Through the windows of the Alpha Chapel

Many of you saw my previous post on Bethania, The Black Walnut Festival, etc. Today I had the chance to run up there again, this time I took pictures from inside the Alpha Chapel that was built in 1894. Most of the glass is still original and offers an interesting perspective on the world outside.

Leopard Seal encounter

As a photographer and a SCUBA Diver, this would be amazing.

1972 BMW 3.0 CS: Yes, I am very shallow.

I went to pay a visit to Gertie and PEAK Auto Restoration who is putting her back together. They have some neat stuff in their shop, so watch the slides, sound on.

PEAK also handles maintenance work on all makes, but specializes in European cars. Cheaper and faster than the dealer. - 919-363-8589.

My previous post on my car.

On set with "The Gatherers" UNCSA film production

We were invited to tag along today to see the filming of "The Gatherers" a production by 3rd & 4th year film students at the UNC School of the Arts here in Winston-Salem. My thanks to John LeBlanc for including us. There are some amazing things happening here in our town, most notably is that this film is utilizing one of the ol RJR Tobacco factories.

University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

More from Brookberry Farm

I took these over at Brookberry Stables, known to most as Cozy Fox Farm (Leigh Trotman has run it for well over thirty years). As I mentioned in my short memoir that I posted along with my slide show, I learned how to ride horses as a boy among other things. The smell of the horses, the way they gently rest their head on my shoulder, the curious twitch of the ears and the inquisitive snort as they smell your hand hoping for an apple or carrot. There really are no other animals like them. My first pony at age 6 or so was a Shetland named Sharon. She was all of maybe four feet high and she HATED me (all humans actually). Our first outing together, she took off at full cantor and if it weren't for the fact that we were in an indoor ring, we could very well still be sprinting off somewhere. Then came Corn Pone - a normal sized pony, white with black speckles. He was great except for the fact that he could not/would not stop eating. I could not take him on trail rides because he would stop and graze and short of beating him half to death, nothing would get him to get moving again. Lastly, I had Periwinkle. We found her in field in Kernersville and she was perfect. We rode and showed up and down the east coast until I was 12 and left home for boarding school. She was sold to a family in Connecticut. The young woman was clearly destined to have her as she went on to win at Madison Square Garden every year up until she retired. They actually had the ceremony at MSG after her final win. I have very fond memories of those days and I regret to say that I have not been on horseback since I was 16. Sometimes it seems I was living another person's life back then. It's kind of like remembering a great movie - you are glad to have seen it, wish you could recapture it, but know that you can't.

11-02-2009 Full Moon WOW

I just took this out front of my house - Anyone else feeling like they are growing fangs and wee but hairy?

In all seriousness, seemed appropriate to return to one of my favorite poems:

Under the Harvest Moon by Carl Sandburg

Under the harvest moon,
When the soft silver
Drips shimmering
Over the garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.

Under the summer roses
When the flagrant crimson
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions.

Spring in Reynolda Village and Gardens

Now that the time change is here, the leaves are past their peak of color and soccer practice for the kids has been backed up to 4:30 - I miss spring more than ever. There is no place quite like North Carolina in the spring. I may have posted these two pictures before, but I thought they were worth revisiting as reminder of what we have to look forward to.

Reynolda Village

Reynolda Gardens


A Prayer in Spring

Robert Frost (1915)

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.

And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.

For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.

Fall For Art at Flow BMW Tonight

Please join me for the annual Fall For Art event to support Associated Artists here in Winston-Salem at Flow BMW from 6-9.

Hanging Rock, North Carolina

Well, my afternoon (OK it was about one hour) in Hanging Rock State Park produced some interesting stuff. It was overcast so the light wasn't great, but I had fun experimenting with various flash settings and a small waterfall. While I do not feel overly ecstatic about what I came away with, it was nonetheless fruitful. I am going to produce one of the water shots on aluminum - that should be very interesting.

Fall Front Porch Sittin'

Yesterday was really a beautiful day here in NC once the monsoon passed. I was in Bethania for the better part of the afternoon at the Black Walnut Festival. Great folk music, Brunswick stew cooked in an iron pot suspended over an open fire, honey crisp apples, lots of wonderful art work and people who define the vision of community. Most of the houses are between 100 and 200 years old most with front porches adorned with our flag and rocking chairs. With the trees on fire with fall and a warm breeze blowing, all I needed was an invitation to sit on this porch with a glass of lemonade and watch the passers by.

Link to photo album from the afternoon.

After Apple Picking

by Robert Frost

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still.
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples; I am drowsing off.
I cannot shake the shimmer from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the water-trough,
And held against the world of hoary grass.
It melted, and I let it fall and break.
But I was well
Upon my way to sleep before it fell,
And I could tell
What form my dreaming was about to take.
Magnified apples appear and reappear,
Stem end and blossom end,
And every fleck of russet showing clear.
My instep arch not only keeps the ache,
It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.
And I keep hearing from the cellar-bin
That rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking; I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,
Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall,
For all
That struck the earth,
No matter if not bruised, or spiked with stubble,
Went surely to the cider-apple heap
As of no worth.
One can see what will trouble
This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.
Were he not gone,
The woodchuck could say whether it's like his
Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,
Or just some human sleep.

WFDD Interview with Bev Hamel and me

This was recorded a couple of months ago in anticipation of the upcoming events.

Click here to hear the interview on WFDD.

A Prayer for North Carolina

From the National Cathedral Book of Prayer For All The States

A Prayer for North Carolina

Preserve unto us, good Lord, the precious treasure bequeathed to us by those silent eons when Thou wast preparing earth for our inheritance. May we cherish, and not despoil the cup of loveliness entrusted to our hands for a space.

So may the green land be blessed, whose smokey highlands yield their mineral riches to the soil below, and whose surf-bound coast is protected by necklaces of sand. Guard the peaceful Sounds; protect the forest mantle, the pliant ploughlands; and let Thy grace abound among Thy Carolina people whose lives are rooted in this place of promise.

Mountain Hide Out

Some days I'd really like to have a place like this to hide out in. Reading the paper (or paperback) on the porch with a hot cup of coffee, maybe a porch swing sitting silently holding hands with Karen or lazily wandering down to the river with a fly rod in search of the ever elusive small mouth bass. It's just over the Va line and overlooks the New River. You are required to take a few miles of single lane gravel road and the driveway actually has a shallow stream running across it. I love all the things that make up my life, but sometimes I wish I could just turn it all off for a while. Sometimes a "full" life can be a bit taxing.


Happiness - Carl Sandburg

I asked the professors who teach the meaning of life to tell
me what is happiness.
And I went to famous executives who boss the work of
thousands of men.
They all shook their heads and gave me a smile as though
I was trying to fool with them
And then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along
the Desplaines river
And I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with
their women and children and a keg of beer and an
accordion.

Auction at Brookberry Farm October 17th ***OVER***

Yes, at the REAL farm, not the development.

Click here to see the slide show of the farm as it used to be.


****THANKS TO ALL WHO SHOWED AND HELPED CLEAN OUT THE HOUSE!******

Fall harvest: Tobacco

It could have been 1950 in that warehouse, the only thing painfully missing was a fast talking auctioneer. There are still a group of men who inspect the tobacco brought in from the various farms around NC who, once they accept the leaf, place it on a conveyor that passes under an impressive machine that determines the weight and moisture content and then spits out a price per pound to be paid. As advanced as some systems have become, this is one area where one still needs to see, touch and smell before they buy. The smell is like no other. When I was a kid, it was on the breeze constantly. Today, I still can catch a whiff from time to time if the wind/humidity/time of year all come into alignment perfectly. This part of the industry is steeped in tradition and ritual. So far removed from the decisions made in rooms high above street level that placed the industry in the cross hairs. Good, bad or ugly, this remains an integral part of the economy on which no less than 37 states (yes, they all issued debt to be repaid from payments from the MSA to balance their budgets - including California) and our federal government depend. Oh the tangled webs they weave.

More than words

These were on various old buildings in St. Louis - not necessarily nice ones in a good part of town either. Seems to me their is a photographic stitch project to be created with these. On the surface they are either graffiti or the name of a company emblazoned in stone for immortality. Taken individually they could be combined to suggest that there is Union, Power & Light in Forgiveness.....

Here's your new wallpaper: Yeah, it's a cow.

Everyone has the default rolling hills wall paper on their windows based machine (I am a Mac man myself) so I thought those of you here in the south or out in the country may appreciate Bessie here. Now if you could get rid of the "TA-DAH" at start up and replace it with a couple of chords from the "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" then your e-conversion would be complete. Just double click on Bessie to access the larger version, then right click for you windows folks and hit "set as wallpaper". This one's on me.

*****Seems you must download the photo first. So, click on the image, when the large image appears, drag and drop it on your desk top, then right click on the file and set as wallpaper.******* Sorry for the confusion.

Off the beaten path in St. Louis

A couple of scenes not in the travel brochures, but I found them to be just as fantastic as any other site.

Back from St. Louis

Each year I have to head out to St. Louis for business. This year I managed to carve out some time to actually try to see the city. What a wonderful place with a really rich history. It no longer looks like the place that Thomas Wolfe wrote about, but occasionally you can catch glimpses of what he saw in some of the old architecture. I really fell in love with the old Union Electric Light & Power Co. building at the end of the River Walk. It's haunting beauty only marred by the neon painted sign announcing the entrance to the walkway. I'll post some pictures of that later.

And yes, the shot of Busch Stadium and the elevated shot of the Arch were taken from a helicopter. Those things are more fun than a roller coaster.

Black Walnut Festival, Behtania NC 10/24/2009

Please join me on October 24th from 10 AM to 4 PM here in front of the Alpha Chapel (built 1894) for the annual Black Walnut Festival. Art, music, food and fun. If you have never ventured over to Bethania you really need to - it is no further away than the Grande Theater!

*********THE DATE ON THE POSTER IS INCORRECT - THE FESTIVAL IS ON SATURDAY THE 24TH, NOT THE 25TH (SUNDAY)**********

Previous post about Bethania CLICK HERE.

Return to Stone Mountain, NC

I have had every intention of going back to take more pictures, but just have not made the time. I was digging through some of my shots from two summers ago and found this one. I am now feeling the NEED to return and spend more time before the leaves are gone.

Previous post on Stone Mountain, NC.

Old Friends

This was taken about a year and half ago. These are the best people (minus two who could not be there) a person could ask for to claim as friends freshman year in college. I had to take early leave from these wonderful friends after only two years with them for reasons I may or may not discuss here another time. We allowed twenty years to pass before we were all able to get together again. I hate that another year+ has passed without seeing them all again. We have managed gatherings of twos and threes for which I am grateful. I count this group one of my many blessings.

If - Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream and not make dreams your master;
If you can think and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools