items from the summer of eighty-nine

my mother has been clearing out their attic.

& she found my portfolio (allow me to use that term loosely)

from a 2D art class i took

during college.

may i present,

items from the summer of eight-nine....

as you will recall, i watched my grandmother draw people

over and over and over and over and.....

it's what i love to draw, too.

i have a very difficult time drawing a profile of someone facing right.  i always choose to draw the profile facing left.  so i wonder, do lefties draw profiles facing right?  here are some interesting statistics about that.  my professional opinion is that it is almost entirely (because nothing is ever one-hundred percent) a handedness issue.  as a right-handed person, i would be covering up where my pencil was 'headed' if i drew the person facing right (assuming - and let me get all occupational therapist on you - i am using a dynamic tripod grasp).  i've often wondered (on a somewhat related note) whether people in countries whose written language moves from right to left (unlike ours and many others, that moves from left to right) are more often left-handed.  or if right-handers in those cultures have some of the woes as do left-handers in ours (like pencil lead all over the side of your hand).  these are the things i think about.

kerosene heater

so, obviously, since these are from an art class, i was required to draw things out of my comfort zone - which means all inanimate objects.  i just can't get very excited about them, but i tried.

empty boxes

i imagine there was a bare tree or twig or stick in the studio

that we were told to draw.

so i drew it.

back to my comfort zone.

persimmons, i'd guess.

we must have been told to try different techniques.

let's call this one bird's feet.

i usually am most comfortable making people up in my head,

but i did use a photograph for this one -

i had lived in Guatemala the previous summer,

and this was a young girl who was selling handmade bracelets

in one of the villages.

i was quite excited to find this next drawing -

it is of my favorite, long-lost umbrella!

i wrote a post a while back that included the story of losing

my psychedelic umbrella

on a train in europe (during my year in españa).

i don't have any pictures of the umbrella,

but, now, i have this drawing!

i found several self-portraits.

this one seemed the most accurate,

in a distorted sort of way.

not sure if this is incomplete.

but it feels complete to me now.

what Nana-Bon drew for me

i've written, before, about sitting beside my paternal grandmother as she churned out drawing after drawing for me of ballet dancers, princesses, and families.  i wanted people.  and not just any people - beautiful people.  my Nana-Bon (her nickname was 'Bonnie,' thus the grandmotherly mash-up) went to two years of art school in Philadelphia in the 1930's, which was a boon to her children and grandchildren.  any one of us can immediately tell you if a drawing or painting is by Nana-Bon.  she had a very particular style of illustration.  i count myself fortunate to have a few of the drawings she did for me (and a couple she did for herself), especially since i was her second-to-last grandchild and her art production was definitely more occasional the older she got.

the one above came from a sketch book of hers, which i now have.  there are only a handful of drawings in it from a trip she took, at some point in the 1970's, to visit her sister in Arizona.  this is one of just a couple that are more than simple sketches.

this highly stylized, geometric detailing with bright colors is totally Nana-Bon.

she wrote on the back of this ballerina drawing

"Next time, I will draw what you want,

which is a conventional ballerina."

i don't know why i complained,

but i think the first drawing i posted

(up top)

is what i was hoping for.

we lived in St. Andrews, Scotland from 1975 through 1978.  in the summer of 1976, my grandmother, aunt, and cousins came to visit.  and i came down with the measles!  i very much remember my Aunt Beth going to the store and coming back with licorice ice-cream.  it was (literally) gray, & it was delicious.

 my grandmother's incredibly glamorous drawing

of Measly Meg.

they stayed long enough that, i guess, i got a bit better and was able to add some key details (like blood flowing from my knee???) to this drawing ~ in the summer of 1976, i was seven-and-a-half (and, apparently, my dresses were quite short).

if you've seen Chariots of Fire, then you have seen the beaches of St. Andrews, Scotland.  the water is a mile away (well, not quite), the beach is completely FLAT (though i do recall a row of low dunes at the street), and the wind is typically quite present.  remember, this was summer time.  my visiting relatives were used to beaches in Cape May, New Jersey - which is only similar to the beach in St. Andrews in water temperature.

closer to Christmas, i'll try & remember to do a post of my grandmother's illustrations for a family heirloom story, as told by my Great-Great Aunt Anna (Nana-Bon's aunt), The Little Silver Hen.

basketball, when you are sixteen

back at the gym for Samuel's last game of the season....

he hit three 3's during the warm-up!

Samuel's been playing for the same coach for a number of years, and it's a really nice group of boys.  this is the 15-17yo age group, so things can get pretty physical.  two of the players are out for the season due to injury (one in a game; the other, unrelated), so the four older guys play the entire game.  which basically entails sprinting from one end of the court to the other & back again & back again & back again and, at each end, attempting to shoot or block before the other team does the opposite.

pre-game strategy talk

for most of the game, Samuel was up against a really big guy, trying to block him from going for a lay-up.  the guy was so big that, at one point, one of the smaller players on Samuel's team actually ended up on the guy's back while trying to block him.  it looked a bit like they were playing leap-frog.  unfortunately, i did not get a video of that.

 Samuel is #21, gold jersey.

we were happy to see these refs at the game.  sometimes there are some really inexperienced refs calling the game, and things can get pretty ugly.  but these guys are good.

after about thirty or forty minutes of gladiator sprinting....

a typical photograph.

the other team had, just about, a full bench.

even so, it was a close game until the very end.

post-game

visiting

quite some time had passed between trips up to see Mike's parents, & we so enjoyed our visit with them this weekend....

Joseph and Grandmama

our two boys are among the youngest grandchildren on Mike's side of the family, but the torch was finally passed for helping Granddaddy sweep off the roofs of the carport and the old shed.  i seem to have a slightly preoccupied (read 'worried') expression in this photo - due, i'm sure, to my children being at the top of ladders and walking around tin roofs.

Granddaddy instructing; me worrying (ever so slightly)

Joseph sweeping the carport

up they go!

Samuel sweeping the tin roof of the old shed

Mike's sister and her youngest daughter joined us all for lunch, and Rebecca (who is just finishing fifth grade) cajoled her older cousins into a drawing game - five minutes to Draw the Best Picture of Your Life.  she took it quite seriously; however, i'm not sure her cousins reached the same degree of commitment.  but they were good sports.

Rebecca drawing a castle.

boys giving it a good attempt.

proud artists (well, 2 out of 3 - the third appears somewhat reluctant)

Rebecca insisted that the adults judge the work and determine the worthiest creation.  you know how that goes.  she expressed eye-rolling disappointment that we selected one 'winner' from every artist, pointing out quality attributes of each entry.  i told her that when she was a mother, she would do the exact.same.thing.

Mike's sister judges the entries

obliging sixteen-year old shows his work, entitled 'Nomadic Incursion'

Joseph and Rebecca are the two youngest grandchildren on this side of the family, and they are both the youngest children in their own families, too.  they are idea-generators who love to play games - so they enjoyed playing on Joseph's new ipod touch together (during breaks from Rebecca's drawing game).

 it was a good visit.

basketball, when you are thirteen

this post is a much better depiction of how i spend my time.  both boys played winter basketball; both boys are currently playing spring basketball.  i live at the rec center.  two practices a week (lucky us, they are back-to-back - which means date night Fridays!), plus at least two games each week.

Joseph has mainly played soccer, but he's had another go at basketball this year.  his team has done quite well this season; playoffs start in a week.  for the game today, on a holiday weekend, they had just five players - exactly what you need on the court.  Samuel's had a couple of games like that, and Mike gave a good description of it....basically like running a 5K while engaging in gladiator-style battles every five paces.

Joseph pre-game.

agreeing on the rules of engagement.

Joseph made a nice shot during the warm-up.

a chance at the free throw line.

Joseph and another of the older players (the group is ages 11-13) got the ball down court on just about every play.  it was exhausting to watch, as you can imagine.  don't know how i did it.

 most of my photographs during their basketball games look like this.

strike one:  we're inside.

strike two:  they're moving really fast.

strike three:  i guess i could blame the camera.

with a bench just five players deep (the other team had nine boys), it was a tough game.  but they never game up!  (the score ended up being something like 40-25).

Joseph in-bounds the ball.

Joseph is great at rebounds and defense.

Joseph post-game.

 as tired as he was, i think he was pleased

to have played the entire game

& made some shots.

Samuel's game is Thursday night, so you know where i'll be.

brought to you by The Color Green

there's a flower lull in the garden right now -

a dormant period between spring and summer,

as green leaves drink from the sun

and push flower buds closer to the blue sky.

purple cone flower

 our yard has turned from bubble gum pink to uncontrollable green.

everything is growing!

lavender

goldenrod

disgruntled baby cardinal

 the store-bought snapdragons are blooming -

and the little alyssum seeds Joseph planted

have put out tiny white and purple flowers.

as a child, i used to love making these dragons 'snap'!  i still do.

everything is doing the hard work of growing.

even the fig (or, rather, especially the fig),

that was killed back by the late frost.

it will be interesting to see if i can get to the ripe figs

before all the little critters -

they will be very low to the ground this year!

the highest fig leaves.

i am working on a separate post about the lords&ladies plants.

they are very busy morphing

from ladies into lords.

it is a fascinating process to observe.

here's a teaser photo....

besides all the green growing that i am excited to see,

there is plenty going on that i would rather not.

bad vine.

 mostly, i am constantly pulling out vines.

some come more willingly than others.

they seem to all grown exponentially

whenever i turn my back.

i'm not against vines, if they are going to grace me
with some flowers or berries.

those can stay.

i've been twining this clematis vine around the light pole

each morning when i bring in the newspaper.

this year, i've resolved to not cover up our house number.

it got impossible for people to find us.

good vine.

 we've been in this house for ten years now.

when we moved in, this maple tree was about my height.

(and the kids used the swingset.)

maple tree.

so, right now,

i water

and wait.