Buskers by Paul Boocock and Rhonda Prince

Buskers by Paul Boocock and Rhonda Prince

cheers from Florida

We were getting ready for my sister's second chemotherapy yesterday. We packed two backpacks and a lovely Pierre Cardin bag with everything we thought we would need for a six to seven hour stay at the cancer center. We were refusing to let cancer and the pumping of toxins into her bloodstream distract us from work and play.  Or maybe we were trying to shut it out by bringing a plethora of toys with us. We packed books, laptops, ipods,  cellphones and cameras into our bags and headed for the hospital.  If we were occupied with our 'stuff' then maybe we wouldn't be thinking about the hard questions. When will her hair fall out? What strange things will happen to her body from the chemo this time? How nauseated will she be? What is this strange rash on her shoulder? What were the results of the PET scan? 

First stop was the blood draw center where they would take a little blood  to make sure her blood counts are where they should be. Then we sat in Starbucks sipping chai tea while we used the laptop and watched soccer. Then we had an appointment with the oncologist. We sat in the waiting room and watched...soccer! Then we were called back to the exam room. And that is where things began to unravel. It seems my sister's white blood count was not high enough to receive her treatment. We would not be able to have chemo until the count was higher. They are expecting it to be higher on Tuesday.  We spent time discussing meds, measuring tumors, rescheduling treatments and arranging more precautions against the inevitable nausea that will follow the next chemo. We were discouraged, disappointed and defeated. And so we dropped off our bags of technology paraphernalia at home and escaped to the safety of a dark theater to watch a wonderful foreign film from South America. We were the only two in the theater and it did the trick. 

So today she returned to work  and I to my computer. Monday I will travel to Gainesville with my parents to find out when my father will have surgery on his spine. He is in pain and unable to walk. He is not a happy camper, to say the least. And my mother in her stubborn, stalwart manner tries to take care of everyone and fix everything because...that is who she is.  So we will fill our weekend with distractions and move on into next week with renewed strength and optimism...and maybe a little less 'stuff' in our bags.

I promise not to bore everyone who reads this blog (all three of you) with continued details of my family's illnesses but it's my life this summer and where my mind and my heart will be for now.

Paul Boocock

Paul Boocock

 photo©Paul Boocock

tiny slices

Watching the world

through the slats of the blinds

The soft breeze

Blowing the bamboo leaves

The drops of rain

On every tree glistening

In the evening sun

I think I like life better

In tiny slices through the blinds

Instead of all at once.

Interview with Rosalind Solomon on 591

Rosalind Solomon

Buk time...thanks to Paul Shelasky

Recently I ran across an excellent blog and not only was I inspired by the photographs it reminded me of how much I love Buk....so today I'm posting a poem by Charles Bukowski. I'm off to Florida this afternoon...be back soon!

photo©Rhonda Prince

 Straight up and down
and then maybe sidewise
for a while
and have your guts
scrambled by a
bully
and the demonic
ladies,
you've got to run
along the edge of
madness
teetering,
you've got to starve
like a winter
alleycat,
you've go to live
with the imbecility
of at least a dozen
cities,
then maybe
maybe
maybe
you might know
where you are
for a tiny
blinking
moment."  - Charles Bukowski

Pure passion, still bleeding and forever young - a conversation with photographer Goro Bertz

 photo © Goro Bertz

Pure passion, still bleeding and forever young - a conversation with photographer Goro Bertz

Posted using ShareThis

under his wing

The man she used to love

stood outside her window

offering tea and oranges.

 He wrote a message

on the back of a maple leaf

ripping it from the tree

and letting the wind take

It from his fingers.

The same message was

written in braille on his

wrist and all she had to

do was take his hand

and touch the words

with her fingertips.

Instead she let her hand

rest on the smooth

bodhi seeds and glide

past the turquoise bead.

She felt the words enter her

heart and  take hold

growing wings and flying

out of her chest…out of the window…

past the man she used to love

and finally soaring up toward

grey clouds and

disappearing forever.

Bittersweet Symphony

One of my favorite photographers has a permanent exhibit on 591... yeah!

Denial isn't just a river in Egypt

Icarus: All limits are self-imposed. 


It's true! Sometimes I'm in denial about it but it's true. So the journey begins to find what I really, really, really want and to stop imposing the limits that have prevented me from finding what I really, really, really want...


 More thoughts on denial:
http://phdcancer.blogspot.com/

Wrestlemania – for Bill

My dad was a soldier, a lifeguard, a wrestler and finally a bricklayer.  I posted this story about him in a comment on Cafe Selavy’s blog and he asked me to share it here too, with a picture. A few years ago a student I had was so impressed that my dad was a wrestler that my dad sent him a copy of this picture with this email:

YOU WOULDN'T KNOW ANY OF THE WRESTLERS THAT I WRESTLED. IT WAS A LONNNNNNNNNG TIME AGO.

WE DIDN'T USE WEAPONS,  WE ONLY USED OUR MUSCLES AND HAD TO BE VERY STRONG AND IN GOOD SHAPE TO HOLD OUT. SOME OF THEIR NAMES WERE-- ANGEL FACE --LOU THEISS- DUSSACK BROTHERS- THE RED DEVIL. THE MOST FAMOUS PERSON I CAME  IN CONTACT WITH WAS HEAVY WEIGHT CHAMPION BOXER, JACK DEMPSEY. HERE IS A PICTURE OF HIM AND ME.  GOOD LUCK IN SCHOOL.

BIG GEORGE

The only story I remember well from the wrestling days, which were before I was born, was this one:

After my mother and father were married he took her to a wrestling match. He was the referee that night for some women wrestlers. During the match the women jumped on my dad, pulling him to the floor and one lady wrestler was sitting on his chest, her legs wrapped around his head. The crowd went wild...people sitting near my mom kept talking about how lucky the referee was and how much he must be enjoying it and how it was all carefully planned beforehand. My mom wouldn't speak to him for days and that was the end of his career.

sometimes good things happen

take heed, take heed of the western wind

BORN IN THE 80'S

BORN IN THE 80'S

whispers in an empty room

 She sat in the silence of the tomb

and opened the  envelope  

 now empty and torn,

though it once held

a letter written on

perfume-scented paper decorated

with lavender flowers .

She knew the words by heart

reciting them to anyone

who might listen.

If she could give them all away,

then the words may

 have a life of their own

spiraling past chimney smoke

And gabled roofs to travel

to stuffy and cold sitting rooms

in far-away places,

each syllable finding a path

that will secure its own immortality

and flaunt  contempt

for those who hear the whispers

of the wind and mistake it for

their own voice.

reprieve

A slight reprieve...the house I'm moving into is not ready so I have an extra two weeks. I'll do it right this time...I won't panic...take it easy...easy as pie!

fallen or just sleeping?

 

"I said, tell me brave captain
Why are the wicked so strong
How do the Angels get to sleep
When the Devil leaves the porch light on?"  ~Tom Waits

the grass is always greener...

...or so they say. I am putting my hopes on that idiom. It's not just the move, it's all the other things in my life that seem to be crowding in right now. I'm drowning...

"When you're drowning, you don't say, 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."  -John Lennon

I'm not the screaming type but don't think it hasn't crossed my mind a time or two...

another fine mess..

 

I don't do well with moving, and packing, and change

today I packed one half a box then ran away

to do something else. But they canceled school tomorrow 

due to inclement weather so now I'll work twice

as hard tomorrow to make up for my lollygagging today.

I was going to write about it all...I thought that might be cathartic

but it just feels like one more thing I have to do...

so instead here's a picture of the inside of my head!

moving on...

I'm moving soon. No not here but moving to a delightful little house in an older neighborhood close to the school where I teach. I think I'm going to be very happy in this house but the move itself is a tad overwhelming. But as moves usually go, I will wait until the last minute and then panic and start throwing things in boxes and somehow it will all work out.  I promised myself I would start early and be really organized this time but I don't think that's going to happen. Life tends to get in the way and I procrastinate and make excuses. I should at least make a list, isn't that what people do when they are getting ready to move? Even making a list seems overwhelming at the moment. 

Still...once I get moved there will be sunbeams and bluebirds...I just know it!

bask

I took a deep breath,

And in the sacred moment between taking in breath

And letting it out,

I searched for a tiny bit of silence.  

Seeking that one infinitesimal second that

miraculously holds

The entire universe in a diminutive space…

But there was something missing.

Something out of kilter, something askew.

I turned in rage against those to blame

For its absence.

I found many to reproach for being

Inept and careless.

They had ruined my peace and

Must be held accountable.

And when they had been reprimanded soundly

I sent them on their way and out of my life.

I was sure I would find the harmony I needed.

But there was always one person left.

No matter how severely I accused her

She was still there…repentant and sorrowful,

begging for absolution…

I don’t think she’s going away.

She may be the one that was

Sent to save my life or for me to

Save hers.

So we simultaneously breathe and hope and let go

in silent contrition.

591 call for submissions

 Sarah, b1980

http://www.591photography.com/2010/01/591-spring-exhibition-countdown-for.html

Steven

This is Steven. I met him at a bus stop in Florida. He needed to use my cell phone to check on a taxicab he had called an hour earlier.  He said his dad was really steamed at him.  He had spent his bus money at a store and when he realized it the store wouldn't give him a refund.  So his dad was going to pay for a cab but take it from his next paycheck.  He wants to go to college to major in business and software developing so he can design video games.  He said his dad was really steamed at him.

a mini-mart for bea

This mini-mart reminded me of some of Cafe Selavy's posts lately about the global soul and the multi-cultured environment we live in...and mini-marts always make me think of bea!

coupling

It's New Year's Eve again when my thoughts turn to failures and disappointments of not only the last year but the last decade. Why don't I concentrate on and celebrate the successes?  But instead my mind turns to the dark side...

Which brings me to something I noticed while visiting family during the holidays...and am especially aware of tonight...New Year's Eve, aka Couples Night. If you don't have a date for New Year's Eve is it really a fate worse than death?  In Florida I was keenly aware of the coupling of America.  I watched the care my mother gave my father after 54 years of marriage, met my sister's new beau who spent Christmas with us, marveled at the  lament of a 10-year old girl about boys in her class,  listened to the discussions of other married couples in my family and wondered about the homeless couple huddled together on a bench under an umbrella clinging to each other for warmth...I also went to four movies this vacation and all of them, if not directly about relationships, had some romantic content.  This includes the newest Disney film which had the usual prince/princess conflict to be resolved as well as a cajun firefly who was in love with a star he mistook for another firefly.  It's everywhere! And most of the time I'm okay with that but on New Year's Eve I start to feel the void, question whether I will always be the woman men love but are not in love with and if being just me will ever be enough?

"The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved... loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves."  - Victor Hugo

home for the holidays

Rules for a successful holiday:
1. Get together with the family
2. Relive old times
3. Get out before it blows   (Brian Andreas)

missing the guinea hen

 I have nothing left to give

since the  guinea hen disappeared.

I considered giving the magenta morning sky

 or the flock of geese in v-formation

 but instead I offer the gift of pain

because it is what I know best.

I will sit with you and shed light on

the charm of misery and despair,

that is yours  for a song.

Together we can sing the ballad

that will capture the anguish

and fill your soul with the

exquisite ache.

Then we will weep in somber unison

when the geese take flight

at first light through the pink skies of dawn

Mickey G

 Mickey G. and me are lovers.

We are kissing under the stars.

His car will not run.

He fears I won’t love him,

so he chooses another.

She is strange and foreign.

Transvestites wearing pearls

crowd into the dimly-lit room.

I scurry away to the boulevard

where every person wears red.

Mikey G finds me there dressed in blue.

He holds me tight and

we float  into morning on a river of

sheets and pillows.

Everyone carries around his own monsters

About a year ago I started on this project...still not finished but here's Chapter 1: 


video copyright Rhonda Prince 2009
Music Credits: Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da by The Beatles

your voice

In my dream I was navigating uncharted territory,

totally susceptible to the influence of the full moon.

 In a small vessel floating through tainted waters,

I heard echoes of your voice and what you once said to me.

I tried to follow your voice in the distance but I can’t reach you.

Maybe you’re not there; it’s only your words shattering my soul.

 My boat takes me far out in to the crystal ocean, still and calm.

 Your song has ended but I hear moonbeams floating on the waves,

and the soft pleas of all the lost begging to be found.

I wait in my tiny vessel. I wait for time, I wait for change,

I wait…

voices and visions (for Brandon)

Intricate pattern-block designs
In primary hues,
“I haven’t been able to do
this sort of thing for about two years,”
They are not his patterns.
The voices from his past life
channel their creativity
through him.


The hippie jet has no missiles
It comes in peace.
Jesus is on the cross
even though
He is reincarnated, no
that’s not right…resurrected.


The butterfly becomes a rabbit

when there is nothing small

Enough to make the antennae

Look at the girl in a dress,

Bees sting, lions roar…

It just comes to him from

A place we cannot touch.

It has to be 720 because there

must be three digits

And then multiplied by 8

Can’t you see the puzzle?
Look inside the box this time

Because hexagons go on forever…

silence of the goats

Okay, it's official now...
I am a total, certified,  card-carrying, hopeless sap. Why do I let movies do this to me? My daughter and I like to go to movies together. The tricky thing is she lives in Boca Raton, Florida. So we find movies that are playing at the same time and go together by cell phone until we reach the theater. Then travel home again via cell phone to discuss the movie. Sappy, I know! But we enjoy it. Tonight we went to see Men Who Stare At Goats. Great cast, great premise...was looking forward to a funny, escapist type movie. Seems I don't do escapist... I escape in the story but I still find meaning and relevance to my life in most everything, it's the same with books, always looking for that magical scene or sentence or even word that will transform me into 'being all I can be' (a catch phrase in the movie)...And all the important themes were there - failure, loss, taking risks, discovering your destiny, memento mori, belief, belief in yourself, belief in others, belief in something bigger than yourself, belief in the universe, all wrapped up in a laugh out loud cinematic treat. But then one of the characters, Bob, asked another character, Bill, the BIG question...the one I want an answer to more than anything else..."Do you believe in redemption?"  You'll have to see the movie to find out his response but as for me, at least for today, I'm going to believe in redemption. The challenge is finding my own personal redemption...and recognizing it for what it is...

What is art?

Ruby's Folk Art and Produce Market, Plant City, Florida

I saw a video clip of Ruby talking about her painting of an angel eating with her feet and she said that "sometimes something comes into your spirit-being and if you don't do it it follows you and follows you and follows you until you finally do it and then your spirit-being can be free."

not there yet

Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.                
                                             -Jorge Luis Borges

lifeguard

I said I would post the picture of the lifeguard from Boca beach that I asked to take his picture.  Here he is.  He was looking away from the camera because I told him of my shyness when photographing people. He thought it would make me more comfortable if he was looking away. Isn't he sweet? After seeing it now I thought of what I would've done differently...isn't that the way...

everything being a constant carnival...

Four days into a new work week and where's the clarity? Seems I need the open road in order to think clearly.

She rode sixteen ferris wheels

in one afternoon,

each one spinning

faster than the last.

Synchronized revolutions

of light and motion

left her shaken and wobbly.

She stumbled into an open field

where an old oak waited

to offer her refuge.

She was cradled in his

knotted limbs,

her head against

his coarse bark.

She begged to stay for 300 years,

there in the shady respite.

But as she slept the sounds of the

carnival plagued her rest.

Frenzied screams of terror

or delight interrupted

her dreams.

Unable to sleep she

left the comfort of the oak

and staggered drowsily

back to the fray,

back to the wild rides.

Buying sixteen more tickets,

and with a nod to the moon,

she mounted the ride,

braced herself against the side

and began to spin again...

day 8 - fly away home

Yes back in the car with my cd's and cameras. Many pictures yet to be developed and edited. The shots I missed preserved in memory. One of the lone zebra roaming in a herd of brown cows...why didn't I go back for that one? 

 Returning home with new resolve to face my problems and make changes.  You know how it is when you go away from your normal routine and suddenly there is clarity! THIS is what must be done...THIS is what needs to happen....THIS is what I will do now that I see things clearly.  You know how it goes...

I was listening to Don Quixote on the way home. Fighting his windmills and trying to right all the wrongs ...inspiring character even if he was a bit daft...aren't we all? He said that, "he was spurred on by the conviction that the world needed his immediate presence."  I don't think the world needs my immediate presence...but I do know I need to be present in my world...every day...every moment. 

The list of what I see clearly now is growing...so on to the work at hand...home is where I should be for now...

day 7 - nothing really

Day 7 was a quiet day. Nothing remarkable to speak or write about.  A little shopping, a little packing for the return trip, a little napping.  That evening we went through my mother's music collection.  She had all of her old vinyls that I remember from my childhood and some old cd's.  I played some Leonard Cohen for her. She said the old songs, from her youth, like Cohen's cover of Tennessee Waltz, just made her sad. 

I'm ready to go home, ready to stay, ready to make a change... 

day 6 - being defensive

Today I attended a dissertation defense. Academia is a different world. They have their own set of rules and customs.  I felt like a stranger in a foreign land. Yes, I'm a teacher but these were the PhD's, the administrative staff of a college...those that discuss pedagogy and Paulo Freire with ease...

I was fascinated by the entire research methodology and thought I could apply it to my own life.  I began asking questions...a good first step for research, I think.  Then I was flooded by questions, hundreds of self-directed queries about myself and the path I'm on...what have I done with my life, what should I have done with my life, where am I going next, when does my life really begin, who said I had to do what I've done with my life, how can I change my life, why do I feel dissatisfied with my life etc., etc., ad nauseum, it went on in my head for hours.

Following the design of a phenomenological study  I found several central themes arising from the stream of questions. The themes were Who, What, Where, When, Why and How. Interestingly enough, those themes can also be my research questions. Now for collecting data and reaching a conclusion with a proposal for future research. Wow, will I then have a PhD in me?

day 5 - expanding horizons

Heading back across the state today to Tampa.  Before I left Boca Raton I went to the beach to take a few pictures.   A gate attendant at South Beach let me park for free. We talked for a few minutes and then she asked me if I could come back at 1:30 and have lunch with her. She had moved to Florida from Michigan and said she hadn't been able to meet anyone just to go out with for a bite to eat. She said I seemed so nice. I told her I did know someone in Boca who didn't work and was about her age, so she gave me her number and I promised to pass it on.  I  would never be able to do something like that, no matter how lonely I was...suffer in silence. I appreciated her bravery.  I hope she makes a friend soon...

 On the beach the waves, the sand,were refreshing.  I had a discussion with a friend this week about overanalyzing photography...thinking about it too much (especially when I want to photograph people) and then ending up talking myself out of taking it at all.  In the spirit of transformation I approached the lifeguard and asked if I could take his picture. I told him about my hesitancy to photograph people. He readily agreed...I wish I had taken the gate attendant's picture too...I will post his picture here when it is developed.  I was quite pleased with myself...

I continued my journey, back north on the Florida turnpike, then revisiting Yeehaw junction, then through mile after mile of rural Florida...cows, sod farms, wide open spaces...wait till you see Ruby's Folk Art and Produce Market...a hidden treasure in the middle of nowhere. I've been nowhere for some time now....hoping these travels into nowhere lead me somewhere...

day 4 - Tiny Dancer revisited...

Today I travelled across the state to Boca Raton, the city of beige and pastel colors, the rat's mouth. I suppose it is the way a beach town should be....

On the way I discovered a little town called Yeehaw Junction. There was a building called Desert Inn that held the history of the town. Over the years it has been the jail, the saloon, a restaurant, and even a brothel. Yeehaw is Indian (west not east) for wolf because as late as 1920 there were rare dire wolves in the area. The town was once called Jackass Junction but when the Florida Turnpike was built the powers that be decided the name should be changed to something more sedate and polite.




Spent time with Tiny Dancer...dinner and 'Where the Wild Things Are" Great movie, the lines were so perfect we found ourselves repeating them over and over on the way home.



Not much to say today...just family time... falling asleep now...


Song for the day: How does it feel? How does it feel? To be on your own, With no direction home, Like a complete unknown, Like a rolling stone... (Bob Dylan)

day 3 - Gwendolyn and Leonard

I have an aunt who lives in Florida. Her name is Gwen. She is 79 years old. I have always loved and admired her. We are losing her bit by bit as Alzheimer's destroys her mind. Today I went to visit her. Upon arriving my mother told her who I was and she responded by taking my face in her hands and saying, "Of course, I know who she is!" She looked directly into my eyes with recognition and love. I don't expect her to be able to do that much longer but today she knew me. I would like to share a story Aunt Gwen told me. I should preface this recollection with the fact that my mother's family lived in poverty in rural Tennessee in the 30's and 40's. Their father, my granfather, was a moonshiner, a gambler, an adulterer, a bigamist and a child abuser.

Imagine a young girl, grammar school age, joining her siblings to hold their mother down on the wooden floor of their small house. They were trying to prevent her from charging out of the house with a gun to shoot their father. My grandmother had just found out that her husband was living with another woman. She was hurt and angry. As they struggled and pleaded with her there was a knock on the door. My aunt realized it was a peddler at the door. A few weeks earlier a contest had begun at school. There would be a prize for the student who had the cleanest teeth. My aunt was determined to win. But the only toothbrush she had was a stick from the hickory tree. She wanted to buy a real toothbrush but there was no money then for such luxuries. She had arranged to trade the peddler wild blueberries for the toothbrush she wanted. She had spent most of her day in the woods picking buckets full of juicy blueberries. When she heard the knock she faced a dilemma, should she let go of her mother or go let the peddler in to make the trade? She paused only a second before she went to the door to give the blueberries to the peddler and retrieve her toothbrush. She did win the contest. I don't know what the prize was and neither did she. Years later, when she was 13, she married a 36 year old man who carried her to Florida to be his bride. She smiles as she remembers this and says he thought she was 16. They were married, raised children and loved each other for over 50 years. Sometimes she forgets he is gone and sets a place for him at the breakfast table.

Tonight I went to a Leonard Cohen concert...Gwen and Leo...aging icons of a more graceful time...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyMC5MJYOZ8