Blog Archives
all the days we’ve been apart
I saw ghosts that day.
The first one was when I turned (randomly, I thought at first) down a ranch road. A wave of memories of one of my best friends from high school and college almost swept me away the very second I made the turn; I guess I thought I knew the things that resided in my memory but I was wrong. And then I saw the house where my friend’s grandparents used to live. I know it was the same house; I could feel it. I had made previous efforts to find it before, but it wasn’t until I wasn’t looking for it that it appeared to me. As I drove by, slowly, I acknowledged the ghosts that I had stirred up.
Later, I went to the town where my adult-life best friend lived. She died almost two years ago, and I am still staggered by the loss. I had lunch at a place we’d gone to before. Then I drove by the house where she’d lived (and where she died); her husband’s truck was in the driveway and I recognized some of his things in the yard. I stopped, briefly, and nodded sadly through my tears at the ghosts who were still there.
It was not the day I expected to have, but it was the day I got.
Eckhart, Texas
photographed 2.19.2023
light comes at you sideways
If you live in an arid region*, obviously your chances to see a harbor with reflections of boats (Or ships? Maybe I’m supposed to say “ships”?) are non-existent. Good thing I was traveling with people who live near water and could explain some stuff to me. (Except when to say “ship” and when to say “boat.” They probably assumed I knew.)
Palermo, Sicily
photographed 8.30.2022
*Like, for example, Lubbock, Texas.
a walking lunch
I don’t know what this gentleman was eating for lunch. But I am positive that it was delicious. I mean…this was in Sicily, where everything was delicious.
La Vucciria
Palermo, Sicily
photographed 8.30.2022
sometimes there are too many contrasts
There was a lot going on here.
It was the first night of my long-anticipated, often-delayed trip to Cuba. I was trying to settle in to what I was seeing and feeling. The contrasts (in both of those things) left me feeling unsettled, and it was a feeling that stayed with me the whole I time I was there.
Av. Bélgica
Havana, Cuba
photographed 11.5.2023
the damage and the dying done
We only had a very short time to visit this cemetery; a whole day wouldn’t have been enough. I had to hurry…and fell into the trap of being so busy taking pictures that I failed to slow down and take in the feeling of the place, to really SEE what was there. (For this, I have no excuse: a have a tattoo on my wrist that says, “Take time to see.” I didn’t even take time to read my own ink.)
But anyway, here’s a mausoleum with a reflection.
And, because I was in a mood when I wrote this, I threw in a Bruce Cockburn line – the damage and the dying done – because I felt like it. (It’s from a beautiful spoken word piece “The Charity of Night.”)
Necrópolis Cristóbal Colón
Havana, Cuba
photographed 11.11.2022
One Day | One Image 