Monday’s child is full of grace,
Tuesday’s child is fair of face.
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has far to go.
Friday’s child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s child works hard for a living.
But the child that is born on the Sabbath day,
is healthy, wealthy, happy and gay.
I share the date with Forrest Whittaker, Emily Ronstadt, Jesse “the Body” Ventura, Jan-Michael Vincent, Alex Karras, Clement Clark Moore and Rembrandt van Rijn.
When my son was 2.5 yo, we moved to Pinehurst. We went to see my parents pretty frequently on the weekends and this meant driving west on I-40 in the evening on Friday afternoons.
On one trip, he was fussing about the sun being in his eyes. Said, “Make the sun go down, Mom. It hurts my eyes.” I tried adjusting the shade, but he was the bad height, too short AND too tall for the shade to be effective. I said “Honey, I can’t make th sun go down.” He said “Sure you can. You can do anything.”
How could I disappoint him?
So, I said, “Put your head down here (on my thigh) and I’ll do what I can. (I checked the distance from sun to horizon) It’s gonna take about 30 minutes.” He said, “Why’s it gonna take so long? I said, “The sun is very heavy and it takes a lot to move it. Gimme about half an hour and it’ll be down.” He said, “OK.” and put his head down.
A couple of weeks later, we were going back.
He said “Mom! The sun is in my eyes again!” I said,”OK. Put your head down again and I’ll see what I can do. This time it’s gonna take a little longer.” He said, “Why’s it gonna take longer?” I said, “It’s daylight savings time. The sun is higher in the sky so it is going to take me longer to get it down.” He said “OK.” and put his head on my thigh, again.
So we got there and my sister was visiting, too.
Saturday, he was buzzing around the house and he threw himself on my lap, gave me a squeeze and said, “I love you, Momma!” and buzzed off.
My sister, Amanda said, “I wish somebody loved me that much. He thinks you are the best thing in the world.”
I said, “He thinks I make the sun rise and set.”
She said,”THAT might be a little extreme.”
I said,”ASK him.”
So she hollered for him and he buzzed back in the room.
“What?”
“Who makes the sun come up and go down?”
“My MOMMA!”
And he buzzed back off.
She said “You are so going to Hell for teaching him that.”
I laughed until I cried.
I love it when people are able to enhance the natural beauty of the world. Chihuly’s Glass in the Garden, Goldsworthy’s ribbons of leaves and flowers meandering along a river or field, Paul Winter’s music interwoven with the voices of whales.
I am reminded of Gimli’s response to Legolas when they came out of the Mines of Moira. Legolas is being snarky about how dwarves would mess up all the lovely rock formations they had seen. Gimli was appalled at the suggestion. He asserted that dwarves would rather take years determining the perfect place to remove a chip than to mar one jot of that beauty. It was where the Elf and the Dwarf became friends, from that shared appreciation of Beauty.
I knew a guy who objected to that gilding of the lily. He thought that Nature didn’t need our assistance.
I don’t agree.
I like the idea of Humanity and Nature working in concert.
Damn, I’m tired! Tom walked my feet off!!!
It was GREAT!!!!!
Had FABulous Indian food.
Walked all OVER the Art Institute of Chicago. TWICE. I have seen more of Georgia O’Keefe’s stuff. I am still a fan.
There was a little Dali that really rocked my socks, too.
They had a photo exhibit with 5 different artists entitled “So the Story Goes”. I liked one (Sally Mann). One was disturbing (Nan Goldin). One didn’t touch me at all (Philip-Lorca diCorcia).
The other 2 …. I have mixed feelings about. (Tina Barney and Larry Sultan).
We saw Redmoon Theater’s Twilight Orchard, which looked like a Cirque du Soleil audition. And a damn good one.
I have had a Chicago-style hot dog. Two of them, actually. And Chicago Pizza at Lou Malnati’s.
I’ve forgotten the name of the Greek restaurant. It was delicious, though. We had a choice of calamari and broiled octopus. We went with the octopus.
We spent an afternoon at the Shedd Aquarium, too. (I did like the shrimp with the go-go boots.)
OH. I almost forgot and that would be really silly.
Millenium Park.
I don’t know if I enjoyed Crown Fountain or the Bean the best.
We stayed with Tom’s aunt and uncle, who are delightful. And we took buses and subways all over the place. (Subways are still a novelty to me.)
And that was my weekend.
I went to the museum by myself today. Last Sunday, I went with a couple of friends to see the Fusion glass exhibit. I needed to see it again before it closed.
I liked seeing the Chihuly pieces. I find that I like the simpler pieces he does, like the baskets. Some of his work is too busy for my taste.
I loved the William Morris pieces. I had become a fan when I saw some of his work at the Mint Museum of Craft and Design in Charlotte a couple of years ago.
Now, I have met the work of Stanislav Libenský and Jaroslava Brychtová, a Czech couple who do chunky monochromatic pieces that are very subtle as the light flows through the different depths of glass.
These are some of the pieces I saw.
This is in the entryway of the exhibit. It is taller than my 5’4″ and surprisingly narrow. There is a bit of a curve so that when you look at it from the side it appears almost ready to topple backwards.
Vestment III looks kind of like a chasuble with bubbles in the glass resembling text (on first glance, anyway). This is a different version. The one I saw was brown rather than grey. It is about a yard wide.
Spaces III is about the same size and is a bit of an optical illusion. There are curves where there appear to be angles.
Cross Head reminds me of the Easter Island heads. The color, and the variations of intensity, is glorious.
I am the Audience 