First off, yes, I actually did entitle this that.
Second off, what a great weekend!  Two of my brothers jetted down for a visit for musican-brother Barry’s birthday. It was a last-minute, spur-of-the-moment thing arranged by cellphone while I was in Publix grocery shopping last weekend and took the form of a multi-day, multi-city hoparound for fun, sun and food.
A great time was had by all, made even more great by my find of this utterly perfectly-labeled wine:
Twitter Art Exhibition 2016 opens tonight in Manhattan and I can’t go! Â Bummer, but I wish great success to the organization and its effort. Here’s my submission, entitled Key West Sunset.
This image is borrowed from the Facebook post by @Karthik Subramanian – A photograph that moved the world!
“In Iraq, a little girl drew a picture of her mother on the floor of her orphanage. She carefully took off the shoes, lay down on mother’s chest and fell asleep… I really don’t know how to use human language to interpret such a picture.”
Hard to believe, but 24 years ago today I married this wonderful guy… I was late to the ceremony (my BFF and I misplaced the car keys in a Rhoda Morgenstern-like scene from The Mary Tyler Moore Show). Kindergartner Peter had fallen in the melting snow and his smart-looking navy suit was all muddy.
But we managed to tie the knot in front of friends and family at a lovely Skating Chalet in Connecticut at a stone hearth with a crackling fire where the roses opened just right. We had little money between us but had the richness of love to spare.
I love you, David and I’d do it all over again!
Congratulations to The Mad Platter of Nashville, TN who earned recognition as one of Nashville’s great eateries. I made my art debut with a solo show there during the flood of 2010. It offers great ambiance, service and food, so if you get to Music City, don’t miss it!
This is always a somber day when I think about all that went before, and after it. Â All lives — at least in the U.S. and in some other western nations too — redefined by this single day.
My sons and all those other mothers and fathers, wives, husbands, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters at the mercy of fate and the heavens. The brave and principled who stepped up and heeded the call. The unfortunate “others” – non-westerners feared for their differences and clustered with the “them” against us.
And so I paint. And write. And avoid. For copies, notecards and more cynically commercial products.
I grew up the seventh of nine children in idyllic Packanack Lake, in northern New Jersey. My dad worked hard in the garment industry and later in the auto sector and he was the epitome of decency and integrity. No finer man has walked this earth in my mind. My mom was a petite fireball of a woman that managed to raise all us kids to become quite successful. She was ever curious and ready to tackle new things. I share with her a deep love of words since it was on her lap I first remember the joy and pleasure of books.
Hay foot, straw foot; The Lonely Doll; What are you looking at? Little Bear; Babar; and of course, Madeline were my favorites in those early years. In school, my first purchases were Rascal and Disney’s 101 Dalmatians.  I wrote my first poem at age eight, I think. It was dialogue between two people about a Grizzly Bear.
Do you see what I see? /Â No, what is it?
Why it’s a grizzly bear / Are you going to wake it?
No! I don’t dare! …
I don’t recall the rest. Suffice it to say, I discovered a joy in putting words together and processed so much of my emotions in that manner from that time on.
During middle school, we moved to Nashville, Tennessee where my dad opened an insanely high-end fabric store in tony Green Hills called the Sewtique. It was a hit for a couple of years and then fate and a store fire at neighboring Pier One (which at the time was more known for its baskets and exotic chocolate covered ants and such).  Fire damage would have been covered by the Sewtique’s insurance policy but smoke damage wasn’t. Alas, who wants to purchase three yards of smoke-scented dotted swiss?
The store went under but rather than filing for bankruptcy and erasing the debts, my dad (of the tremendous integrity), held a fire sale, took out personal loans and assumed the debt personally. I think it was around that time I was burned, too. In a kitchen accident. I spent five weeks in Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital recovering from the third-degree burns to my legs. The bright spot during that time for me was having so much attention from so many people. I flourished if you can imagine. To while away the hours, Mom would bring me a new stash of library books each week.
After the store disaster, we moved to a fabulous old 15o-year-old antebellum mansion in the country owned by the Tennessee Orphans Home. It had been bequeathed to them with the stipulation they could never sell it. My older siblings recall the drudgery and clusterf*ck of it all. I only recall the romanticism of it all. The 240 acres surrounding the property were leased out to a local farmer who also owned a Tennessee Walking Horse that was ours to use whenever we cared to. It was fabulous for a middle-schooler with an active imagination!
Television channels weren’t strong out there so entertainment again meant trips to the local Franklin Public Library where I discovered Trixie Belden mysteries. And then, Laura Ingalls Wilder graced me with her Little House series. I was hooked and never looked back. Â Because we lived six miles out of town, organized sports and other activities wasn’t really an option, so I spent my pre-teen years playing in the fields, riding the horse, attempting to catch fish with a makeshift pole, and reading. It was a great respite from school where I was bullied for being different – northern accent amidst these rural folk, and visible scars on one leg below the knee didn’t help.
Stay tuned for part two of my “story,” when I discuss adult years reading, writing and how I “fell” into making art.
But before you depart, tell me: What were your favorite books as a child?Â
During the summer, stepson James was here from England with his fiance for vacation.  He is a fan of my artwork and mentioned how he’d  love to have an original citiscape to grace his home.  So it got me thinking…
When he was young, he and his lovely older sister visited a couple of times while we lived up north. Â Their time here included visits to New York and our most precious photos are of each of them posing with their dads at a spot on Liberty Island with the World Trade Center towers behind them. Â It got me thinking… and then painting. Â So here, as a gift for James, is “The New York I Recall.” Â Unfortunately, we’ll have to figure out how to get it over to him now. Â Anyone have any great suggestions for cost-effective Trans-Atlantic shipping?
Rather than let them just wither and die, I took the opportunity to paint the beautiful Mother’s Day flowers my son sent me. What do you think?
Very glad I was able to get over to Orlando for this wonderful cultural and humanitarian event. David Sandum founded this 4 years ago and there were 600+ works of art donated to the Orlando 2014 ‪#‎TwitterArtExhibit‬ curated byRobin Maria Pedrero which raised funds for the The Center for Contemporary Dance special needs program . Enough words, now for the pictures:
