I don't know what it is about ballet schools and railroads, but just about every single school where I've studied or taught has been on top of them; you learn to deal with the teeth-rattling thunder of the enormous diesel engines barreling down the tracks. It's part and parcel of operating in a low rent … Continue reading Homecoming, Part the Fourth
Photography
Homecoming, Part the Third
Before we pulled out of Chattanooga on a hazy Tuesday afternoon, my dad reported he'd seen a burgeoning praying mantis and stick bug population this summer. And evidently my son is a praying mantis whisperer. I could not capture the kind of image he did, a challenge I threw his way. And what it lacks … Continue reading Homecoming, Part the Third
Learning Curve
Once upon a time when I was the director of a small ballet school I taught classical ballet to adult beginners a couple nights weekly. They were dedicated people, mostly women, but also a few men, from all walks of life. Some of them told me it took them weeks to gather the courage to … Continue reading Learning Curve
Auto Mode: Thou Art Weighed…
...and found wanting, along with my outdated photo editing software. I am itching to get out of auto mode. Not sure I can wait until the October workshop. Today's experiment was the vista opposite the building where I work. (I have always found it funny to see an actual building somebody dropped on top of … Continue reading Auto Mode: Thou Art Weighed…
Kingdom of Wilis: Foggy Vermont Morning
Giselle is a story ballet with Romantic-era sensibilities that still somehow reaches modern audiences. In it a pretty peasant girl—Giselle—dies at the close of the first act, duped by a handsome nobleman promised to a princess, her heart too weak to withstand the loss. In the second act she is transformed into a wili, a … Continue reading Kingdom of Wilis: Foggy Vermont Morning
What does THIS button do?
I lived in Denver for a few years in my twenties, mostly piddling around, as my mama would say. I took a brief break from academia (where I should have been hard at work), to dance a little, but mostly to explore. The last year I lived there I worked in a frame shop with … Continue reading What does THIS button do?
Sycamore Stories 