Girls Bathing
Boys Playing
Photographic Journal
Camping du Pont Couvert
Camping du Pont Couvert is only 15 minutes from home.
Martin passes by each night for dinner on his way home from work.
* * *
Tabea, looking like the little girl she is.
Inside this little girl is a magnificent brain, re-inventing the future as she sucks her thumb.
Akiva, looking like the little boy he is.
Inside this little boy is endless charm and fledgling mastery. Women swoon. Strong men tremble.
Ashes to Ashes
All ashes to ashes,
All ashes to dust.
All ashes, all ashes,
All ashes to dust.
The Buried Boy
She buried him alive
in the sandbox,
one shovelful at a time,
and slowly.
She watched him writhe—
and laughed with glee when he broke free.
The Piano Obsession.
There was an old woman tossed up in a basket
Seventeen times as high as the moon
And where she was going, I couldn’t help ask it
For under her arm, she carried a broom.
“Old woman, old woman, old woman,” quoth I,
“Where are you going, up so high?”
“To sweep the cobwebs off the sky—
And I’ll be with you, by and by.”
—M. Goose
We saw her yesterday in Compton. A woman— destined to be an old woman if all goes well— with a broom under her arm. Or over her head. Well, anyhow, she was making brooms. She remembered Iris from last year. She remembered the tiny veggie scrubber they had worked on together. She remembered how much of it they had made and she said to Iris, “This year, you are old enough to make your own broom.” She sat Iris in front of her on her broom-maker’s bench and made a broom with her. She was absolutely delightful and I didn’t say thank you nearly enough.
When we walked down to the school today, we took the broom so that I could carve Iris’s name & yesterday’s date on it, as Madame KeeVanne (a.k.a. Julie Jo) had said to do.
I took my camera with me, as you can tell. That’s becoming a rare event these days. I used to take it everywhere! I’m not sure what happened. Perhaps I got disgruntled with the quality of the lighting at the apartment. Perhaps I got distracted my a myriad of things to do. But I did take my camera. I like to document my children, to prove their youth and beauty.
On the way back, we stopped at the woods piano. These days, one has to hunt for piano keys on the ground if one wishes to play the piano with piano keys.
Akiva is my main piano player. He appreciates all pianos.
This was once an integral part of a once-beautiful upright grand piano.
Iris & Akiva play a duet.
Akiva bangs out a solo.
Keys. There once were keys.
Brief photographic timeline of the woods piano:
Broken Down Piano: September 11, 2017
How Fares the Piano? April 9, 2018
Val-Estrie Piano (again): May 30, 2018
Decline of the Woods Piano (Winter): January 1, 2019
Walk to the Island
We walk through the woods to the island for the first time in a very long time.
I have not been sleeping well lately, & I have no energy to go in the water.
At the Dentist
Akiva was excited, so he went first.
He hopped up into the chair and opened his mouth.
Iris went next because she was anxious.
Despite her anxiety, she was the perfect patient.
How We Move
Akiva & I have been moving for months now. In January, we emptied the storage unit largely by ourselves. It took a good number of trips in the van. Martin went back for a few large items that couldn’t be carried with a child seat in the van.
After storage was emptied, on snowy winter mornings, I would pack a box, put it on the cargo sled, & I would pull the sled & Akiva to school while Iris walked to school. After dropping Iris off, I would pull Akiva and the box through the woods, up the hill to the yellow house, drop off the box, then pull Akiva home. I moved many, many boxes this way.
Long after spring began, when the snow finally melted, I had to get a bit creative in order to get my near-daily moving workout. I used the wagon for a few loads, then I left the wagon up at the Yellow House. I packed my large backpacks full of things, then I left the backpacks & things at the Yellow House. I used the cargo bike for a few loads but, ultimately, it wasn’t terribly convenient, so I left the cargo bike up at the Yellow House.
At the beginning of June, I started packing boxes to bring up with the car. The car! That’s serious! Today was playroom moving day. I didn’t take a photo with the car packed fully, tho it would certainly have been more impressive. I stopped at this point just to look at the car and wonder how many times these items have been moved and how many more they could move, should they live a good life. I remember when the slide and the play kitchen were unpacked in Syracuse, New York when I was four years old, the summer of 1978. They haven’t moved much since then, it’s true. Once, about 35 years later, to Shelburne; once to Waterville; and now just up the street. But they’re good toys. They like to be played with.
Akiva is excited to go to school next year to get away from all this moving and renovating stuff. He wants to play with kids.
Renovation: Sandbox
One of the most important things that needs to be built before the house can be considered move-inable
is the sandbox.
Pink Lady’s Slipper (L’Ile Du Marais)
I am missing the spring with all this work I am doing on the house, so we took an emergency trip to L’Ile Du Marais. It’s been a while! The woods were positively overflowing with wildflowers. Being mainly a photographer of two very specific individuals (I really should branch out), I didn’t take many photos of the delicate blooms. It was an absolutely delightful trip! We should go more often.
How does this superior-type expression of self arise in isolated individuals? Akiva has never seen someone take this posture.
Portrait on the very very very abandoned car.
Another five-leaf trillium!
Iris inspects the labia of a lady’s slipper.
