Simple Shots

It's not spring, but my house thinks it is. I did one of those cleanings that people talk about - the old top to bottom. I had lots of good music playing all day long and just went at it with a vengeance. Okay, not the most exciting way to begin a post but I'm kind of down to the bone weary so if I get off track or becoming oddly melodramatic about anything, you'll know why. Our secret. Oh, "out damn spot". Perfect example, if I do stuff like that just ignore me.

It never dawned on me until Thursday that Thanksgiving is next week. I was so focused on the fact that we were having an abbreviated week at school that I completely missed the why. Yeah! I love the smell of turkey cooking. Every year the group that gathers at our table is different. I like that this isn't a holiday that is so traditional you can't change it around a little. No changes to the turkey though - nothing that radical. Thanksgiving was actually one of my very most favorite days when I was growing up - wee lass that I was. My mom would always get up before the sun even thought about touching its own rise. She'd put this enormous bird in the oven and I would smell it in my dreams. I would head downstairs and watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. God how I loved that parade. Apparently my sister was impressed as well because when she was little and anyone asked her what she wanted to be when she got older, she would always tell them "a parade girl". One year all four of us kids got to actually be in a Christmas parade. There was a big department store in my hometown called Iszards. Every year Iszards would put on their Christmas parade, floats, clowns, marching bands, Santa the works. My mom worked at Iszards on and off for a few years and volunteered the four of us to be in the parade. My sister just about wet her pants she was so excited. Our youngest brother was the one we all envied though, he got dressed up as an elf and got to ride on Santa's float. There's just no topping that when you're a kid! Of course none of us even got to the place in our thinking where we realized that that experience could have quickly laid to rest any doubts he may have had about the reality of jolly fat men with white beards.
Okay, now comes the time I have to come up with a picture that has any thing to do with this posting. And I have just the one!

Simple Shots

So, I'm sitting in hell at the moment. I am in a class with about 15 teenagers. The other teacher is threatening to quit and I'm letting her know in no uncertain terms that I will beat her out the door even if I have to hurt her to do so. The reasonable side of me keeps asking the irrational side of me why I ever agreed to teach high school. Women my age just shouldn't have to put up with hormones in rage mode.

Yesterday I went to Hopedale, a quaint, little, New England mill town to take photos. Most of the people living there live in duplexes. It's fun to drive through and look at some of the creative ideas people have come up with to distance themselves from their grafted neighbor. Smack dab in the center of town is a very cool old stone library covered in vines. Beautiful. It was kind of hard to snap a good photo of it though, because right next to it is a large white canvas tent with a couple of vinyl windows. No one was around because it was a rainy day (again! notice how that is a re-occurring theme? I mean, I live in New England for God's sake, not Seattle, Washington) so anyway, I got real close to the tent and snuck a nonchalant peek inside. I thought there would be boxes and tables with books or some other sort of libraryish stuff. What I found was this incredibly large, mammoth really, soft white marble sculpture covered with scaffolding. I think it might be a water fountain but couldn't say for positive sure. I'll have to wait until I get home today to insert the photos I took. It is a magnifient, yet very eerie. You have to wonder what the artist was thinking about when he carved this. The craftmanship is incredible, but I know that I wouldn't want this gracing the front of any home I would ever live in.

Simple Shots

Okay, summer is over! All in all it was a good one that was over too soon, the standard line for anyone in the educational field. Lucky for you I'm not going to summarize (like the Christmas letters that too many people send out in lieu of a card. I don't know, Christmas letter? Or pretty picture of the perfect Christmas all set to send off waves of oooohs and ahhhhhh's? Sorry letter writers, that one is a no brainer.). However I will post some of those fireworks photos that I mentioned in my last post way back in whenever.

So, I got up at 5 AM today - couldn't resist staying awake to listen to the rain dripping on the last few leaves of 2006. It's pretty quiet this time of the day, other than the rain. And it's really quite nice not rushing through my coffee this morning. Our home is pretty quiet in the morning now that the girls have moved out. Michael and I have learned how to dance around one another in our too small kitchen. Don't ask me which dance that is, I could only hazzard a guess...Samba? I like the way that sounds, samba, samba, samba... It's funny when you take dance apart, disect it, find its bones. It's really only a set of movements that millions of people duplicate everytime the proper tunes play. Deep huh?

So, my photo taking business (on the side) has become a reality. I have set up booths at a few craft fairs, sold several at Nancy's shop and have started doing some custom work at my school as well. Lugging the big framed photos around got to be a bit much, so I developed a line of greeting cards - affordable art! We have turned one of my daugters (almost) empty rooms into a studio. I like to get lost in there. Sometimes I miss dinner because I lose track of the time. A hobby with weight loss options! Hmmmmmmm wheels are turning.