chronicled & illustrated

birthday present!,
originally uploaded by nuanc.

Today is my birthday. This is a wonderful surprise gift from my husband. I’m thrilled to bits and pieces and would be out taking photos except that the battery has to charge first.
I should be reading the manual but I can only absorb so much at a time. Especially before I’ve even had a chance to take one shot!

Here’s a poem written on my birthday in 1995, revised for today

Birth Day

Sunday,
glistening glinting
but growing grayer
Yesterday,
not as showy
but with morning rolling into
an afternoon of full summer
changing to cool deep night
full of fire flies and intimacy
dissolving into the first thunderstorm
of a dry season

Today
is no memory
yet
present moment
elusive fleeting
already gone
capture impossible
unlike those fire flies
who let themselves
be caught
Let me catch
this moment more fully
these summery sights
this singular smell
symphonious overlapping sounds

As I write,
the sun comes
through clustering clouds
for the third time
I know
because I am witness
that today is no better
than the last two days
I know
because it is now
if there were but one
in all of creation
this would be
the day

I ended my last post by saying I’d be busy for a while with my school girl friends who were going to be visiting from Texas. But instead I’m here because they opted out of coming. It was a shock, as they cancelled abruptly the day before they were to arrive and the decision was already made without my input.

I’m still wandering around picking up the pieces.

My friend decided not to come because the forecast for the week was for rain. She says it’s just a postponement and not a cancellation but that just makes me laugh because when—I wonder—does she think she can come to Nova Scotia with a guaranteed forecast of no rain?

I’m using this photo manipulation I call “Peeling Rain” since it’s supposedly a rainy post.

Peeling rain seems especially appropriate since it’s NOT a rainy morning here in Cape Breton. It’s a gorgeous, perfect summer’s day. Bright sun, light breeze, slightly cool. All I can think is that it’s their loss. They…stuck as they are in blisteringly hot Texas for the summer. And yet, it is my loss as well. I would have loved to have shared this day with them.

Here is my proof of the wonders of a Nova Scotian summer day. All taken this morning, July 5th:

“inner sunshine”

“joy around”

“bee happy”

“blue breeze”

“volunteers”

“purple non-rain”

made myself laugh with that title.

So, I will attempt to regain my focus and work on that almost finished short story…or maybe I should go lie in the hammock and soak up the warmth before it starts to rain.

Cheers.

attention span,
originally uploaded by nuanc.

Summer isn’t good for concentrating. Maybe it’s the leaves rustling or the birds singing or the clouds rolling by. I’d say it’s the heat, but here in Nova Scotia, we haven’t had any yet. It’s summer’s long days of sunlight that can both seem to last forever and pass by in a flash. The on again/ off again activity level. Hurry up and relax.

This is a piece I did the other night after having put a big push on to get several end of the month articles published in the zine followed by the subscriber’s email update. I needed a creative activity that was involving without being involved. For several hours I immersed myself in my photos and photoshop. (I don’t really use Photoshop. For this kind of photo manipulation I use a super simple product called ArcSoft Photostudio. Easy and quick.)

I keep way too many of my digital photos. That’s because I use many of them in these layered art pieces and it’s hard to predict which will be useful later on. I’ve always enjoyed the idea that there are no failures—only the raw material for other kinds of art. I used to tear up paintings I didn’t feel were successful. Then I’d use the wonderfully torn fragments as collage material for others. This is the same.

For the next week all my attention will be with my childhood friends who’ll be visiting from Texas. We’ll laugh.

Tra la~~~

learning our colours,
originally uploaded by nuanc.

One evening while in Maine, I picked up my granddaughter, Acadia, and took her for a little drive. It was getting toward dusk. We stopped between my son’s house and my rented cottage several times as Cadi was asking to “see the water.” We got in and out of the car and took short walks.

These days, she holds tightly to one of my fingers as we walk. I showed her things. A bird flying. White cherry blossoms and lilacs. Bees on the bushes. A feather. A pine cone. The sound the water makes as it rushes over the rocks. The older boys playing on the other side of the street.

Our last stop was where this photo was taken. The wetlands at this spot are always stunning to see whether it’s sun, fog, rain, morning, noon or night. This day had been gloriously sunny. One of those late spring days when the new warmth, super-blue sky and the fresh young leaves and grasses combine for a spectacular crispness that will soon blur into summer fullness—rich, deep green, hot, but no longer new.

As the sun went down I held Cadi while snapping a dozen photos or so. She was patient with me and afterward we talked about what was happening to the colour of the clouds. I reminded her that they are usually white but that sometimes when the sun goes away for the night they change into a variety of colours. Cadi’s only just learning her colours. She has the idea now, but the specifics as to green, blue, red are still in process. Sometimes she gets them right and sometimes she doesn’t.

I started naming the colours in the sky.

“Pink.” “Orange.” “Violet.”

“Yellow,” whispered Cadi, her eyes fixed on the sunset.

“Yes,” I agreed, so pleased that she was with me, “yellow, too.”

READING: I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes by Jaclyn Moriarity
WRITING: NetWorld, a short story
PLANNING: Our new front porch
WATCHING: A mama woodpecker feeding her babies in a tree outside the bedroom window

This is my wonderful 2 year old granddaughter, Cadi. I’m in Maine right now for her birthday celebration. This was taken on my first full day here. I got to stay with her while my son had some well-deserved r&r. Cadi and I took a walk into the little town where there is a school playground.

I took a dozen or more photos but this one and only a couple of the others are decent. Cadi’s difficult to take pictures of as she moves fast, does not—to say the least—like to pose and often looks away if she sees a camera.

I like that in a little girl. While there’s nothing wrong with a child who knows how to “turn it on” for a camera, it’s pleasing to me that Cadi doesn’t see the need to do so. She’s been seeing images of herself on my laptop screensaver and she definitely enjoys the photos. “Dat’s Cadi,” she tells her dad. She seems to remember certain ones, what she was doing and where she was, even though many of them were taken at Christmas. But she obviously doesn’t like them enough to make herself available for my lens. She’s got more important things to do with her time. Right on, Cadi!

Now, I just need to get a camera with a faster response time!

The jacket and hat that Cadi is wearing were brought from Cape Breton. I ‘won’ them in a silent auction at Girl’s Night Out, a fund raiser for the Sydney women’s shelter. It was made by a local woman who’s name, unfortunately, I didn’t get. I planned on giving it to Cadi as a birthday gift but didn’t really have an expectation that it would fit or that she would like it. But the day we were going to the playground was a little cool and Ty hadn’t brought her a jacket, so I immediately busted this out. She took right to it and especially loves wearing the hat. And doesn’t she look grand in it? I love it when a non-plan comes together.

deep pink blues,
originally uploaded by nuanc.

The photograph is a mock-up cd cover that I did for a utata project last summer. The guitarist is my son Carson who is a singer /songwriter in Albuquerque. He’s been slowly working on a web home for himself and his music all this year, and is, in fact, my inspiration for moving my website-family to wordpress. I THINK it’s been a good move. He’s on my mind, because I just took a look at techornati tags this morning and found that he’s put in a link to my zine. The “web” is indeed a fine metaphor.

I brought this fun project out of the archives because it relates to one of the themes of my life this year. That of self-promotion. I’m terrible at it and always have been, but I have accepted that as a fault; something that I must overcome. Even as I do it (mainly on the web, at this point) I feel that others won’t like me. It’s an old primal tape running in my head. Mustn’t draw attention to ones achievements. Particularly if one isn’t absolutely sure of that those actions/behaviors/products can be counted as “achievements.” Yes, there are always doubts.

And yet, I’m pushing myself to make connections, promote my sites, feel happy that my photo was the needle found in the haystack of flickr for the german beer ad. Perhaps age has taught me a few things—usually three or four words at a time: Things take time. Little things add up. Life is too short. People like success. Pride cometh before a fall—

Oops.

Old tapes.

I titled this Pridefall because those two words are firmly associated in my mind. I have experienced the relationship many times. Pride makes us boastful, boastfulness makes us vulnerable to tripping because our nose is in the air? I don’t know. It’s a firm relationship, but not a useful one.

I’m proud of my son and his music. I’m proud that he’s hung in there with his creative endeavors even as he works so very hard at his academic and teaching careers. And in that, there is no fall. Being proud of others is ok.

By the way, the title of the album and band on my mock-up cd cover are not my son’s.
His site is carsonmetzger.net. Go. Find out his names. Read his words. Listen to his music. Go see him perform. Understand my pride.