Out of hopeful green stuff woven
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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Bezige Bij" journal:[<< Previous 20 entries]
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03:01 pm
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You don't want to know how much I've been reading about "authentictiy" lately; it makes one cynical.
Chicago's famous blues scene is a world of grungy bars set in upscale neighborhoods, where affluent white tourists bask in the musical tradition of the black working class. According to Grazian's fascinating study, this fertile stew of contradictions makes for a cultural Rosetta Stone that helps us decipher the relations between art, business and postmodernity's quixotic search for the real. The ironies go on forever. As fans flock to blues venues in search of authentic black culture, they are served up a commodified and caricatured "minstrel show" of endlessly repeated blues standards punctuated by off-color jokes; inevitably, a backlash sets in amongst aficionados, who set off to ever smaller bars in ever poorer neighborhoods where the truly authentic blues are said to reside. Sociologist Grazian is less interested in finding authenticity than in understanding the "symbolic economy of authenticity" by which we accrue social status and seek out an "idealized reality" that "might render our lives more meaningful." If that theory sounds stuffily academic, be assured that Grazian's approach is anything but. Much of his research methodology consists of hanging out in blues joints, drinking beer, striking up conversations, occasionally sitting in with the band on the sax. The result is a elegantly written exploration, both skeptical and sympathetic, journalistic and erudite, of the many diverse subcultures, both black and white-tourists, regulars, bartenders, impresarios, musicians-that stake a claim to the blues.
- from a review of "Blue Chicago: The Search for Authenticity in Urban Blues Clubs"
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10:20 am
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Good things
Men working in *our* garden.
Happy dance! Happy dance! Happy dance!
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O, and Tess came back very happy and excited after the first of her 7 children's book illustrations in Amsterdam yesterday night. Girl's got talent, but I knew that already...
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And, the Sally Mann exhibition is at the Fotomuseum in Den Haag is very much worth checking out. I was there Saturday with Monique. Had a wonderful day as a whole actually. I love Monique and when I don't see her for a while I forget how much we connect. Monique and I need to see each other more often.
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And for some reason I find myself singing this today:
Tags: good things
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08:55 am
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More Halloween
And then we have my nephews and nieces celebrating Halloween:
I'm sure most people would be distracted by the flower getup, but all I can think is, "Poor kid has my feet..."
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09:01 am
[Link] | Slept well last night, really well, for the first time in a while.
Yesterday I placed an order for literally thousands of bulbs. It's late in the season to place the order, but I still have time. I look forward to the physical act of putting them in the ground in the coming weeks. I am also planning on potting up a bunch of bulbs. Some I will sell in the spring to put directly in gardens. However, I am also scheming on selling flowering bulbs in pots on Koninginendag.Koninginendag is a national holiday celebrating the queen's birthday and takes the form as what is essentially an nation wide garage sale. I am thinking I can equip each pot with a tag that doubles as a business card and marketing action.
(And suddenly I am reminded of this scene from Oliver Twist and I see myself singing "Blue, bluebells, blue...")
I have four gardens being built right now which should be completed in the the coming weeks. They are all good and innovative designs and I am pleased with the results thus far. It makes me happy to create something that I know hasn't been created in that way before.
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09:05 am
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Heehee
Mom and Dad celebrating Halloween. Just noticing now that they have matching glasses hanging from their shirts too. :)
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08:00 am
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Birthdays and anniversaries
Tess turns 45 today. Yeah Tess! Yeah Tess! Yeah Tess!
She just got a note from a colleague congratulating her on her 35th birthday. She was obviously pleased and amused.
I made us pancakes this morning with the last of the Bisquick. We sat at the kitchen counter giving each other that silly smile that we always give each other.
Tonight I have class so I won't see her till late. That's a shame. But this weekend we went to Rotterdam and after visiting the Edward Hopper exhibition at the Kunsthal we had dinner together at Hotel New York. When we were there last April we had spied these amazing looking seafood platters. So Saturday we indulged ourselves.
Fresh seafood is probably one of my favorite foods. As a kid I would eat buckets of steamers (steamed clams) which came out of the local river by myself. I would look forward to eating them at the end of summer at the Firemen's Fair each year. I like the physical aspect of preparing the food, of opening of the shells and pulling out the soft bodies and peeling off the protective film and then placing it in my mouth with my hands.
I love oysters too. I like how they slide in one motion out of the shell into your mouth. There is a freshness and a realness to them that you rarely taste in other food. It's like eating the sea.
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Also it was two years ago today that I told Dirk that I was in love with someone else. We were driving down to Den Bosch for a party which wound up being a surprise wedding for my good friends Monique and Peter. I was silently sitting in the car unable to speak, not sure what to do and Dirk finally pulled over and said, "Okay, we need to talk." It was somewhere on the side of the highway between Utrecht and Den Bosch that I managed to pull the words out and tell him how I was feeling. We then needed to drive on to Den Bosch, put on our happy faces and pretend that everything was just fine the rest of the day while we attended someone else's wedding. There was this annoying waiter who felt compelled to tell us, repeatedly, during the party what a cute couple we were. And there was Dirk beside me telling me, "See, we look good together." And I wanted to die. It feels like such a long time ago.
Dirk emailed recently about making dinner plans with the three of us. We still need to arrange that.
I just texted Monique to wish her a happy anniversary as well.
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Just read the post from October 25th 2007 where I posed the questions about selfishness again. It is intriguing to reread my thought process back then and doing so makes me so incredibly thankful for the feedback that I got here at that time. So here's a big cry out of thanks to all of you!!!
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ETA: Also interesting to read my post from last year at this time. One friends locked and cryptic. One kept private for reasons that I now can't completely understand with exactly the same title as the one I posted today.
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09:08 pm
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Philip Sooner, I salute you.
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04:44 pm
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Look out towers and tree huts
I was just googling the guy whose lecture I will be attending this evening and I am intrigued by what I see. I really like this aspect of studying again - coming in contact with people who are doing interesting things and having the opportunity to hear how they work and what inspires them.
This treehut is very cool as well. There are more pictures on his site (linked above).
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07:55 am
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Raspberry jam, vitamins and "gardens"
Tess always puts a little pile of vitamin C tablets out for me in the morning. Sometimes she puts them by my mobile telephone which is charging on the counter, or on top of my agenda which I have left open on the table. Sometimes she simply puts them on the kitchen island where she knows I will sit for breakfast. Every time I see the little pile of vitamins I smile because I know someone cares enough about me that it makes a difference to her whether or not I take my vitamins. That means a lot.
Today I made myself a fried egg and two pieces of toast for breakfast. I spread raspberry jam, my favorite, on the toast. While I was carrying the plate to the kitchen island a piece of toast went somersaulting to the floor. It fell jam side up. I laughed out loud with joy when this happened and thought, "What are the chances of that?" Probably the chances are 50-50, but often when our toast falls jam side down it feels like toast *always* falls jam side down. It does not; sometimes it fall jam side up and for this I am happy.
I have been corresponding with my Aunt Geri about my Grandmother. Aunt Geri is the steady rock that every family should have and I find myself hoping there is a heaven just so she can have a special place in it for eternity. This morning I read that my Grandmother is back in the Victorian House, but this is not because she has healed so well, but rather because she isn't healing and the doctors don't think that a longer stay at the physical therapy unit will make a difference. The therapy hurts and Grandma doesn't seem to be able to work through the pain. Alcour Gardens, which is what the nursing home is called, says it could take ten weeks before she is walking again. Why is it that they always name these places after things like gardens? Do they think that will make the reality of it any better?
I am reminded of the summer when I was ten and I lived with my grandparents in Oregon. There is a picture of me and Uncle Michael, my Grandmother's younger brother, eating toast with jam at the table. I would gamble that it was raspberry jam, because that has always been my favorite. I am smiling and my head is tilted to the left. There is a yellow bow in my hair. I wore that silly bow almost every day that summer. Uncle Michael died years ago of a stroke despite the vitamins my grandmother kept trying to get him to take, but he too was smiling in that picture.
I leave you with music:
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05:42 pm
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10:51 am
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Garden photographs
Last Thursday photographer Jolanthe Latkens and I visited 3 of my gardens. Originally the plan was to photograph 4 gardens but the weather didn't cooporate. The photographs still need to be further edited, but she just sent me a rough selection and I like what I see!
( More )
( And more still )
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02:50 pm
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Gracias a la Vida
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11:47 am
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Pictures of the bedroom so far
It's not quite finished but the bedroom as of now:
The bed is from scaffolding pipes and "cheese boards" - cheese boards being the pieces of wood that cheese is set on to dry of be sold and the market.
The floor is once again our trusty OSB material, this time cut into tiles of 120 x 120 cm and white washed.
The shelves are the Ribba series from IKEA and the goal is to have only white and metal frames on it (not there yet). I've also cluttered it with my stone and shell collection.
We're looking for a piece of wood to put the vase on, but that will come.
As seen through what I at this point am inclined to call my "trusty" Tord Boontje lamp; it's moved with me that many times and has survived. Points for paper.
( The rest is behind the cut )
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10:19 am
[Link] | It is quiet here. We spent much of the weekend working around the house and the new bedroom is finally near a state that I would call "finished". I will share pictures soon but suffice to say that as we tucked ourselves into bed last night Tess said "Het is gewoon zo mooi..." with an undertone of disbelief at least ten times. It's a very good mix of both our styles and that makes me happy.
Saturday afternoon we ventured to Den Haag to participate in a workshop about children's books. A woman from my writing class this spring is head of the local chapter of SCBWI (Society of Children Book Writers International) invited me to the workshop and I encouraged Tess to join me. For those or you who don't know, Tess is great at illustration. In the past she did a whole series of murals for children's play areas in stores. She also reguarlarly draws and designs cards for birth announcements and the like. She is very versatile in this area and does far too little with her talents, so I thought it might be fun for her to join.
To make a long story short, the day was really fun and inspirational and Tess is seriously considering signing up for several illustration workshops focused on children's books. I received a couple of concrete tips on how I can further develop and structure some of my story ideas which were deemed surprising and in possession of lots of potential. I "definitely have a book or two there" so I will play further and see what I wind up with.
Further news, last Thursday I visited a number of my gardens to have them photographed and I am very curious as to the results. I'm expecting good things and will keep you posted.
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04:08 pm
[Link] | I have a cold that will not die, aggravated surely by the fact that I refused to accept that I had a cold for a number of days and acted accordingly. You know, by biking home late at night without a scarf on and other such stupid actions. Yesterday I was so thoroughly miserable that I canceled my dentist appointment and today I did not attend class. I felt guilty not going to school today, because I am not "really sick" but I do have a low fever (have for a week) and so I really need to just relax for a bit.
School continues to be interesting. Thanks for the thoughts regarding my last entry. I agree that audience is important and I am inclined to think that this was the main issue. My design could have been crazier. Though I still feel that it was sound, I will admit that it was on the safe side. Part of the point of art school is try out a little of the crazy and it would be a good excercise for me to do so. Also, I suspect that it would be useful for me to not not explain quite as much from the get go. I can let things speak for themselves, even be a bit mysterious, and wait for the questions. I intend to try out this tactic.
Further I am liking the format that this first semester has in the sense that every Tuesday we have a guest lecturer. It is interesting to have this opportunity to come in contact with a wide variety of designers and artists and their perspectives.
Work wise things are a bit slow. I have had at least 6 new potential clients decide not to go through with the project, most of them citing financial concerns as their reason for this choice. I'm still not sure how concerned I should be.
Internet at home has been spotty which has partially responsible for my decreased presence both here and on Internet in general. Part of me is inclined to think this is a good thing. Part of me is not so sure. Not writing here and communicating less on Internet is not leading to me communicating more elsewhere, as I might have expected. It is leading to me simply communicating less. I'll see how this progresses.
Tess is presently driving home from visiting her brother at the hospital in Eindhoven. He had an operation for a cancerous tumor in his ankle. Her brother seemed unconcerned and said the doctors saw it as routine, so for now we will take him on his word. Tess met up with her sister at the hospital and arranged to take "the girls" back with her. They will be spending the night with us both tonight and tomorrow night, when their parents will join them. Tess is all excited about the prospect of making pancakes and going to the park and generally being an ideal aunt for the weekend. It should be fun; I just hope they don't catch the cold that will not die.
I need to run the store and do a couple of errands before they get back, so I'll get on that now.
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11:45 am
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Not poetic enough
Remember how in Vienna two years ago Topher Delaney told me that my presentation wasn't poetic enough? No? Well she did and it hit home. Yet, apparently, I didn't really do anything about it. Last night my project was again criticized for being too pragmatic, too neatly tied up. It made too much sense and followed the program too closely.
Art school is going to be a real adjustment for me.
Do I have to relearn how to not make sense, or not such perfect sense anyway?
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07:53 am
[Link] | It is decidedly autumn like this morning. I am trying to decide what it is that makes it so. Is it the way the air smells? The angle of the light? The temperature? The color of the sky? I do know that the anenomes are blooming on my balcony and I expect it will rain today. On the radio they said there will likely be showers and so I'm still debating whether or not I will bike to my appointment in Nijkerk or simply take the train.
For me it is innate to this time of year to want to take a rake through my life, buy new notepads and prepare myself in back to school fashion. This year is no different and because school for me will indeed actually start in a week my feelings seem justified.
I was just playing with my journal and for the first time in 5 years altered the style. The colors aren't right and I am still wondering if I should change them back or fiddle further, but somehow I want this journal to also reflect the start of a new year, a new stage. I changed the title of the journal as well to "Out of hopeful green stuff woven", a quote from Whitman that I underlined twice (and then added a star) while reading Leaves of Grass. This journal has lost the urgency and the active role that it had for me 2 years ago when I chose the title "Biting off the matter with a smile", a line taken from "The Love Song of Alfred Prufock".
I plan to keep this journal, but it seems now that I am more recording occasional reflections and findings here than searching for answers through my writing. I also plan on starting a professional blog, linked to my website, to discuss gardens and designs and much of that green stuff. So we'll see what the role of this journal will become. Regardless, I am infinitely glad that at this moment I feel much more like celebrating and singing of myself than measuring out my life with coffee spoons.
I think I will bike to Nijkerk.
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03:33 pm
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Snapshot
Life seems to be continue is a steady tempo. Tess and I are working slowly and surely on the house. Our new bedroom is almost done. The current bedroom - future office - is currently a disaster area full of far too much stuff. I'm getting nervous and excited about school starting in a bit more than a week. I have enough assignments and I am enjoying them. Life is soft and augusty and good.
The photo below was sent to me this morning from a client. The garden was built last spring for the sweetest couple you can imagine. In a year or two the rose vines will completely cover the pergola and the crabapple trees will be full and offer shade, but I am very pleased with how well and much the garden has already grown. They are in their sixties and since retirement have more time to enjoy life, including the garden. The garden suits them perfectly and they are very happy with it, which is very satisfying to hear, observe and realize.
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03:42 pm
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Running over bridges
West of my neighborhood there are polders, large open fields criss crossed with canalized waterways, lined with knotted willow trees and alternatively inhabited by sheep, horses, cows and the occasional blue heron. Not more than twenty meters from my front door there is a small bridge crossing a larger canal. If I turn right I can run straight into the polders and keep running until I reach Soest or Baarn or even Eemnes.
Last week I was running in the polder just before sunset. It was so quiet that I could hear the cows chewing. And in all directions I could watch the clouds flowing across the 180 degree sky. It's a strange kind of beauty this landscape, barren and lush at the same time. The grass is incredibly green and from the moistness in the air you can almost feel how saturated the soil is, and yet the horizon lies so low and far off that you feel like you could get lost before you reach it.
Today I crossed a bridge, under which was a sluice and the Eem. While crossing the bridge I was reminded of my first weeks running freshman year in highschool. I was a gangly thirteen year old with little athletic abiltiy, yet I had just joined the cross country team. Every day that first week we ran half way across the Oceanic Bridge and back. It felt like the end of the world, but we were only running maybe three miles. I remember how my calves cramped and my shins ached and the cramps I had in the side of my abdomen. It was awful but I was determined. In the next four years we would run over countless bridges. The Rumson Bridge, The Highlands Sea Bright Bridge, Middletown Bridge and the, for me, unnamed bridges on Seven Bridges Road. Everywhere there were bridges, and they created the primary landmarks and destinations for much of my early running years.
I hadn't thought about it till today, but since I have lived in Amersfoort bridges have not been a part of my running experience. I would run to and through the woods. I would head to the heather fields in the Treek. I would run past Leusden and onwards towards Woudenberg, or perhaps in the direction of Soesterberg, de Bilt and Zeist. Nowhere were there bridges. The soil was sandy and dry.
It was funny and nice to realize that my running territory has returned to a collage of bridges and waterways. Baarn is a very different destination than Highlands or Sea Bright, but that doesn't really matter. I think I will be regularly running over the bridge and back in the coming months.
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07:05 pm
[Link] | I'm on a diet. I don't like being on a diet. It causes me to think about food constantly. Too bad it's necessary.
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