Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘new england’

I wanted to share a few photos documenting a view of New England’s transition from fall to winter. (Maybe it’s not officially winter, but we have had our first snow.)

I start off here with one of my favorite photographic subjects: shadows. These are shadows of late-autumn weeds. Next we have a view of French’s Meadow along the Sudbury River. It is nearly always covered with water from the river escaping the banks.

Concord was the site of the military funeral for Tom Hudner, Korean War hero and a native of Fall River, Massachusetts.

The classroom picture was taken December 12, when students from a Providence English-as-a-Second-Language class where I volunteer gave me the sweetest thank-you celebration. Many of them also took phone videos of me trying to replicate the dancing of a Congolese woman in the class. Now I am worried about how many Facebook pages it’s on.

The gingerbread house is the 2017 version by the woman who does one every year for the town library. Each year’s is more amazing than the last. Note the little duck pond in the lower left.

The Grasshopper Shop, a women’s clothing store, put out a tree decorated with the holiday wishes of children. How sad that one child would have to wish “that North Korea doesn’t nuke anyone.”

The deciduous holly and white pine are pictured after our first snow. The town was really pretty when my husband and I walked through the shadows cast by streetlights and holiday lights on our way to dinner that night.

112517-shadows-of-weeds

110417-French's-Meadow-Sudbury-R

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

111517-Thos-Hudner-funeral-ConcordMA

121217-Dorcas-class-gave-me-presents

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

121017-gingerbread-Concord-Library

120617-Xmas-wishes-from-kids

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

120917-deciduous-holly-white-pine

Read Full Post »

Today’s photos include two beauties that Sandra M. Kelly took at the Painted Rock in New Shoreham. I think the seal and mermaid are better than any work I saw on the Painted Rock this year, and I wish I could find out who the artist was. (NWG, if you know the painter, please let me know so I can give credit.)

The cow jumping over the Davis Square subway station has something to do with the bucolic history of City of Somerville. The mysterious door to nowhere is near my house, and I never get tired of taking pictures of it.

The next few photos are of the Sudbury and Concord rivers and include two shots of a popular canoe-rental business on the Sudbury. The antique metal pole in Wayland Square, Providence, is another mystery. Is it a lamppost? I’ve never seen it lit.

I felt compelled to post another picture of shadows, my favorite subject, plus food for thought from Ralph Waldo Emerson.

The field of pumpkins is at Verrill Farm.

Oct2017-seal-on-rock

Oct2017-mermaid-on-rock

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

100617-Davis-Sq-cow-in-sky

102617-door-to-nowhere

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

102017-Sudbury-River

102217-canoe-rental-ConcordMA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

102717-boathouse-Concord

092917-mist-North-Bridge

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

100217-strange-pillar-Wayland-Square

100417-art-is-where-you-find-it

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

100517-Emerson-on-tragedy

101117-Verrill-Farm-field-of-pumpkins

Read Full Post »

Under gray skies or sunny skies, I never tire of the beauty of Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Most of the photos are mine, but three were courtesy of Bo Zhao, Suzanne, and my husband.

We start off with the boathouse that is near the Old Manse and the famed North Bridge in Concord. You can see that the grasses at Minuteman National Park are changing into autumn attire.

On a morning walk, I saw a happy little snake where the bike path meets Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. I think it was a garter snake.

The Kindness Garden was on Blackstone Boulevard in Providence. The last time I walked by, I saw that people had taken whatever they needed of kind words, and there were only a couple left.

The picture of the sidewalk poem in Cambridge was taken by Bo. I wrote about that initiative here.

The photo of the beautiful message on New Shoreham’s Painted Rock was taken by Suzanne. And my husband snapped the funny Help Wanted sign at Summer Shack. I sent it to my cabaret-artist pal Lynn, who wrote back

Another [clam] openin’
Another show
My hand is bleeding
Please stanch the flow
The tips are fine
But my nails don’t grow
Another openin’ of
Another show

The purple flower is called Blazing Star, and it’s native to New Shoreham.

091417-near-Old-Manse-Concord

091517-sign-for-boathouse-ConcordMA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

091517-Old-Manse-boathouse

091517-rude-bridge-that-arched-the-flood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

091417-September-colors-Minuteman-Park

091317-snake-in-cemetery

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

090617-Kindness-Garden-Blackstone-Blvd

090917-Bo-Z-took pic-of-sidewalk-poem

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

090117-painted-rock-photo-by-S-Wernevi

090917-summer-shack-seeks-piano-player

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

082917-blazing-star-RI

082917-Mohegan-Bluffs-RI

 

Read Full Post »

Yes this post’s title is toying with the name of the famous John Singer Sargent painting “Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose,” which KerryCan told me she liked.

The roses in New Shoreham are so abundant this year, I couldn’t stop taking pictures. I admire these roses because they do their own thing. They need no attention from humans. If they feel like climbing up a tree or entwining themselves with acres of poison ivy, they will just do it.

I’m also posting a water-lily pond where I saw a rough-hewn guy in a beat-up car place a rescued turtle. Other photos include a typical New Shoreham dirt road, Suzanne’s daughter’s monkey enjoying a rare respite, a deer, and Stuga40’s breakfast idea (flax seeds and pumpkin kernels on cereal).

071317-Block-Island-roses-1

 

071317-Block-Island-roses-4

 

 

 

 

 

071317-Block-Island-roses-3

 

071317-Block-Island-roses-2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

070917-dirt-road-New-Shoreham-RI

 

071317-Block-Island-water-lilies

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

070917-monkey-in-early-morning

 

071417-lovely-but-oh-the-ticks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

070717-flax-seed-pumpkin-kernels

Read Full Post »

Well, we’re home and adjusting to the time change more easily than when we traveled east. Meanwhile, it occurs to me that I have a bunch of New England photos from both before and after our trip that I want to share. I call the first one “There Will Be Grapes.”

The yellow and white tulips have since died off, but the yard they graced has a floral display that keeps on giving.

My three shadow pictures feature the North Bridge in Concord, Mass., a wildly exuberant dogwood, and a vase of spring flowers.

Two antique child vehicles are on the porch of a home furnishings store.

The life forms by Korean sculptor Jaeok Lee at the Concord Center for the Visual Arts completely captivated me. The artist has written about making the tiny cabinet objects while experiencing health challenges that kept her from other projects.

“The healing quality of nature also motivates my work,” Lee says. “A few years ago, I developed an illness that doctors could not diagnose. While going through various diagnostic tests, since I did not have much energy, I started working with very small objects.

“I would go out to my garden for inspiration and would start to pinch small forms of seeds, pods, berries and flowers. Over the course of one year, I made thousands of small pieces that filled a Chinese medicine cabinet that I bought from an antique shop a few years ago.

“I named the project ‘Making my own medicine.’ The simple act of pinching the forms has been a healing experience that gave me enormous hope for my recovery.”

More at her website, here.

060717-there-will-be-grapes

060717-there-will-be-grapes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

051817-north-bridge-concord-ma

051917-backdoor-dogwood-shadows

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

051917-backdoor-dogwood-shadows

060717-old-time-toys

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

052117-Jaeok-Lee-life-forms

052117-Jaeok-Lee-Cabinet

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

052117-Jaeok-Lee-Concord-Art

Read Full Post »

As spring belatedly decided to show up in our neck of the woods, a Hollywood movie crew turned the town into a Christmas set, building a crèche in front of a picturesque church, decorating store windows with candy canes, snowmen, and plastic poinsettias — and spreading fake snow on lawns that had barely recovered from an April 1 blizzard. It was a little weird. One friend said she looked up from washing dishes at her kitchen window and saw what looked like a gigantic spaceship hovering over the trees. It was the boom for the cameraman.

In more seasonal news, spring flowers began to poke out. Woodland walks were taken. Mushrooms and lichens were admired.

040517-movie-set-Xmas-in-April-1

040517-movie-set-Xmas-in-April-2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

040517-hyacinth

040717-forsythia-and-lichen

 

 

 

 

 

 

040917-Oct-Farm-river-view

040917-Oct-Farm-fungus

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

041217-Concord-forest-walk

041217-stream-in-woods

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

041217-woodland-lichen

041217-shadows-stripe-forest-floor

 

 

Read Full Post »

Back in the day, a regular on the kids’ television show Howdy Doody was a putative Indian called Princess Summer Fall Winter Spring. The last two seasons in her name were run together as if they were one word.

Lately, “WinterSpring” seems to be the right name for what we’re experiencing in New England. Here are a few pictures from my confused season.

There are four photos of the beautiful Boston Public Library. The hardest shot to get was a lion not surrounded by photographers and visitors posing for their picture. While I was at the library, I was delighted to hear the retired Massachusetts chief justice being interviewed by Boston Public Radio, which sometimes broadcasts from there. Margaret Marshall is perhaps best known for her reasoning in the case to make gay marriage legal in Massachusetts. My photo of her friendly wave did not come out.

The ornate clock suddenly appeared on Washington Street. I don’t recall seeing it in all the years I took walks in that neighborhood.

The 5-lb coffee bag will get us through any kind of WinterSpring.

Finally, I include a couple indoor shots of my living room in a welcome shower of sunlight and a couple pictures of grandchildren managing just fine in WinterSpring.

Caroline is fine and let me know what flavor you want there is vanilla, chocolate, coffee, pineapple, and I expect your response many thanks Caroline

031717-library-courtyard-shadows

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

031717-rare-view-of-BPL-lion-sans-tourists

031017-snow-writing-ConcordMA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

032017-thinking-beach-time-in-the-snow

031717-pastoral-reminder-re-love

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

031717-outdoor-clock-washington-st-boston

032317-coffee-in-5-lb-bag

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

032317-sunlight-thru-lattice

032317-rugs-on-wood-floor

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

032317-two-young-artists-sunny-day

 

 

Read Full Post »

It is not really spring yet although a weird February tried to fool us with several warm days before handing us back to single-digit temperatures.

There is a period in New England when the weather teeters back and forth between winter and spring — and inevitably brings to mind the e.e. cummings poem “[In Just-].” It’s a happy poem reminding one that as long as there are springs, there will always be excited children running outdoors to play, hollering back at someone in the house, “I don’t need a coat — it’s hot!”

Here is the poem:

in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles far and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it’s
spring
and

the

goat-footed

balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee

 2017-sunrise
021217-tree-in-snow-Providence
021217-tree-in-snow-Providence
021817-snow-melting-at-stream
022517-fungus-rock-lichen-woods
022117-thru-the-looking-glass
030217-vinca-rises-from-decay

Read Full Post »

Photo: Daily Table
Fresh surplus food is sold for less, with help from a distribution platform called Spoiler Alert.

A logistics company that moves unwanted, unneeded but perfectly fresh food to people who do want and need it has chosen the perfect Internet slang for its name: Spoiler Alert. Ordinarily, “spoiler alert” is what you say if you are recommending or reviewing a film or book and don’t want to spoil the ending for someone else. In this case, it’s about delivering fresh food where it’s needed before it spoils.

Janelle Nanos writes at the Boston Globe, “Spoiled food is a costly problem, accounting for about $218 billion in financial losses to US farms, businesses, and consumers each year, according to ReFED, a group of companies, nonprofits, and foundations that was formed last year to minimize food waste. Since its launch in 2015, Spoiler Alert’s food-matching platform has been adopted by 200 businesses and nonprofits in New England to cut down on waste and encourage donations by making them easier to track.

“The company was created by two MIT Sloan School of Management graduates, Ricky Ashenfelter and Emily Malina, and their chief technology officer, Marty Sirkin, and has worked its way through the city’s accelerator programs, winning $50,000 from MassChallenge in 2015 and a spot in this year’s Techstars Boston cohort. …

” ‘At Daily Table I like to think of Spoiler Alert as an opportunity to further meet our mission of capturing healthy, tasty products before they make it to compost or trash,’ said Ismail Samad, executive chef of the Dorchester grocery store, which sells food and prepared meals gleaned from donations. He said he relies heavily on Spoiler Alert to source the food for his store shelves.

“But part of Spoiler Alert’s recent success can be credited to another, rather wonky aspect of its platform, which helps companies navigate the tax code. [In December 2015], Congress passed a bill that expanded the tax breaks companies can receive for donating food, making it easier for small businesses to donate and for farmers to assess the fair market value of their inventories.” Read how it all comes together, here.

A nonprofit organization that is also a MassChallenge winner and does similar work in the region is Lovin’ Spoonfuls, which I blogged about here. MassChallenge is a startup accelerator that helps new companies get launched. Its judges are partial to companies that can do well by doing good, bless their hearts.

Photo: Lovin’ Spoonfuls
Lovin’ Spoonfuls donates food to Safe Haven, a housing program run by the Bedford (MA) Veterans Administration.

Read Full Post »

I’m old enough to have lived through many contentious election cycles, my mother having gotten my help going door-to-door when I was 7. So I’m here to tell you, life goes on. The old world keeps turning. The seasons come around. Dawn lights up city streets. Those who seek kindness and beauty find it.

101116-voting-outreach-2

101116-voting-outreach-2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

101116-voting-outreach-1

 

102616-old-time-services-providence

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

102616-turret-shadow-wayland-square

 

103016-graveyard-tree-concord

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

103016-graveyard-tree-concord

 

103016-decay-concord-ma

 

Read Full Post »

We turned on the heat and started wearing warm coats. (I’m even wearing gloves and earmuffs in the early morning, but don’t tell anyone.)

I think it’s time for a round-up of late summer scenes in New England before the snow flies.

First come two pictures illustrating the Providence claim to fame as Creative Capital. Then shy mushrooms. Next are four photos from New Shoreham, including horses and a turtle who really hoped I’d just go away.

Moving right along: lovely shadows and fall colors in field and farmstand.

092816-creative-capital

100316-joyous-foil-dancers-brown-university

100616-mushrooms-hiding

100616-mushrooms-in-fall

100816-island-house

101016-horses-new-shoreham

101016-dirt-road-new-shoreham

101016-turtle-payne-road

100716-light-and-shadow-at-home

100216-fall-colors-concord-mass

093016-tomatoes-at-farmstand-concord-ma

093016-verrill-farm

Read Full Post »

Among the sights I’ve wanted to photograph in the last few weeks is a sculpture outside the Umbrella Community Arts Center. It invites you to look through and focus on an aspect of the view.

Next up, the old house where Ephraim Bull developed the Concord Grape. Another sign there told me that there was a “Sale Pending.”

My friend Meredith is a featured artist at Concord Art’s new juried show. She has done several treatments of her fica plant, but the one in the show is a lovely collage of painted paper.

I recently discovered on a morning walk that the Providence Preservation Society has generously opened its multilevel garden to the public during certain hours of the day. What a peaceful place to just sit and think! Not far away is the What Cheer Garage (I like the name). Across Providence, you can discover a fine-looking hen on the wall of Olga’s Cup and Saucer, and a street art stencil recommending Speak no evil, See no evil, Hear no evil.

I also like the alley alongside the Providence Performing Arts Center and a hilly street that looks more like Europe than New England.

092416-sculpture-at-umbrella-center

092416-looking-thru-sculpture

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

092516-concord-grape-origins

092516-meredith-fife-day-at-juried-show

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

092016-please-enjoy-our-garden

092016-preservationists-share-garden

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

092116-hen-at-olga

092116-3-no-evils

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

092016-what-cheer

092116-providence-alley

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

092016-providence-street

Read Full Post »

Missing the excitement of the summer Olympics? As these Vermont farmers show, any determined and organized group can have their own “Olympics” and have a lot of fun.

Jessica Rinaldi writes at the Boston Globe, “With the world’s attention focused on the Olympic Games in Brazil, a decidedly different type of competition was held in a small corner of New England, as farmers took to the field for the second annual Farmer Olympics in Vershire, Vt.

“After taking part in warm-up events that included a hay bale toss, the crowd gathered for an opening ceremony where a quartet performed the Olympic theme song on kazoo. When the competition began, 60 farmers sprinted up a hill, empty bins and shovels in hand, for the manure relay. The event was sponsored by the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont. In the end it was a team from Cedar Circle Farm in East Stepford who took the gold. Their team’s name? Soil’d.

Click here for a terrific collection of photos from the second annual Farmer Olympics.

Photo: Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont
Competing in the Farmer Olympics, Vershire, Vermont.

Read Full Post »

This healthy sunflower is at the Old Manse in Concord. The Trustees of Reservations always plant a big garden there, with pumpkins growing between the corn rows.

The lantern-like seed pods in the next photo embellish a tree beside the Providence River. The leaf shadows on brick were spotted not far away, along a grubby Providence sidewalk.

Can you read the plaque on the Providence Journal building? It shows the crazy height that the water reached in the infamous Hurricane of ’38. Golly!

My husband says the barrier at Fox Point will prevent flooding like that from ever happening again. I don’t know. Were the engineers aware of global warming when they started construction in 1960?

New Shoreham (in the next picture) was also battered in the hurricane of ’38. In fact, the storm wiped out the island economy on land and sea. The fishermen and farmers were not insured against such a catastrophe. No wonder people there remember that hurricane!

One thing that is different since 1938, as I learned in a splendid book called A Wind to Shake the World, communities in the path of a hurricane now get plenty of warning. But in 1938, when houses on Long Island, New York, were washing out to sea, no one up north knew it.

A few other shots of New Shoreham: a Wednesday farmers market, the Little Free Library, a view through a stone wall, a rumpled morning sky, and the North Light.

081916-sunflower-at-Old-Manse

082916-little-lanterns

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

083016-shadows

083026-sign-re-hurricane-of 1938

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

082816-Old-Harbpr-bye-for-now

082416-farmers-market-New-Shoreham

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

082016-Free-LIbrary-BI-3

082216-thru-a-wall-darkly

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

082816-morning-sky-New-Shoreham-RI

082616-North-Light-New-Shoreham

 

Read Full Post »

After a father’s death, the family tries to find homes for his perfect metal miniatures.

Isaac Feldberg writes at the Boston Globe, “On any gift-giving occasion in the Megerdichian household, the most exciting presents to unwrap were always both the smallest and, funnily enough, the heaviest.

“Some boxes held metal miniature re-creations — a brass violin with horse-hair strings and a latched case; an aluminum piano music box that played ‘Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head.’ Others concealed stainless-steel jewelry, intricately detailed, immaculately formed. And others still contained children’s toys, like steel tractor-trailer sets to be nudged along the wooden floors of their Cambridge home.

“ ‘They were 14 ounces of love, 1 ounce of metal,’ says Robert Megerdichian, 63, of the tiniest pieces his late father, Abraham, bestowed upon the family throughout his lengthy career as a machinist. ‘He started off with a solid block of metal, brass, aluminum, copper, or stainless steel, and he gouged away, like a sculptor would, like an artist would, to create all of these objects.’

“Megerdichian’s description of his father as an artist has recently earned official validation, with museums across New England displaying an array of Abraham’s pieces. The Attleboro Area Museum of Industry, the Lynn Museum, and Boston’s Museum of Science all currently house some of his metal miniatures. Additional museum exhibits are set to open in the fall, including at Connecticut’s New Britain Industrial Museum. For more than half a century, however, Abraham’s creations were reserved for his loved ones. …

” ‘It was important to him to make things that made the people he cared for happy,’ ” said his son.

Read about Abraham’s history here. A great example of what the intersection of love and skill can give the world.

Photo: David L. Ryan/Globe Staff
Robert Megerdichian looks over a miniature Hoover vacuum cleaner crafted by his father.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »