The California Kusamura Bonsai Club’s 51st Annual Show

Uncategorized

A couple of weeks ago, at the invite of Vern Smith, Michele and I went to a Bonsai Show. I love plants and I love plant shows, but I have never been to a Bonsai show. My only exposure has been through wandering around a couple of Bonsai nurseries and what I have gathered from the zeitgeist. Most plant shows feature rows or groups of plants, usually lined up in some sort of contest mode – at a cactus show for example, all the Mammillarias will be together –

but, at a Bonsai Show, each plant is displayed separately as an individual. And the entire display is important. The plant, the pot, the top dressing – which is often some sort of moss – and the background. Even the entry to the show is given special attention with a display called a tokanoma – I think. To me it felt very Japanesey but when I talked to various hall monitors at the show, they didn’t think so.

As an aside, I think of Bonsais as being only Japanese and was shocked to find a very old Bonsai at the Guangzhou Airport when we were in China. End aside.

It seems that each Bonsai Club has a different character – on purpose – as part of their charter. For example, the Dai Ichi Bonsai Kai (“Number One” Bonsai Club) – Serenity through Bonsai – says that they take  great pride in its family-oriented character. The California Kusamura Bonsai Club, according to its website, specializes in teaching. Because of that, there were several first time entries at this show which I found very attractive but Vern found somewhat wanting. I can hardly wait for a show from a club that specializes in only experts. In the meanwhile, this very fun show will do.

De gustibus non est disputandum

Uncategorized

I have learned alot from my mother,  not the least on which is my sense of humor. Unfortunately, I also learned the snobbish attitude that my opinion being the only right opinion. One of her favorite expressions was a variation on the heading which – roughly – means There is no accounting for taste. Almost always, with my Mother, it meant My taste is right and yours is wrong but I will not argue about it.

I thought I had moved past that attitude. OK, not much, but a little. I once took a photography class – actually a spectacular trip down the Grand Canyon, actually, two spectacular trips down the Grand Canyon – with Dewitt Jones. At the end of each class – trip – we played show and tell while Dewitt critiqued. Every once in a while, Dewitt would ask what the photographer was trying to show and make a suggestion or two, but – usually – the critique would go What a great picture or What a great solution and then another – totally different –  picture would be shown by the next guy and Dewitt would say Another great solution.

It was the photographic parallel to really listening to somebody and being open to their point of view. I was very impressed.

A couple of days ago, I saw an ad for the new HBO series Game of Thrones and I thought it sounded very interesting. Then I saw the first 15 minutes as a promo piece on HBO and was pretty sure I would not like it. Then I read a question answer piece with the director Tom McCarthy in which they asked him what he thought the best science fiction / fantasy movies were. He named ten movies and put Aliens by James Cameron higher than Alien by Ridley Scott. All my snobbery came up. What – impossible! Now I know I won’t like Game of Thrones.

 

 

The Escape Trail

Americana, Art, California

In reading Peter Kuhlman and Ophelia Ramirez’s blog – I think 99% Peter now – post about Peter’s reclaiming of his creativity and his posting of Chupacabra From La Habra, I am inspired to post a Haiku and a short  non-fiction piece I wrote in a Meditation and Creativity class I was in over the Weekend. I brought a bookmark – to class- I made from a photo I took while on a trip into Death Valley last year.

Manly died quietly
on his farm near Lodi CA
fruit trees blooming

Remembering The Escape Trail

The first thing to remember is that we went backwards- from Trona to the Panamint. From busy, dirty, mining town to Peace. Up an easy downhill, over the gentle summit, down the road that was such a struggle for Manly to lead the Bennett and Arcane families in the climb out of their hell. The oxen eaten long ago, the wagons left behind.

The Bennetts and Arccanes didn’t want to die, didn’t want to embrace Eternal Peace in the Panamint. Eternal Peace that sounded so good , sitting in the cool shade, inside Pastor Bennett’s church with its hard pews.

Under the glaring sky of the Panamint, Eternal Peace felt too much like Death. Death accompanied by the Angels of Fear, the hounding fear of thirst. Their thirst for a new life in the goldfields of California, turned into a thirst for water. Any little water.

Water we so easily carried; sloshing in the five gallon containers in the back of the truck. Sitting in front, we smiled and chatted; looking for wildflowers, going up and over the Escape Road.

We had red wine with dinner that night, not sacramental, but still welcome. We talked about Manly and how he had saved Bennett and Bennett’s wife and Bennett’s children and how, years later, when they came back to look for silver, Bennett had betrayed Manly. Leaving him for dead. Just up the road from our bright campfire.

 

Some staggeringly gorgeous aerial photos

Uncategorized

no, not from me, from a French aerial photographer, Yann Arthus Bertrand.

 

I think the shoots are just knockout and, as a bonus, a nice shoot of Syria showing lots of satellite dishes. No wonder the Syrians are trying to revolt; they can see the world they are not part of.

These shots were taken from Buzz Feed which has a larger sample or you can go to his? website.

The Sonoma Historics are on the weekend of June 4th and 5th

Cars

Be sure to pass this on to Al Grubbs if you know him and his whereabouts.

This year the Sonoma Historics will feature McLaren cars. McLaren – like Ferrari in the 60s – is a company who exists to race and has made some very memorable race cars. Their late 60s early 70s Can-Am cars are especially fun to watch. Sporting huge American V-8s stuffed into lightweight, mid-engine, racing chassis (es?); they were loud and spectacularly fast.  McLaren has raced in Formula One since 1980 and will bring several F1 cars to Sonoma. It should be great fun for anyone who really loves cars and racing – that means you, Al.