HAPPINESS IS

a new leather couch to curl up on.

DAY IS DONE

BODY FUEL

What ever happened to an apple a day?

ORIENT

CAT NAP

Lately, I have been seeing things in black and white. I guess that is how my world seems right now. Funny, when I first took photography in high school, I was shooting and processing everything in black and white. I have always loved black and white images, they seem stronger and more compelling. They have a timeless quality to them. Black and white photography is more dramatic, I guess I wish that real life had a little less drama in it.

THREE AM

On sleepless nights, like last night, I am always reminded of a quote from "The Crack-Up" written by my favorite author, F. Scott Fitzgerald. "In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o'clock in the morning". So true.

TRUMPETING INTO SPRING

My trumpet dafffodils are always among the first sign of Spring in my garden. Today as temperatures climbed above ninety it felt more like summer. I'm just glad the brutal winter is behind me.

TWILIGHT

I've always thought of those moments after the sun sinks as magical. Everything looks warm and inviting in the sun's afterglow. Tonight I glanced out the window at the same stuff I see every day which has become rather ordinary and the view was anything but.

EASTER EGGS FOR BOCA BARB

I think I have been suffering lately from the photographer's version of "writers' block". Hence, my absence from blogging. So this post is for my good friend Boca Barb, who quietly sends emails with visual suggestions that help me to "see" again. Thanks, Barb!

CALLA LILIES

CHILD'S PLAY

WINDOW SHOPPING

A SECOND LOOK

I couldn't resist shooting another picture of these tulips. In the past few days they have opened fully and they are having trouble holding their heavy heads up high. Some have lost a petal or two. They are past their prime and nearing their end, yet the combination of their grace and translucence somehow make them seem even more beautiful to me.

BOWED HEADS

The white tulips in my living room were drooping a bit this afternoon. I think they may just be bowing their heads to acknowledge today's Spring-like weather.

THE RENDEZVOUS

DISHWASHING

On most winter mornings, I start my day with the breakfast of champions, Irish oatmeal. Loathe to wash the pot I throw some dish washing detergent in it with hot water and let it soak (I never put my pots in the dishwasher). Late in the afternoon when I start thinking about what to prepare for dinner I force myself to scrub the pot. This afternoon some magical late afternoon light created some cool reflections on the granite and made scrubbing the pot almost look enticing.

SOCKS OF MANY COLORS

IN THE DEPTH OF WINTER...

... This beautiful floral arrangement has created Spring inside my home.

SUSPENSE

In the final minutes of her first day as a fifty year old, Sonia unwrapped her last birthday gift.

WHITE OUT

I remember the movie Endless Summer, but this feels more like an endless winter. The white stuff started falling this afternoon and it is still coming down. I saw this person (through the windshield of a car) trudging through the snow holding an umbrella. What I like is there are so many unknowns--- is the person walking towards me or away from me? Is the person male of female? Everything is occluded by the falling snow.

SLEEPYHEADS

Slugger wasn't the only one cat napping today.

SCHOOL DAZE

I got my macbook pro back from the Apple hospital today. It's as good as new. As I walked out of the store I saw this funny moment. Three older women getting a computer lesson from one of the Apple geniuses. My Mom isn't the only one learning new tricks.

ENOUGH

I suppose it looks pretty, but I have had more than enough of the white stuff. Life is hard enough without the weather ganging up on us too. I'm beginning to understand that golden years (when they arrive) = Florida.

APPLE DOCTOR

Separation anxiety has already set in. My mac is sick and needs a new video card. It will be a five to seven day recovery period.

TUNING OUT THE WORLD

SHADOW PLAY

I loved the shadow play in this and the illusion of a table for two. After all tomorrow is Valentine's Day. Okay... today. Yep, I am late again with my post. That said, I like the geometry of this image.

SUNNY SIDE

After the snow shellacking we got yesterday, Pistachio was delighted to bask in the sun on a porch cleared of snow.

SNOWED IN

Long Island got hammered with a big blast of snow today. Periodically, during the day I glanced out to see just how much more snow had fallen. I have a big pine tree that has stood on my property since the house was built in 1946. I could tell the limbs were hanging low under the heavy, wet snow. In the early evening I heard a loud crack and a big limb was down. Across the street, one of the neighbor's daughters was sledding over mounds of snow piled up by her dad. She hit the bump, flew off her sled and rolled in the snow. I couldn't help but remember the proverb, "A young tree bends an old tree breaks". And so it is with people too. Note to self: be flexible.

HAPPY 92nd MOM

Mom was born in 1918 during the flu epidemic that killed more people then all who perished in World War One. Needless to say, Mom is a survivor. Tonight we celebrated her 92nd birthday. I decided to omit the nine candle from her cupcake, because Mom is not your average nonagenarian. She expressed no concern about the massive amounts of snow and blizzard like conditions forecast for tomorrow. After all she said, "I got to the hospital to deliver your brother during the blizzard of 1947!" She's remarkable, always has been. Happy Birthday, Mom!

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

My favorite room of the house is the kitchen. After almost ten years here, I realized only today, it is because of the light. I just love the way the light changes how the room looks. Soft and bright in the morning. Hard lines, sharp contrast and long shadows in the late afternoon. I'm not sure which light I like best.

LOST IN THOUGHT

FROM BED

It isn't exactly a room with a view, but it's home.

OLD SCHOOL

This cupola on the junior high (now middle school) in my hometown was always a landmark for me. I spent seventh, eighth and ninth grade at this school. In all the years I have driven past it I just never noticed the cupola illuminated. You know how you look at familiar things without really seeing them? In this case, I'm guilty. Maybe it was the light, but I really saw it this time around! (One other thing I am guilty of... failed to post on time because I was really under the weather.)

KEEPING AN EYE ON HIS DISH

The sun was pouring in through the kitchen window and Slugger was soaking it up. Of course, he was also keeping an eye on his empty dish. I liked the shadows cast by the window mullions on him... they almost make him look like a bandit.

R.I.P ANGUS

Last January 19th, I posted this photo of Angus on my blog. In that post I talked about his gentle spirit and how he had the eyes of an old soul. Sadly, he passed away suddenly and before his time. I will always remember his sweet disposition, his sturdy, chunky body, how well he got along with Slugger and how devoted he was to my cousin.

FIRESIDE

There is perhaps, nothing better than spending a cold night watching the flames of a roaring fire dance.

BURNING THE MIDNIGHT OIL

LABOR OF LOVE

I remember it like it was yesterday. Forty three years ago today, my Dad who was a ship's officer died at the age of forty seven in a faraway land. My Mom was left with a mortgage, two kids and the need to find a job in a hurry. By September, Mom was teaching elementary school in the community I grew up in. At night, after correcting papers and making lesson plans I remember her sewing, knitting or needlepointing. Mom is artistic and creative. I like to think I got that gene from her. For years she knitted watch caps and donated them to an organization that distributed them to sailors. Of course she did this to remember my father. I recall the day, some twenty years ago that she decided to participate in a church project--needlepointing kneelers. She wanted to do this in my father's memory and was determined that it depict a ship and the sea. It took her months. Because her breathing is so compromised she hasn't been inside the church in years and for me it has been even longer. Today, I went there to see if her labor of love was still there. It is.

THINKING

IT'S COMPLICATED

The older I get the more complicated things seem to become. Funny, thirty years ago I thought it would be exactly the opposite. Nothing is simple any longer.

RACING HOME TO SEE THE GAME

VOTE NO

I love the newspaper business. I feel privileged to have spent the past thirty one years at the same newspaper doing what I have wanted to do since I was fifteen years old and took my first photography class in high school. Tomorrow the members of that newspaper's union will be voting on a proposed contract agreement. Sadly,this is how I will be voting.

NOT JUST AN APPLE A DAY

The shelf in the kitchen is beginning to look a lot like a medicine chest. For an eight year old cat, Slugger has a lot of health problems. Just a few months ago he was diagnosed with asthma and another pill was added to the cocktail. The minute I reach for the pill vials Slugger's ears get flat and like Houdini he disappears. He doesn't get too far before I scoop him up and return to the kitchen. Once I have him he takes his pills like a champion and then the reward... a few treats.

ENDURANCE

I looked out the kitchen window this afternoon and saw a blob on the lawn. Immediately I thought that a bird had met some awful fate. I went out to inspect and was relieved to see a tired looking pine cone. In the far corner of my backyard I have a pine tree that has probably been on the property since the house was first built in the late 1940s. The red bellied woodpecker loves it as do the squirrels. Every fall it drops a boatload of pine cones in the yard. I hate picking them up because they are sticky, but by Spring they seem to be gone. I was amazed that this one had survived not only the twenty inches of snow that had buried it, but the cats who seem to love batting the pine cones around.

POKER FACE

THINGS MAY APPEAR

Today was a very troubling and difficult day. Sitting in the passenger seat of a friend's car reflecting on the day's challenges, I saw the "objects in the mirror are closer than they appear" warning. Sometimes they are larger than they appear too. As Yul Brenner said in The King and I, "Is a puzzlement".

CAMERA SHY

OLD DOG, NEW TRICKS

Mom has really gotten the hang of her Christmas Kindle, so much so that she seems to be overcoming her Internet/computer trepidation. Tonight she came over for dinner and a game of Scrabble. True to form, she arrived with her completed New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle. She informed me that before we ate, she wanted to look at a crossword blog that discusses the puzzle's theme and also shows the answers. She wanted to make certain that she had it all done right. I think Mom's Christmas Kindle may have created a monster! She sure is warming up to using a Mac. Oh boy, her birthday is less than a month away.