Thanks so much to the editors at Wilderness House--Steve Glines and Irene Koronas--for selecting my poems. I'm looking forward to reading all the contributions to the Spring 2014 issue.
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| In Australia. |
Monday, March 31, 2014
Wilderness Poems
Hooray! My two poems are up and ready to read at the latest issue of Wilderness House Literary Review. The poems are "Australia" and "The Fading of the Heart." If you read them, I hope you enjoy them. The direct link is here.
Thanks so much to the editors at Wilderness House--Steve Glines and Irene Koronas--for selecting my poems. I'm looking forward to reading all the contributions to the Spring 2014 issue.
Thanks so much to the editors at Wilderness House--Steve Glines and Irene Koronas--for selecting my poems. I'm looking forward to reading all the contributions to the Spring 2014 issue.
Saturday, March 8, 2014
Railroad Romance
Well, that was fast. Yesterday I put up a post mentioning that some pics of mine would be included in the new Rockwell's Camera Phone project. And one of them is already up!
First a little background on Rockwell's Camera Phone...
Rockwell's Camera Phone is the creation of Joseph Lapin, a writer and poet based in Los Angeles. The Rockwell blog asks us to imagine if Norman Rockwell had a camera phone. Norman Rockwell, as many folks probably already know, was an immensely popular painter of the early 20th century whose works captured idealized and nostalgic representations of American culture. So the question is: If the man were around today, walking around with a smart phone or a pocket-sized digital camera, what kind of moments and scenes would he capture?
Other questions apply as well. Is the kind of Americana that Rockwell painted still to be found in the United States today? Did it ever really exist at all? Is there a new vision of Americana waiting to be captured and rendered into art, albeit using new technology? Can the folksiness associated with Americana coincide with the sophistication of 21st-century technologies? Can "camera-phone art" measure up to painting and other traditional forms of art? What are the themes and dreams of America and Americana that persist, that still catch the eye and haunt the minds of Americans even more than 30 years after Norman Rockwell's death?
Rockwell's Camera Phone is an exploration of this 21st-century vision of American culture, the new Americana. The blog features photos and other work, such as flash fiction, by Lapin and other contributors. One of my favorites so far is this shot of a man getting a shave in West Hollywood. The colors of the pic have been enhanced to look like those used in Norman Rockwell's painting, and at first glance the pic is a convincingly exact re-creation of the sort of scene in Rockwell's art. But then we spot the dead giveaway that we're in 21st-century territory: the tattoos. What would Rockwell have thought of the man's tattoos, Lapin asks. And his question makes me wonder if any of his models in fact had tattoos, or any other characteristics that might have been deemed "unsavory" or in conflict with old-fashioned American values, and were thus edited out to appease Rockwell's audience.
The latest post on Rockwell's Camera Phone, as of this writing, is a series of photos featuring trains: Rockwell Sees Trains Across A New Americana. And what a perfect subject for a new study of American culture. Trains figure so often in American folklore and mythology. Several different photographers contribute to this post, and Joseph was kind enough to include a pic of mine too. I love all the other pics in the post, especially the "ghost train" shot by Jessica Ceballos. As an American and a travel lover, I'm hardly immune to the romance of trains. And I have an ancestor, a great-great-uncle, who once lived out of a freight-train car, in California, with an avocado tree nearby. In his younger days he rode freights across the country, lived at the bottom of the Grand Canyon for awhile during World War I, and had a job taking care of horses on board cargo ships traveling to Australia. He married a German woman, and in his older days he lived off the avocados that grew just outside his train-car home. I like to think that I inherited a bit of his eccentricity and wanderlust. I had to get it from somewhere.
Anyway, we'll see what else Rockwell's Camera Phone has in store. It's an exciting project, and I'm honored to be a part of it. Please check out Joseph's project, and if you need a little more railroad inspiration, here are a couple classic tunes inspired by the choo-choo.
First a little background on Rockwell's Camera Phone...
Rockwell's Camera Phone is the creation of Joseph Lapin, a writer and poet based in Los Angeles. The Rockwell blog asks us to imagine if Norman Rockwell had a camera phone. Norman Rockwell, as many folks probably already know, was an immensely popular painter of the early 20th century whose works captured idealized and nostalgic representations of American culture. So the question is: If the man were around today, walking around with a smart phone or a pocket-sized digital camera, what kind of moments and scenes would he capture?
Other questions apply as well. Is the kind of Americana that Rockwell painted still to be found in the United States today? Did it ever really exist at all? Is there a new vision of Americana waiting to be captured and rendered into art, albeit using new technology? Can the folksiness associated with Americana coincide with the sophistication of 21st-century technologies? Can "camera-phone art" measure up to painting and other traditional forms of art? What are the themes and dreams of America and Americana that persist, that still catch the eye and haunt the minds of Americans even more than 30 years after Norman Rockwell's death?
Rockwell's Camera Phone is an exploration of this 21st-century vision of American culture, the new Americana. The blog features photos and other work, such as flash fiction, by Lapin and other contributors. One of my favorites so far is this shot of a man getting a shave in West Hollywood. The colors of the pic have been enhanced to look like those used in Norman Rockwell's painting, and at first glance the pic is a convincingly exact re-creation of the sort of scene in Rockwell's art. But then we spot the dead giveaway that we're in 21st-century territory: the tattoos. What would Rockwell have thought of the man's tattoos, Lapin asks. And his question makes me wonder if any of his models in fact had tattoos, or any other characteristics that might have been deemed "unsavory" or in conflict with old-fashioned American values, and were thus edited out to appease Rockwell's audience.
The latest post on Rockwell's Camera Phone, as of this writing, is a series of photos featuring trains: Rockwell Sees Trains Across A New Americana. And what a perfect subject for a new study of American culture. Trains figure so often in American folklore and mythology. Several different photographers contribute to this post, and Joseph was kind enough to include a pic of mine too. I love all the other pics in the post, especially the "ghost train" shot by Jessica Ceballos. As an American and a travel lover, I'm hardly immune to the romance of trains. And I have an ancestor, a great-great-uncle, who once lived out of a freight-train car, in California, with an avocado tree nearby. In his younger days he rode freights across the country, lived at the bottom of the Grand Canyon for awhile during World War I, and had a job taking care of horses on board cargo ships traveling to Australia. He married a German woman, and in his older days he lived off the avocados that grew just outside his train-car home. I like to think that I inherited a bit of his eccentricity and wanderlust. I had to get it from somewhere.
Anyway, we'll see what else Rockwell's Camera Phone has in store. It's an exciting project, and I'm honored to be a part of it. Please check out Joseph's project, and if you need a little more railroad inspiration, here are a couple classic tunes inspired by the choo-choo.
Friday, March 7, 2014
Good With The Bad
February was not a good month. I wish that complaint was solely in reference to the perpetually freezing temperatures we've been enduring this year in Chicago, including all through February. But bad weather was just the half of it this past month.
At the beginning of February, the bakery where I work part-time was damaged by a big fire that started in the restaurant right next door. The fire started about 3:45 AM on a Sunday morning in the basement of a Japanese restaurant housed in an old (by American standards) building in town. It took 4 hours for the fire departments (note the use of plural here--several in the area were called out) to put it out. There were two bakery employees--the night bakers--in the building at the time. Fortunately, they smelled smoke and got out in time. So did all the residents and pets who lived in the apartments above the restaurant and elsewhere in the building. But those residents all lost their homes in the fire; the restaurant and a neighboring realtor's office and the town's chamber of commerce were severely damaged and are set for demolition; and the bakery has been temporarily displaced since the morning of the fire. Here's a video with footage of the fire:
While a firewall and the work of the firefighters kept the fire from spreading into the bakery, the bakery got some water and smoke damage and has yet to have its power restored. Until the store can be reopened, the bakery is fortunate in that it has a wholesale facility in a neighboring village where it can bake (but not sell) most of the same products it made at its store location. For 2 weeks after the fire, the bakery sold out of a small room in the village hall (where it kind of looked like we bakery employees were just having a community bake sale). Since then, we've been working out of a temporary location a couple blocks from the original location.
This fire came at an especially bad time for the bakery, as it happened just a few weeks before its biggest time of year, Paczki Fest. Paczki, for those of you who sadly don't know, are Polish jam or cream-filled pastries that are traditionally made and eaten in the days leading up to Ash Wednesday and the long Lenten fast. They're a big deal around here in Chicago, where the Polish population is second in the world only to Warsaw. The bakery I work at is owned by a Polish-American family who have been in the business for decades. During Paczki Fest, the bakery gets more customers than during major holidays such as Christmas and Thanksgiving and sells nearly 50 varieties of paczki. Needless to say, this fire was one of the worst things that could happen to Chicagoland's north-side Polish and otherwise paczki-loving community. Paczki Fest prevailed, however, and went ahead as always. Never underestimate the power of the paczki.
I wish that was where the bad news of February ended. But near the end of the month one of my mother's closest friends lost a long and very courageous battle with cancer. Though her friend's death wasn't sudden or a surprise, my mother was upset and already misses her friend greatly. She was a unique and strong person and a friend to my mother for over 60 years.
Two days after this came the shocking news that an old friend in Ireland died when he fell into the sea off one of the Aran Islands. He was only in his early 50s. He was a popular man and an unforgettable character, and he was friends with many of the visitors who've come to the islands over the years. He had a mighty laugh. I saw him last time I was in Ireland, last fall. It is hard to imagine the island without him.
It's the 7th of March now. February is over. The cold weather is still here, still being stubborn, and there's still at least 2 feet of snow on the ground around here. But the beginning of this month brought a little good news--for me at least. An essay of mine will be published in an upcoming Irish-themed issue of the wonderful online journal Literary Orphans next month. And some pictures of mine will be featured on a blog project that started up this year that explores the "new Americana," called Rockwell's Camera Phone. I'm thrilled of course. Acceptance always makes me feel like maybe I'm finally doing something right. As with the poems I mentioned in the previous post, I'll post more info and links when the publishing/posting dates arrive for all these pieces.
Hope a better, warmer wind comes along for this 2014 soon.
At the beginning of February, the bakery where I work part-time was damaged by a big fire that started in the restaurant right next door. The fire started about 3:45 AM on a Sunday morning in the basement of a Japanese restaurant housed in an old (by American standards) building in town. It took 4 hours for the fire departments (note the use of plural here--several in the area were called out) to put it out. There were two bakery employees--the night bakers--in the building at the time. Fortunately, they smelled smoke and got out in time. So did all the residents and pets who lived in the apartments above the restaurant and elsewhere in the building. But those residents all lost their homes in the fire; the restaurant and a neighboring realtor's office and the town's chamber of commerce were severely damaged and are set for demolition; and the bakery has been temporarily displaced since the morning of the fire. Here's a video with footage of the fire:
While a firewall and the work of the firefighters kept the fire from spreading into the bakery, the bakery got some water and smoke damage and has yet to have its power restored. Until the store can be reopened, the bakery is fortunate in that it has a wholesale facility in a neighboring village where it can bake (but not sell) most of the same products it made at its store location. For 2 weeks after the fire, the bakery sold out of a small room in the village hall (where it kind of looked like we bakery employees were just having a community bake sale). Since then, we've been working out of a temporary location a couple blocks from the original location.
This fire came at an especially bad time for the bakery, as it happened just a few weeks before its biggest time of year, Paczki Fest. Paczki, for those of you who sadly don't know, are Polish jam or cream-filled pastries that are traditionally made and eaten in the days leading up to Ash Wednesday and the long Lenten fast. They're a big deal around here in Chicago, where the Polish population is second in the world only to Warsaw. The bakery I work at is owned by a Polish-American family who have been in the business for decades. During Paczki Fest, the bakery gets more customers than during major holidays such as Christmas and Thanksgiving and sells nearly 50 varieties of paczki. Needless to say, this fire was one of the worst things that could happen to Chicagoland's north-side Polish and otherwise paczki-loving community. Paczki Fest prevailed, however, and went ahead as always. Never underestimate the power of the paczki.
I wish that was where the bad news of February ended. But near the end of the month one of my mother's closest friends lost a long and very courageous battle with cancer. Though her friend's death wasn't sudden or a surprise, my mother was upset and already misses her friend greatly. She was a unique and strong person and a friend to my mother for over 60 years.
Two days after this came the shocking news that an old friend in Ireland died when he fell into the sea off one of the Aran Islands. He was only in his early 50s. He was a popular man and an unforgettable character, and he was friends with many of the visitors who've come to the islands over the years. He had a mighty laugh. I saw him last time I was in Ireland, last fall. It is hard to imagine the island without him.
It's the 7th of March now. February is over. The cold weather is still here, still being stubborn, and there's still at least 2 feet of snow on the ground around here. But the beginning of this month brought a little good news--for me at least. An essay of mine will be published in an upcoming Irish-themed issue of the wonderful online journal Literary Orphans next month. And some pictures of mine will be featured on a blog project that started up this year that explores the "new Americana," called Rockwell's Camera Phone. I'm thrilled of course. Acceptance always makes me feel like maybe I'm finally doing something right. As with the poems I mentioned in the previous post, I'll post more info and links when the publishing/posting dates arrive for all these pieces.
Hope a better, warmer wind comes along for this 2014 soon.
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