Process prior to writing: Yesterday, I blogged about my mother’s 90th birthday party, the passage of time, and how things change. I alluded to a strange quality of my visit. I have found that it is nearly impossible to write well about things that I haven’t fully processed; this is particularly true about ongoing situations. Sometimes I need to […]
I write the on February 8th, the day of Mom’s 90th birthday party. Her birthday is actually February 9th, which is when I scheduled this post to go live. Mom planned on having a her party more than 6 months ago. She called me at that time to ask if I would be coming. I […]
So, here I am on the east coast. The opening sentence of yesterday’s blog began: “Right now, I am probably on the red-eye to the east coast.” The ‘right now’ referred to was midnight, when I schedule my posts to go live. Strictly speaking, I was correct. I was on the 10:59PM flight sitting at […]
Right now, I am probably on the red-eye to the east coast. Mom is going to be ninety years old in a couple of days and I am going there to celebrate it with her and family. The only problem is, Joy won’t be able to go with me. She came down with the flu […]
Yesterday, I noted that an intense laugh sometimes has an amount of ambiguity. However, the ambiguity in yesterday’s post is, I fear, the fault of the artist. Expressions conveyed by the mouth are extremely difficult to capture. For example, if one looks at photographs of family members, a particular the line of the mouth represents an intimately familiar meaning. And […]
Painting recognizable faces: There is something that is so satisfying when I paint a watercolor portrait actually resembles my subject. At first, I was satisfied to get the appropriate shape of the head. The next problem I addressed was the proportions of the features within the face. Even when they became more or less correct, in the long dimension, I […]
An article in today’s New York Times about the plans to close the Brooklyn Developmental Center (BDC) in New York City sparked some memories in me. My brother Mike is autistic, nonverbal and low functioning. I visited him at the BDC when he was an inmate there. Inmate seems such a harsh word, but it was a fitting term in the era […]
We’re getting ready to travel across the country. I am anxious. The adage, “getting there is half the fun,” used to hold true for me. Not any more. Is it the crowded airports? The waiting time? Taking all the various and sundry items out of each and every pocket of my cargo pants, vest, and jacket? […]
Nothing too inspirational happened today. I was too lethargic to read, although I started a very interesting book by Dr. Patricia Churchland called Touching a Nerve. She and her husband Dr. Paul Churchland are neurophilosophers, a subject I find extremely interesting and hope to write about in the near future. I found myself staring at […]
It is one thing to understand the term ‘confusion’ and another to confront it in real time. I’m not talking about being confused but rather observing someone who is confused. Many of you who read my blog know exactly what I am talking about. There was a time when I thought that the questions, “Do you […]
