It was already dark and raining when I arrived in Pittsburgh on 15 November. We swung by Squirrel Hill and picked up some Italian heroes and then headed for home. Slept well.

On Thursday, 16 November, I moved slowly but managed to take the 61a to Oakland, make a quick visit to Top Knotch, have a good bowl of soup and coffee at the corner cafe on S. Craig Street, and then head on back to a quiet afternoon.

Friday, 17 November, the Mouse and the Bean were both home. We went to the Strip to buy some good appetizers, visit the craft museum, have a huge late breakfast at Pamela's and make it home for a Bean-nap. At around half past six we headed Downtown, to discover it was Lights and very crowded. But with typical Mouse-luck, at the last moment, we got a parking space on Liberty and joined a throng at Wolf's Gallery, part of the Pittsburgh Trust, to see some amazing light art and hear Eden whisper.

It's Saturday now, and mid-afternoon. We've been to the storage unit, the Coop, and eaten lunch. Mouse and Ness are cleaning up their kitchen.

Watercolour in Taos

For more than a month I have been trying my hand at watercolour--straight from the lofty tubes of D&R, DS, MG and a small number of W&N and one tube of Schmincke-rose madder. These are all new, and available at Artisan, and hopefully not too much duplication from among those watercolour tubes sitting in my storage unit back East.

I also have a small number of pads, blocks and sheets of watercolour and drawing paper--again not the generous lot in storage, but a sufficient number to test and touch.

I found the MG and W&N the most reliable. DS comes in third place as their tubes continue to run out faster than I can top off a plastic palette with their juicy watercolour. Also living in a very dry climate, totally different than the humid one I lived in for 10 years, I found that the DS dried on the palette faster than the honeyed MG, and the standard W&N. This has been my first time with D&R, and I rank them last. I found their pigment load insufficient or at least radically lower than the others.

But, it is paper that really gave me a full course of instruction and the start of a degree in art materials. I am contrary, and find Arches pads at the lower end of satisfactory. I just tested some water and colour on my Robert Bateman (cover series, recycled, 110lb) and it curled not at all while the Arches, 140lb. seems to want to arabesque.

Today, I feel a change coming on and perhaps a totally new direction. I plucked the 7 of Coins and gave it some thought; more meditation later.

Think about a room with Northern Light, a cheerful room, spacious, uncluttered, something like the imaginery studio you created in 1982.

Draw it, speak it, dream it, live it!

Finally got a chance to experiment with Daler-Rowney cartridge paper A5 (5x7) (something that appears rare here in the States, but which I purchased from a NYS outfitter).

It is smooth, heavy, heavy weight and a pleasure to draw on. I was able to do two quick drawings with watercolour--and no buckling. The third piece, too much water, too many colours, didn't work.

So, I'll keep these pads for quick drawings in the house or on the road.

It was a strange feeling, voting early, in my new town and then waking today knowing I didn't have to stand in line today, November 7.

I was one of more than two thousand in a community of about five thousand who elected to vote before the official date.

Some say, like Vidal, that this is one, if not, the single most important election in his life-time, and to some extent I must agree.

I'll be watching and waiting for the returns, and this time, I am two hours behind the East, and will be seeing the returns in a different light.

Yesterday I went to vote for the first time in a new town, and a new state. We had paper ballots that were then inserted into a counter. Five days before the actual election it appeared that at least 40% of the county voters went to the poll. I was number 2074.

It seems I'd forgotten about this promised recount of my journey, but now reading a mystery novel, I stopped and recalled a missing person. I wondered if I could explore a time table from the time I remember last seeing him and my car.

Yes, my car!


The missing person was my auto mechanic, no ordinary man, but a rough, temperamental Sicilian. I had met him in 1997. Walking around my new neighbourhood, I often took routes that were beyond a normal foot-path. One day I noticed an auto repair shop and a parking lot opposite one another. In the lot was an old Honda Accord. No rust, looked good, seemed solid. With five hundred dollars I bought her. I know it was a she because not only did this car bring me into personal contact with my Sicilian she also brought me into a minor relationship with her former owner.

The car lasted all of that summer, and perhaps beyond. She drowned one winter from repeated rainstorms. But when I bought another car, a Saab, the Sicilian remained main man. I counted on him and he never let me down. He called himself, Vinny; I called him Vincenzo. He loved it.

The last time I saw this Vincenzo--I have another in my life--was shortly after the World Trade Center were hit by airplanes. Vincenzo's daughter had just flown off to California for her honeymoon. He was nearly hysterical with worry. He drove out to California to get his daughter and son-in-law. Somewhere between there and New York City, he decided life is too short. He sold his auto repair shop to one of the mechanics and disappeared.

I lost my Saab.

I am trying to remember not only the sequence of events, but a time table--when was it I hugged Vincenzo good-bye and cried as I walked away from Falcon, the car that plagued me and my chequebook.

Israel 1982

Where was I?In 1982, on the eve of Christmas, I was in Bethlehem (Israel).

Tuesday, December 20 the Transit Workers of New York went on strike. I believe I was stunned into immobility. I realized that I wouldn't be able to walk from my house to the bridge.














For three days the Union and the Metropolitan Transit Authority wrangled. Hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers, day and night, walked, biked, car pooled from their homes to Manhattan--the hub of the workforce.

On Christmas Day, Marijke and I are going to New Mexico.

We'll arrive in Albuquerque around lunch time, Marijke from Pittsburgh and me from New York.

I am just beginning to get excited; thinking about what to pack or rather how to pack, one of my bete noirs, packing is but thrilled to be able to think about another adventure with my daughter.

We haven't traveled regularly together but we've done it swell. Last trip was to Sicily just before the little Anya Zoe was born six months later.

At Thanksgiving dinner Thursday night, our hostess, invited the circle of more than 3 dozen, to share their thanks. Sophia, 13 years old, shared, "I am thankful that I don't have to experience loss to appreciate what I have."

Yes, I'm paraphrasing, but you get the idea!

Now, believe it or not, I am struggling with how much I'd like to see of my City of birth before I leave.

Several times I've nearly come to tears as I touch base with the past. This past Thursday, December 1, was such a day.

After taking some unpleasant tests, one of which had me still for 45 minutes, coffin-like, I decided to proceed Uptown to 53rd Street, a most magical street of New York City museums.

I only managed the MoMa, but I did peek into the shops of two others.

At the MoMA, I was privileged to see van Gogh's "Starry Night" and several rooms filled with the work of Redon.

But for every street and avenue that sparkles under my feet with remembrance, nothing shines like the skylights of this City.

Everyday is different but some days remind me more of yesterday. Reading the news this week, I recalled the times since September 11th that I traveled by air. On more than one occasion I hastily packed and found myself with a scissors in my carry-on bag. On two occasions my little scissors were confiscated. Once I nearly cried!

I don't recognize any of these, but mine was orange but much smaller and perhaps even sharper.

It seems that effective December 22, the prohibition will be lifted.

Will I take my favorite scissors again and risk another loss, or will I be more mindful when I pack my case coming and going to New Mexico?

I'll let you know when I return.

Stolen Moments at the Museum

Today was a most special day, not because it is Thursday, but because it was filled with stolen moments.

Up a little earlier than usual, I went with a certain trepidation to the Diagnostic Center to have an MRI and a bone density test; nothing like getting older for ratcheting up these expensive tests to see why we're aging.


But instead of going to work, I headed uptown to West 53rd Street for a look at van Gogh's "Starry Night" and an hour's tour of Redon.


Going, coming, staying, all stolen moments as I first sat leisurely in the Museum Cafe and eat the tinest portion of smoked trout and drank two really well made cups of coffee--so fresh it was as if I was drinking an aphrodaisiac!

Trying to catch up with each day's memories can be a challenge.

Monday, R and I found ourselves in the East Village. While walking back from a St. Mark's restaurant, I looked up as we approached Second Avenue.

I was perplexed by the absence of a movie theatre on Second Avenue off St. Mark's Place that I recall going to with great regularity. I know I saw the outstanding film, "Coming Home" with Jane Fonda about a paraplegic war veteran played by Jon Voight. The movie left a big impression on me then, enough so that nearly 30 years later I recall it clearly. It probably was among the first post-Vietnam movies, and among my favorites.

But no matter how much I craned my neck the theatre was gone. What was left was the Stuyvesant Polyclinic and the Library.

Annie's Gallery Opening in Saugerties

Sometimes it isn't the map that leads but circumstances like an invitation to a gallery opening that seems to lead me along the path--that's how I found Saugerties.

When I learned I was going to drive up to the Delaware Water Gap, I thought I'd stop by Annie's gallery opening.

What a detour? Dashing back and forth between the two Catskill counties might become habit forming if I decide it is the New York State mountains that will entertain me in my next move.

First I drove up, through the Verrazano Bridge through NJ to the Water Gap and stopped in Hurley, Honesdale, visited Calicoon and zoomed through Narrowsburg, never stopping but continuing along Rte 55 to make it with plenty of time for the Opening.

Thanksgiving

Thursday I had Thanksgiving in Phoenicia with two or more dozen people only two of whom I had ever met. This trip to Phoenicia and the celebration of the holiday was a two-fer. I had the pleasure of a wonderfully prepared, joyful dinner and the opportunity to house hunt with RW the following morning.

I saw about half a dozen houses, none of which pleased, but all of which helped me move closer to understanding what it is I want.

Phoenicia was already covered with light snow when I arrived mid-afternoon and foolishly I arrived sans boots. My apple torte from the Hens was a success that evening, and I started to feel real comfortable, almost too comfortable as I was headed out Friday morning for the West, that is, across Ulster to Sullivan county.

Friday was Thanksgiving in Narrowsburg, New York with Judith, Miranda and the Buckley clan.

I tried to dash across the State but found myself lost less than 20 miles out. Somehow I lost Rte 52, and drove around one country road after another. Having become dependent on a cell phone I was lost. No service in either sojourn. The phone was able to reach out to Pittsburgh and Marijke but not in the mountains. With a little help from Marijke, lots of disjointed calls that got cut off with Judith, I made it!

When I pulled into the road, it appeared that we all timed our arrival: we all came together so although I considered myself late I was really on time.

Everyday, it seems, a small part of the past vanishes. Something new appears, but is new always better? I think not!



I have a memory, albeit distant, of an early morn in the 70s when I visited the Fulton Fish Market. It was bustling, thriving, invigorating and I was there at 4 a.m. Perhaps it was a Friday, perhaps not. For a short while I had been part of the "Buy Team" at our local 10th Street Food Co-op. We rose early, went to the Bronx Terminals, the Meat Packing district and Fulton Fish Market.

I loved it!

This blog is intended as a place to record memories, not ordinary memories but my memory of place.

Today for example, I had a false start in Park Slope because in such a few short months, less than 9, the number just short of pregnancy, since I lived there I found my favourite Lebanese shop altered, the corner store at 3rd Street now a restaurant, the place I bought 3 of my 6 Merrick's closed and no evidence of a bakery between 9th and Union Streets.

I was grateful the eyewear shop was present and open. I will have some new spec's by February, two years since I dropped by and bought two pair, one for walking around and another for reading this fuzzy screen we call a laptop.

I managed to pick up some new underwear, and two warm wool socks, buy terrific cheese, crackers and two treats for myself: halva and nutella. I neglected the lemon curd but will remember before the year is out.

Speedy was ready for me with a Nissen,

and off I drove to the Two Hens. Crowded with people clamoring for good pies, cakes, cookies and freshly brewed coffee, I bought not one but three pies in anticipating of two days of Thanksgiving. Thursday in Phoenicia, Friday in Narrowsburg.

Perhaps I'll have memory of these places to share. Perhaps!