The Saturday Morning Post: Leave a Creative Legacy

 

Back in January, Neil over at Yorkshire Pudding posted an image of a drawing he had completed of one of his granddaughter's favorite toys. His plan is to have it framed for her fifth birthday. At five I imagine she will find it sweet, 75 years from now, when she turns 80, if she has hung onto it, it will be a precious reminder of a grandfather she has but memories of. 

Our challenge is to create and share, to create a legacy, that will trigger memories long after our time. Most of us hide away our creations, afraid that our work is not worthy, not good enough. Your work is  precious, it is your legacy. Legacy is not about the riches you leave behind, it is about how you are remembered, how you want to be remembered.  To be remembered for your creative endeavours, create and share your work. Create work that has meaning for others, for others to have and to hold onto.  I have crochet throw my maternal grandmother made for me, in colors I selected. I have another my one and only Aunt made for my great grandmother. These are tangible connections from those two members of my family, to me today. They are the legacy of those two loved one's.  

Funky Friday: The Time I Made an Interior Designer Cry

A comment on a Saturday post a couple of weeks ago, reminded me of the time I unintentionally made an interior designed break down in tears. 

It was in the summer of 1985 or 1986.  I was working for now long gone Laurel Homes* in Orlando Florida. We were opening a new community called Arbor Woods North out near the University of Central Florida. In a rare step for that company, at that time, we hired an interior designer to decorate and furnish a model home.  It was a 2-bedroom, 2 bath, about 1,000 square feet (a little less than 100 sq. meters.) Our target was young, recent graduates, first time home buyers.  And we hit the market right, we sold half of the community in just a couple of months. 

The designer came up with the idea of doing the model to attract female buyers. The color scheme was light and bright, with celery green paint, and pink carpet. The pink carpet was a bold choice, but it worked. It felt very comfortable for single women, and very old Florida. The designer reasoned that if young single men, thought young single women were buying there, they would also. (That part didn't work, there were very few women buyers, and those that did buy were not interested in men.) 

The living room in the model had a light tropical print sofa, and glass topped tables.  On the tables at each end of the sofa, was a lamp, that combined a coil of brass as a base, perched on that was a pale green grecian amphora, topped with a shade. The young designer was finishing up the installation and she asked me what I thought. 

Then for some reason she asked specifically about the lamps. I honestly answered that the lamps looked much better turned on, than they did turned off. 

That triggered a breakdown, tears and shaking. She kept repeating, "I knew no one would understand what I was doing, I knew everyone would hate it!" I didn't hate it, in fact I it worked as a model showing what could be done with a relatively small space.** I swear I meant no harm. And the lamps stayed for the duration of the project. *** 

*The company was named after the founder's favorite cow. 

** One exception, the glass topped table in the tiny kitchen was to large, I begged them to put in a drop leaf table, and was told "I didn't understand design." 

*** I was onsite as we were setting up and moving in. The desk for my office arrived, and wouldn't fit in through the door.  We lifted it in through the window. I was not there when it came time to move out of that office, the guy couldn't figure out how to get it out, and took a power saw and cut it in half. The next day he asked me how did you get the desk in there? Sometimes you really should ask the person who helped put it there. 

The Thursday Ramble: I've been there.

Photo From https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=122233334282262582&set=pcb.122233334540262582

There is generally a special pleasure in seeing photos of places I have been, and I have traveled a lot in north America and Europe, so it happens often.  There are places we have traveled to, to see things that we have seen and read about on blogs.  Inspired by Angus we spent a few hours in St. Andrews last spring and I am often thrilled to see his photos of places we visited, and wishing he would post a travel guide so we could have found a few places he frequents that we didn't stumble across (there is a great bookstore there - someplace.) 

Glasgow was not on the original agenda for our visit to Scotland last May, it was added when I found a good price on really nice airline seats from there to fly home.  We were so glad we added Glasgow, we really enjoyed the city and the people.  It is post industrial city with amazing architecture. We arrived in Glasgow by train from Edinburgh, the train station is a masterpiece. We were so enchanted by the area around the station, that we walked back there one day to explore. 

I was shocked a week ago on Sunday to see news reports of a tragic fire, the building that was destroyed (see first image) was just beyond the glass roof on this side of the station. The station and the hotel in the station are closed, there is smoke damage and ongoing engineering assessments. It has been determined that the remains of the building that burned are unstable and must be taken down before the front part of the station can be safely reopened. (Platforms on the other end of the station are providing limited train service.)  This was a strange sense, of "oh I have been there" "how terrible."   

My World of Wonders: March 18, 2026

What is happening today? Happy Birthday to Karen, my dear sister. I hope you are 29 again, that would make me 27. 

Where have I been this week? The gym, the pool, Whole Foods, the Farmers Market, Mt Vernon, Old Town for a walk, Harris Teeter (local supermarket.) 

What have I been up to in the kitchen?  Fried Shrimp, coccus, and salad. Pork Tenderloin, and focaccia. Butter fried chicken, cauliflower au gratin, and cornbread. Beef and Guinness pies. 

What made me smile this week? I was in my local independent bookstore on Saturday afternoon, and it was packed with people browsing and buying books. It is nice to see people reading, and especially nice to see them doing business with a local merchant. 

Who have I talked with this week? Ruth, Lynn, Amy, Michelle, my sweet bear, Marcel, Warren, David, Linda, Paul, and Tom. 

What random thought came from a comment this week? I posted last week about Huntley Meadows. Two things notable about the place. It was a military test zone for decades. It was converted to a wildlife preserve about 40 years ago, it is amazing how nature heals. Beavers. For several years there was a shallow pond with trees around the banks. The Beavers were taking the bark off of the trees, so the rangers ringed the trees with fences. The Beavers responded by by removing the dam and draining the shallow pond. 

 

Travel Tuesday: Grandma Moses

A couple of weeks ago I took the subway into the city, to wander a couple of museums.  At the National Portrait Gallery there is a show of the work of Grandma Moses. I was blown away, I have heard of her, but I had no idea what her work looked like.  

 

Monday Moods: A Little Something

Somedays all it takes to make someone's mood better is a little something, a kind word - just the right thing at the right time.  Last week I went out to Huntley Meadows park, for a walk in the woods and boardwalks over the the wetlands.  I was too late for the morning birds, the 500-plus millimeter lens crowd was leaving as I was coming in. Photographers with lenses that cost more than my car. They know when the birding is at it's best.  It was one of the first warm days of spring, the landscape is that shade of wet-brown that happens post hard freeze winter, with only the earliest sprigs of green.  The biggest sign of life was what you can hear, it is frog mating season, look back at last Tuesday's extra blog for a listen. It was a good walk, but nothing special. Nothing that would lift my spirits.    

Near the back, as I was turning the corner to return to my car, I noticed this painted rock, a simple message, left there intentionally to remind random strangers that we are all rockstars in our own way. It made me smile. It reminded me of my painting rocks in 2020, to cheer people up, to encourage them to vote, leaving them carefully placed along the trails here on Mt. Eagle and in Dyke Marsh - my daily walks in the year of covid isolation. I hope that one of those rocks did for someone, what this one did for me, a little something that reminded me every day, is a good day in some way.  

The Sunday Five: Water-Water Everywhere

1: Did you grow up drinking from a garden hose when outside? 

2: Do you leave home without a massive water bottle? 

3: Do you often buy bottled water? 

4: When you were growing up, did your home have a well, or a "city water" supply? 

5: Do you drink enough water each day? 

My answers? 

1: Did you grow up drinking from a garden hose when outside?  Yes, the water from the hose was fresh and cold from the well. 

2: Do you leave home without a massive water bottle? I don't own a water bottle.  

3: Do you often buy bottled water?  Seldom. 

4: When you were growing up, did your home have a well, or where you on a "city water" supply? The house on the farm had a deep well. 

5: Do you drink enough water each day? I think so, I am seldom without a large glass of water nearby. 

Please share your answers in the comments. 

The Saturday Morning Post: Get Involved, Remain Engaged

Volunteering sounds like making a commitment, to being there, to doing things that have to be done, creating obligations at a time in my life when I want fewer obligations and more time to explore creativity. At the same time, I don't want to spend all of my time in relative isolation. Now I am seldom truly alone, my Sweet Bear is nearly always here, this is a desire for social contact with more than just home. 

There was a story on Public Radio about an epidemic of loneliness. A mass shortage of social interaction. Research shows that social media has made this worse, rather than better.  Especially the big platforms that use algorithms to feed us paid content and advertising, rather than the updates from family and in-person friends. I miss getting the daily posting of what Jackie is having for dinner each day. 

That being said, how do we build social contact? The last three years that I worked, social contact in the office fell apart. We worked remotely for 18 months, and when we returned to the office, only about 10% of the people were there any given day. It was good to see those people, but I missed the random walking around talking with people. Management by Walking Around, someone wrote a book on that back in the 1980s. We did it because it fed our creative thinking.  People unrelated to our division, would be doing something we could model, or have suggestions we could not think of without their help. 

When I retired that contact largely ended.  I stay in touch with the person who took over when I left, we meet for lunch 10 or 12 times a year. I hope that my input helps her with being creative. 

What other options are there? Get involved in your community. Go to gallery openings, artist talks, author talks, book parties, take a class, lead a class. When you go, silence your phone and leave it in your pocket. Go to concerts. I can't remember the last time I heard a high school band concert, or the local Gay Mens Choir (in Orlando so it was before 1995.) There are musicians playing tonight in a church or, a bar, restaurant, nightclub, or civic organization near you. Engaging with creative people, will inspire your creativity. 

Volunteering with our community arts group started innocently enough. I entered a couple of paintings in one of the shows, and on the drop off day, hung around and handed the hammer to Kevin, helping him hang the show. I was invited back to help hang the next show. Then I was asked to help with some organizing, then asked if I would serve as co-chair. This has fed my creativity in unexpected ways, that I will write about later this year. 

The goal is to remain engaged, to regularly see people you don't regularly see. To talk to strangers, to become acquainted, maybe to make some new friends. Doing this pushes back against isolation, and feeds your creativity. Try it. What do you have to lose? 

Freestyle Friday: Flaneur

I walk a lot, an hour of more almost everyday.  Probably half of the time this is walking and going nowhere, plodding on the treadmill, 2.3 miles an hour, with between a 5 and 6 degree incline. I watch YouTube videos on my Ipad to fill the time. It is movement, just to keep moving even if I am going no place. But then most walks finish where I started, this one just covers less ground in between.  

For years I had a Nike running poster framed on my bedroom wall, showing a man running a scenic street in San Francisco. The caption read, "There is a fat man, he was born on your birthday, he is wearing you clothes, and he looks a lot like you, and if you ever stop running he will catch up with you." I shouldn't have parted with that one when we sold the other house. 

Other times I walk because I have someplace to go. Sadly many parts of our neighborhood are not pedestrian friendly. But I can walk to the subway station, or Aldi.  

Other times I flaneur, I walk aimlessly. I walk to walk, to explore whatever I happen to see. The photo above was a recent flaneur along the River in old town Alexandria.  I found a parking spot along Founders Park, and walked, with no plan, no goal, just to move along. I went south along the waterfront, out onto a couple of piers to see what boats where in, then further south finding that they are replacing some of the pavers at Robinson Landing, an area that was finished just a couple of years ago, in the place of the old Washington Post newspaper dock and warehouse. Then a block over the Union Street and back north, wandering through the Torpedo Factory Arts Center, and eventually back to the car. It was a delightful walk, with no aim or goal, a classic French flaneur. 

Tell us about your latest flaneur. 

The Thursday Ramble:Thoughts

I have read a couple of great books recently. 

Tribe by Sebastian Junger, a short book about human behaviour. He researched behaviours during war, Bosnia, London during the blitz, and Dresden during World War II. Behaviour changes in times of stress, people work together against a common enemy. The Blitz didn't break the spirit of the people of London, it galvanized their resolve, and deepened their hatred of the enemy. I wish we had leader who read. 

The Most Beautiful Walk In The World, by John Baxter describes the joys of walking, mostly as a pedestrian in Paris.  He weaves the history of the place, with the simple joys of walking about and telling stories. A joy to read. The world needs to read more. 

I am on a bit of a reading binge, at this rate I would surpass 100 books this year. I know there will be a slower time, I have four books loaded on my Kindle for this year's grand adventure, when I will slow to maybe one book a week for a month.  

The weather here is starting to lean towards spring, warm for a couple of days, the cold, then undecided.  Bone chilling and foggy, then sunshine and warm.  We have had longer periods of cold this winter than we do on average. The prediction is that the cherry blossoms will be later than the last few years, but a week in the 70s could change that in the blink of an eye. 

The first of the early spring flowers are out, snowdrops, and crocuses. I am looking forward to daffodils.  I have started painting spring flowers, from memory. 

My World of Wonders: March 11, 2026 Spring Flowers

What have I been up to in the kitchen? Pork schnitzel, blueberry coffee cake and fresh bread. Roast beef and mashed potatoes, red wine-mushroom - onion sauce. Beef stew. Sauteed cabbage and Italian Sausage 

What is on the easel? Spring flowers, the cold weather has delayed the spring bloom, so here are some bright yellows. I am on my second spring flowers painting. 

Who have I talked with this week? Ruth, Warren, Paul, Amy, Brad, Marcel, Mary, my Sweet Bear, Zack, Jon, Giuseppe, Ana, Susan, Larry, Rafael,  

Where have I been this week? IKEA, Aldi, filled the car with gasoline, Safeway, the gym, the community center, the Troll Park and a nice walk along the river. Huntley Meadows. 

What good has happened this week? Despite TurboTax crashing and having to start over - the taxes are done. It warmed up, the daffodils are budding, the forsythia is starting to show color. 

 

Tuesday Special Edition: A Warm Morning in Huntley Meadows, TURN UP THE VOLUME

Travel Tuesday: More from the Briscoe Museum of Western Art

 

Monday Moods: Don't Worry, Be Happy

It is a weird time. I need to finish our tax return, I need to do my brother's taxes, I need to see my doctor for prescription renewals, we are leaving on a grand adventure in a little over a month. 

I have to remind myself, that everything is under control.  

When I was growing up, my parents stressed over doing taxes, it was one of the only times they demanded silence in the house, and the tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife.  An irrational fear of making a mistake. An unhealthy pattern that I should have shed about 45 years ago, and persists. I will get them done, ours are relatively simple these days, it is just a matter of plugging the numbers in. 

My health needs are pretty simple, and have not changed much in a decade. And I am not out to live forever, just to be relatively healthy until the inevitable catches up with me.  And my doctor understands me - she even has a similar twisted sense of humor. I shouldn't stress, still it is one more thing to get done before we leave on the grand adventure. 

The trip is planned in detail, four airline flights, one train journey, one cruise (already checked in I have the boarding passes), six different hotel reservations, all done and planned.  Almost always something will not go as planned, and we will find alternatives and it will all work, it always does.  

And yet there is that low level background anxiety, it happens at this time of the year. I am reminded that most of what we worry about either already has happened, or never will happen. 

Bobby was right, Don't Worry, Be Happy. 

The Sunday Five: No Talking Please

1: Where do you go for silence? 

2: Do you have quiet neighbors? 

3: What can you hear in the middle of the night? 

4: Do you talk on your phone in public? 

5: Have you ever left someplace because it was too noisy? 

My Answers: 

1: Where do you go for silence? Anyplace at home is usually quiet 

2: Do you have quiet neighbors? Yes, thankfully. We can hear people passing by in the hallway, but we have had good neighbors. 

3: What can you hear in the middle of the night? Freight trains, the train tracks are a little over a mile away and most of the middle of the night traffic is freight. 

4: Do you talk on your phone in public? Almost never, but then I seldom talk on the phone. 

5: Have you ever left someplace because it was too noisy? Yes, restaurants, stores, the pool Sunday afternoon. 

Please share your answers in the comments. 

The Saturday Morning Post: Fast and Dirty

There is a concept in writing, known as the fast and dirty first draft.  The idea is start writing and not stop until all of the ideas have flowed onto paper. Don't edit, don't reread, don't revise, until you are exhausted, until you have given all you can give. 

I find that this concept applies to many creative endeavours, painting, drawing, even photography.  Create today, refine and edit later. One feature of digital photography that screws up a lot of creative energy is the ability to immediately play the image back on the screen.  For some this becomes an obsession, checking and even deleting images immediately. I am not saying I never check, but I check rarely, and don't delete. You may well find that the image that looks imperfect at the moment, has great meaning and value later.  Save the bad images. 

In painting, you can revise and repaint. One technique is to create a quick underpainting, and then revise, refine and edit in layers. Many of the old masters always painted this way. 

Pausing to edit, breaks the creative flow. There are two problems, while micromanaging the current idea, other ideas will slip away never to be recovered, and the creative flow can be difficult to restart once it stops. Don't stop, until you have a exhausted the creative flow or you have a complete first draft.   

Freestyle Friday: Smart Phones

Neil over at Yorkshire Pudding ranted recently about businesses expecting everyone has a smartphone. I agree with him that relying on apps only is wrong, and I have had a smartphone almost since smartphones first came on the market.  I was already carrying Blackberrys when Apple came out with the first glass faced "smartphone." I bought an android phone within a couple of years of the first smartphone. 

I bought the blackberrys for a couple of reasons, they had great international phone and data service and we were starting to travel a bit, the thing that tipped the scales for me, was maps on the phone.  The novelty of maps on my phone, rapidly wore off, one car has in-dash GPS, I have a portable Garmin unit to use in the other car and when we rent cars. I find maps on my phone to be annoying most of the time, and I think using a phone to navigate while driving is very dangerous, it should be outlawed. 

What kept me using smart phones is email. I check email on my phone several times a day. I solve Wordle on my phone everyday. I exchange morning text messages with three people on my phone. I seldom use it as a phone.  Honestly, smartphones make lousy phones, they are hard to hold, hard to hear. The flip phones of 25 years ago were better phones. I take photos with my phone. It takes good photos, and when I am away from home it is always in my pocket. The best camera is the one you have within reach. I check the news, looking for a particular obituary every day on my phone. 

I dislike the app world. I find it cumbersome to unlock my phone, find the app, then half of the time the app wants me to log in, enter a password, while the world is waiting behind me. I can, but I never have used my phone to tap and pay. I prefer paper boarding passes to electronic ones, I hate struggling to get the boarding pass to display. The battery never runs down on paper, it can on my phone. 

Five years ago, when I bought a new phone, my old phone was so short on memory that the phone store couldn't download the app to transfer my data to a new phone without deleting something. The guy asked if he could delete Facebook and Instagram from my phone. I agreed, and then I never put them back on. I freed myself from Meta on my phone. Try it, you will like it. 

So why do I carry a smartphone? I like having a phone with me for my use when I want to use it. I like having email and a camera in my pocket. I like being able to do a quick web search. When needed the maps come in handy (I used maps to find a restaurant in San Antonio, including walking directions.) I check the temperature outside on my phone. But I try to avoid being bullied into using it as my only means of doing anything.  

Thursday Ramble: What has changed in retirment

I am a little over two years into retirement, long enough to have passed the extended vacation phase, and I am starting to understand the joys of retirement. 

I recently realized that when I was working I often wanted to escape, to get away, from work. I wanted to go someplace and be quiet, to do nothing, to talk to no one. And this was very-very hard to do. At best I might get a random day or two here and there, but for the most part vacation days were just replacing one filled calendar for another filled calendar. Since retirement I don't have this feeling. I am often able to have quality alone time. There is nothing in my life that I wish to escape. It is not that I don't want to get out and see the wonders, I do this often, or travel - I love to travel and will keep traveling as long as I am able to - but it is no longer to escape. I don't need to escape from this life. 

The longer I am retired, the less my identity is tied to my work. When introducing myself, my work is no longer in the first sentence. Slowly it is moving into the third or fourth sentence, sometimes not even being there at all. I am retired. Not a retired lawyer.  I am no longer afraid of the term retirement.  It is nothing to be ashamed of, or afraid of. We worked and saved for many years to be able to do this. 

I no longer dread Mondays. Monday morning, is just another morning. Sunday evening is no longer filled with fear and loathing. There are differences from day to day. Sunday is CBS Sunday Morning Show and 60 Minutes, Thursday and Saturday are water aerobics. Saturday if the weather is nice is farmers market morning. Everyday I walk, and most afternoons I spend time in the pool. The day to day, stress level is very even. 

It took me a couple of years, to replace the social network of the office, with social connections in the community. This is something many people fail to do. I was surprised how fast, and how completely the work related network ended.  There is one person from my old office that I stay in monthly contact with. A couple of people that I connect with a few times a year. But most of them are busy with their work lives. I have new connections, here in the community. 

The last few years that I worked the income far exceeded my needs. It is easy to say I miss the income. But we have enough, our savings have grown over the last two years. I remind myself that we can't take it with us, and we should start spending what we want (within reason - once a stingy bastard, always a stingy bastard.) 

I think I have moved forward into an engaged, but relaxed phase of life. Then I am shocked to think, HOW CAN I BE OLD ENOUGH TO BE RETIRED? 

My World of Wonders: March 4, 2026

 

What have I been up to in the kitchen this week? I poached a chicken, boned it out, and made chicken stock, then made chicken pies with steamed veggies and homemade pastry. I have two half-liter containers of chicken stock to cook with later.  Risotto, chicken and coleslaw. Duck eggs benedict. 

Who have I talked with? My middle brother, he is sending me the paperwork to do his income taxes with. Giuseppe, Mary. My sweet bear. 

What blog posts from this week, needed a longer comment? 

    John at Going Gently, posted this about an encounter at the grocery store. It got me to thinking, my Grandmother and her family left England over 100 years ago, leaving behind everything they knew, family, friends, culture. They were economic refugees, seeking a better life. My Great Grandfather made a living digging tunnels, not as an engineer in an office, as a man with a shovel underground. How bad must things have been at home, for them to leave behind the life they knew for the unknown. The immigrants washing up on your shores are fleeing something pretty horrible, or they wouldn't be fleeing. 

    Doc Spo posted about life expectancy and the shift from saving to enjoying. A couple of years into retirement, I am still struggling with spending anything from a lifetime of saving. There were a couple of trips I wanted to take last year, to see family and friends, that I didn't take, in large part because I didn't want to spend the money. One of the friends has been back in the hospital, if I keep putting off going Kim will not be there. I have a grand-nephew I have not met, how will he ever know his funky uncle if I don't meet him. Make the plans, spend the money, you can't take it with you. You have saved for your old age, you are only going to get so much older. And likely the last few years of your life, you will be limited in what you can do. Harsh to say, but it is what I have watched happen thousands of times. Go meet the Viking, Go see the family and friends, come see where George Washington had dinner. 

Where have I been this week? Mt Vernon for a nice walk. The library, and a fluenear along the waterfront near King Street, and a wander through the Torpedo Factory Arts Center.  The Farmer's Market in old town Alexandria, the first time since the weather turned cold. Across the River to National Harbor for a nice walk - I had the top down on the car for the first time this year on the way there and back. 

What was on the easel this week? I finished this. I remarked that it was my cubist phase, and Sweet Bear suggested "Cubist Phace". Should I show this one? 

What did I have a flashback memory of this week? My Sister and her youngest are staying at Universal Orlando for a week in the sun, she texted me that they had dinner at Universal Citywalk the first evening. My brain flashed back to the mid 1990's. Emeril Lagasse had a restaurant there, we took my parents there for lunch one day. The service was formal and fussy, over the top as my mother described it, and the food was very-very good. They both enjoyed it. It was a special treat for all. It was fun to see them both smile.  

Travel Tuesday: San Antonio Riverwalk

Hilton Palacio Del Rio on the Riverwalk

The electric boats are a wonderful way to explore the Riverwalk, covering about 2.5 miles of meandering water. 

Top left, is the Hilton we stayed in, with a room on the River side.

The color in the water caught my eye. 

The View from the balcony of our room, down onto one of the boats. 

There had been a hard freeze a couple of weeks before, and the trees and many plants were brown, adding an unusual dimension of color to the landscape.