from an artist's studio in Shelburne, Massachusetts. I bought it for several dollars because the artist, Maria, gave up. "I can’t," she said, "support myself." Her asking price for all the work in her studio—"priced to sell"
"The contours and curves of this vase," I said,
"captivate me. I can lose myself in the glass."
"I made it," she laughed, “with you in mind."
A wood horse on the Flying Horse Carousel, the oldest merry-go-round in the U.S.A., stares beyond his wood frame. Three of us, all teachers at the same school, unaware at the time of the circuitous years ahead, went to Martha's Vineyard for the day. I liked the spirit of those wood horses—first carved in 1876 in New York City.
Years later I went to the New England Carousel Museum where hand carved horses went to be repaired, gilded and put on display.
A glass box is filled with postcards, cards from friends who traveled all over the world. One friend managed to write pages of words on a postcard by diminishing the size of her handwriting and necessitating my use of a magnifying glass.
No one sent a card that relied on a witty saying and few words from the correspondent. We all still loved the written word in longhand.
Shells fill a bottle and the bottle underwent a metamorphosis into a lamp.
A carved seagull—bought in the town of Perce on the Gaspe Peninsula –balances on a flat rock. She misses the sea air, the thermals, and the sea smell. I miss the replenishing ocean, the waves, and the assurance of the tides. The sounds of the ocean surround me, enter me and cleanse me. The repetition of sounds remind me of life’s rhythm even when that rhythm stutters.
Two photos of faces—one, a profile jutting out of a tree stares at Walden Pond, the other created out of geological rock layers on the Grand Canyon’s Bright Angel Path.
I've walked around Walden Pond in early spring when the ice is a thin glaze receding from the shore, in spring when greens move beyond an artist’s palette, in summer when early morning swimmers cross the pond, in winter when the snow covers my boots.
I've hiked down Bright Angel Path, moved over to let the mules pass, watched a hummingbird hover on a branch, spread my fingers on the canyon walls and encompassed eons between my thumb and pinky.
And I recall the prayer –“Blessed are You... who makes the works of creation”
Inclement weather lends itself to nostalgia. Yesterday I dusted bookshelves, pictures and what some people call knickknacks —stopping often to recall the circumstances and history of several pieces.
A mauve glass vase, hand blown, pinched in the middle, with a heft that belies its size came from an artist's studio in Shelburne, Massachusetts. I bought it for several dollars because the artist, Maria, gave up. "I can’t," she said, "support myself." Her asking price for all the work in her studio—"priced to sell"
"The contours and curves of this vase," I said,
"captivate me. I can lose myself in the glass."
"I made it," she laughed, “with you in mind."
A wood horse on the Flying Horse Carousel, the oldest merry-go-round in the U.S.A., stares beyond his wood frame. Three of us, all teachers at the same school, unaware at the time of the circuitous years ahead, went to Martha's Vineyard for the day. I liked the spirit of those wood horses—first carved in 1876 in New York City.
Years later I went to the New England Carousel Museum where hand carved horses went to be repaired, gilded and put on display.
A glass box is filled with postcards, cards from friends who traveled all over the world. One friend managed to write pages of words on a postcard by diminishing the size of her handwriting and necessitating my use of a magnifying glass.
No one sent a card that relied on a witty saying and few words from the correspondent. We all still loved the written word in longhand.
Shells fill a bottle and the bottle underwent a metamorphosis into a lamp.
A carved seagull—bought in the town of Perce on the Gaspe Peninsula –balances on a flat rock. She misses the sea air, the thermals, and the sea smell. I miss the replenishing ocean, the waves, and the assurance of the tides. The sounds of the ocean surround me, enter me and cleanse me. The repetition of sounds remind me of life’s rhythm even when that rhythm stutters.
Two photos of faces—one, a profile jutting out of a tree stares at Walden Pond, the other created out of geological rock layers on the Grand Canyon’s Bright Angel Path.
I've walked around Walden Pond in early spring when the ice is a thin glaze receding from the shore, in spring when greens move beyond an artist’s palette, in summer when early morning swimmers cross the pond, in winter when the snow covers my boots.
I've hiked down Bright Angel Path, moved over to let the mules pass, watched a hummingbird hover on a branch, spread my fingers on the canyon walls and encompassed eons between my thumb and pinky.
And I recall the prayer –“Blessed are You... who makes the works of creation”
1 Comments:
Very excellent.catedle
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