In Remembrance of Donna De Solis

This post is in honor of what would be the seventy-fourth birthday of my dearly departed friend, Donna De Solis, who passed away on June 25th, 2015. In the picture directly above she can be seen at the bottom of image and I am standing directly behind her. It was taken in 2014 and we were on a pier at the Hudson River, celebrating my birthday. 

Little did we know it would be the last time I celebrated mine with her, for she died the following June two months before my birthday in the year 2015.

Donna was the office manager at The Church of the Blessed Sacrament (my parish).

Over the many years I knew her, I was honored and privledged to be a guest at a number of the Christmas parties she held in her home and to go with her to various events happening in NYC. 

Moreover, she came to a couple of exhibitions that featured my photography. In the next picture, Donna can be seen with a yellow sweater over her shoulders and yours truly is standing behind her. 

We are at an opening for a 2002 art exhibition that I was featured in (with two other artists who are not in this photograph) at The New York Gallery Building (on West Fifty-Seventh Street in NYC). The art piece which is behind us is one of my kaliedoscopic images titled Rocks By Strawberry Fields. 

At the time our picture was taken, my kaliedoscopic photographs could only be printed on photographic papers as wall art or rendred on to note-cards.

Howeover, over the years, with advancement in printing processes, my kaliedoscopic works (as well as all of my other photographs) can be rendered (by Fine Art America AKA FAA) in an aray of sizes on to various surfaces for wall art including, acrylic, art paper, canvas, metal, poster-paper and wood. FAA also has framed options available and they can render the images on to note-cards.

I think Donna might've found it cool that FAA can print my kaliedoscopic images (and my other ones) on to items for personal use such as totes, week-ender bags, pouches, note-books, stickers, cell-phone cases and jigsaw puzzles; as well as face-masks.

In any event, I'm certainly thinking of Donna as well as those family members who survived her including her husband Tony as well as her son, Bryan, who shortly after her death, requsted that I create a video in honor of memory, which I did and it can be viewed on Vimeo as well as You Tube.

Remembering Albert Loth Youngquist (born on this day in the 1920's)

Thinking of my father who was born on this day of May 13th in the 1920's and died in 1995. If truth be told, a big part of him died the year after I broke my wrist (as seen in the copy of a anapshot which is posted atop this entry) during the summer of one of my elementary school years, for he moved out of our house after the following summer.

Brittle bones are a consequence of having Neurofibromatosis (NF) and I mention this because I was born with this condition and the month of May is designated as Neurofibromatosis Awareness Month.

As some of you may know, I've written a book length piece titled Imperfect Strangers, re living with this condition and I've been querying agents for representation.

My eyes are on the House sparrows...

HOUSE SPARROWS ARE FEATURED IN WIOB

HOUSE SPARROWS ARE FEATURED IN WIOB

I came across the photos (which are posted directly above) just the other day when organizing my photo-library. They were taken on October 24th 2015, which happens to be the day my dear friend, Donna DeSolis (DD) might've been celebrating her birthday with me had she not died a few months prior (in June of 2015). As readers of this blog may recall, I created at the request of DD's son a video commemorating her life and it may be viewed on Vimeo and/or You Tube.

As for these two pictures I am which I am now referencing they feature House sparrows enjoying a meal from a bird feeder in my rooftop garden. The sparrow with dark features an a black "bib" is a male. In a recent entry here on Blogger, I discussed this characteristic (bib) which is a feature of male House sparrows in a recent entry here on Blogger. However, my seeing these photos at this time caused me to think of a poem by Mary Oliver, which is posted below.

In the song sparrow's nest the nestlings,

those who would sing eventually, must listen

carefully to the father bird as he sings

and make their own song in imitation of his.

I don't know if any other bird does this (in

nature's way has to do this). But I know a 

child doesn't have to. Doesn't have to.

Doesn't have to. And I didn't.

Ms. Oliver is referring to a song sparrow in this particular poem, "Blue Horses" (from "To Be Human is to Sing Your Own Song"). I have pictures of that bird type too within my photo collection, an example of one whom I saw in Central Park is featured in the next image.

SONG SPARROWS ARE FEATURED IN OTHER BLOG POSTS

However, it the House sparrow whom I've included in my three volume hardcover book series, Words In Our Beak.

MY BOOK SERIES

Monday Musings: August 24th

MY GRANDPARENTS ARE FEATURED IN MANY POSTS

Today is my birthday and if truth be told for the most part, I have always disliked the fact that it falls on August 24th. This is because in college days (which were not good for me) orientations and class registration were taking place. Moreover, I've had an aversion to to the date, August 24th, as it is often the day either the RNC or DNC begins (or began).

BUT when unpleasant thoughts occur surrounding the date of August 24th, I think of one reason (and IT'S A GOOD ONE), to have been born on this day: I am my maternal grandparents first grandchild and I was born on their anniversary.

They can be seen in the picture (atop this entry) celebrating my birthday in bygone (way bygone) years as my dearly departed maternal aunt watches me open a gift.

Many people now know of my grandparents through posts on this blog and because the narrator of my book series, Words In Our Beak, (pictured below) is a female cardinal named Cam.

MY BOOK SERIES

The name Cam is in honor of my maternal grandparents, a fact I've mentioned  in my cyber-venues over the years, where I've explained the "C" in Cam's name is for my grandmother, Clara. The "a" in Cam's name is for my maternal grandfather, Albert. And the "m" in Cam's name is for their surname, Melahn.

In Memory of my Maternal Grandfather

MY GRANDFATHER MAKES A WISH

I'm thinking of my dearly departed grandfather, Albert Elmer Herman Louis Melahn, who was born on this day in 1903 (he died in the late 1970s.) The image atop this entry was taken on one of his birthdays in the early 1970's.

My grandmother can be seen helping him blow out his candles and my next youngest sister and I are behind them. We were told to "pose laughing," by my mother, who took the snap-shot when his cake caught on fire. (Our cousin Karl, who is for the most part of camera, is to my left).

I'm on my way! Tuesday's Truths WK 140

TADA! On 8/23/2019, the eve of my birthday, I announced on FB  that upon reading my author bio and my synopsis for "Imperfect Strangers," a book publisher had contacted me requesting my full manuscript. I emailed a PDF version of it to them yesterday morning and have already gotten a response (seen in the "dialogue bubble" atop this entry) as to when I will hear their decision regarding publishing it! Thanks again for your support, readers of this blog!

Sunday's Sequel to Friday's Follow-up

In my last entry here on Blogger, I discussed the fact that I had submitted a synopsis for my book project, Imperfect Strangers. Later that same day my aforementioned post was published, I received a response (email) from a person who works for the place I had submitted my book. Her words are featured in the "talk bubble" atop this blog entry.

I am beyond thrilled to have received this news and they came on the eve of my birthday, which was yesterday.

WEIGHING IN JUST UNDER EIGHT POUNDS! Flash Back Friday (Only it was a Tuesday)

The Eve of August 24th

This evening marks my New Year's Eve, dear reader!
Will you still be sending me a valentine, Birthday greetings, bottle of wine? (I like dry white and rosé...)

Maybe FB was trying to tell me something? (Wednesday's Wisdom)

The image atop this entry features the statue of Henry Ward Beecher that is located in Brooklyn. I have passed the monument on countless occasions, without giving it much thought, and without my taking a picture of Beecher's statue.

However, the statue came to my mind today as I was thinking about a quotation that is attributed to Henry Ward Beecher, which is this: "Every man should be born again on the first day of January.  Start with a fresh page. Take up one hole more in the buckle if necessary, or let down one, according to circumstances; but on the first day of January let every man gird himself once more, with his face to the front, and take no interest in the things that were and are past."

In my pondering Beecher's quote, on this third day of the new year, I found myself thinking about the fact that Facebook (FB) has my birthday listed as the first of January, which it is not. I've tried to set this straight with them for years to no avail. It seems once FB has one's birthday recorded a certain way, the date cannot be changed. Moreover, two days ago, on January first, the powers that be at FB notified my FB followers (as I discussed in yesterday's blog post) to tell them to wish me a happy birthday.

Because of this I received a number of birthday wishes, which prompted me to publish a FB post alerting my followers that this was fake news.

Now, after my reflecting on Beecher's quotation, I'm taking FB's error re my day of birth, as a sign to heed the wisdom of the quote: see myself born again on the first day of January, by girding myself once more, with my face to the front, "taking no (negative) interest in the things that were and are past."

Disputing Fake News! I wasn't born yesterday. (Tuesday's Truths WK 69)

Hello, and welcome to my sixty-ninth posting for my Tuesday's Truths series. It's the first one in this series for the year 2018. In this entry, I want to alert anyone who might follow me on either one of my Facebook (FB) Pages (personal and author) that FB reported some fake news yesterday, which was New Years Day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR JAMES MIRANDA (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!)

Today is my nephew James's birthday. He can be seen in the photograph (which was taken in 2014) atop this entry. It features James checking out a garden hose that I had mailed to him. James's hose is a custom made one in the sense that it was made from my garden hose which can be seen in the picture directly below,

where it is indicated by an arrow I've superimposed over the image; which was also taken a number of years ago. It's an old story, but I'm featuring it today in honor of my nephew's birthday; and, also as a suggestion for what one can do with a garden hose that is too long or cumbersome.

Solemn Remembrance: August 24,1944

This past August 15th, here on Blogger, I wrote about Mathilde Freund, a woman from my hood who had survived the holocaust. In the entry I referenced an article, Trading on Elegance, by Rui Miao.

The picture atop this entry is featured in Miao's article, but I did not include it within my 8-15-2017 posting;  as I wanted to save it for the day of August 24th, because that is when the photograph Mathilde is holding (in Miao's image) was taken, in the year 1944.

Re this image in the aforementioned article, Miao states the following;

"In a photo taken in Lyon the day it was liberated from the Germans, Freund is pictured with 10 men whom she risked her life to save. She had the men brought food and water while they hid from the German occupiers. 'It was August 24, 1944,' said Freund. 'I was 24, full of hope that I was going to see my loved ones.' She wore a white suit and skirt, looking cheerful and full of hope. She did not yet know that she would never again see her husband or brother. "

Here's Tuesday's Truths WK 52: How the plant known as Tricyrtis, came to be referred to as a Toad Lily

Hello, and welcome to the fifty-first week of my Tuesday's Truths series, where I will shed light on how the plant known as Tricyrtis, came to be referred to as a Toad Lily. Details of the flowers from this exquisite plant (which was recently planted in my rooftop garden by Juan V) can be seen in the images atop this blog entry.

However, before I go into detail re this awesome flower, let me digress a bit, and apologize for not posting an entry for week fifty-three of my Tuesday's Truths series! Unfortunately, the truth for that day, which was August 1st, is that I did not feel well, due to an injury I sustained to my right foot.

Therefore I was preoccupied with the logistics of getting my boot cast to fit properly and other pesky details associated with recovery from my injury! But if truth be told, and it's about to, what I had planned to point out that day was the fact that the beginning of this month of August was a good time to point out that (according to a web-news page) "there are almost 4 million newborns delivered each year in the United States. Of that amount, 9.05% (or 353,000) babies are born in August alone, making it the biggest month for births. July comes in second with 349,000 births, followed by September."

A number of years ago, I was one of those 353,000 born in August. Moreover, I was born on a Tuesday, which, according to the aforementioned source, is "the most common day of the week for little bundles of joy to be delivered is Tuesday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention find that on average there are 12,323 births on Tuesdays, with Wednesday and Thursday close behind."

Be that as it may, I admit that this news may not be particularly relevant to those of you who read urban related blogs; but, hey, you never know when the topic might come up in conversation; and you also never know when you might be selected to be on the game show Jeopardy, with details of birth months and days of births being a category worth mega bucks.

And, now that what I would've written on the fifty-third week for Tuesday's Truths is out of the way, I'll move on to my intention for the truth re this fifty-fourth week, and tell you a little bit about the back story of the Tricyrtis flowering plant being nicknamed "toad lily."

A Pigeon and CoCo Chanel are in agreement on Post Labor Day Fashion "Rules!"

A lone pigeon clad in nearly all white feathers, listened intently as I told her that last week someone treated me to dinner as a belated birthday gift. I had worn white sandals with my dress and she proceeded to tell me me, "You won't be able to wear those shoes after Monday." (which is today and happens to be a Labor Day Monday).

Upon hearing my accounting of the incident, the pigeon reminded me that I had once written about the wisdom of CoCo Chanel, who said, "Vous pouvez porter blanc toute l' année!"

Then the pigeon made a pivot on her pinkish red feet and strutted her mostly white feathers as she made her way around the railing that surrounds my rooftop urban (NYC) terrace garden.

Tuesday's Truths WK 7: More people are born in August than any other month.

Today, August 30th, marks the seventh week of my Tuesday's Truths series. It's also the last Tuesday in August, so I should point out this truth: more people are born in the month of August than any other month of the year! I'm one of those persons, and am very grateful to CDDS and FRG, as well as his mother, Ruthie, for giving me a very special birthday celebration last week,  a  couple of days before my birthday. After they took me for a short trip to the Atlantic Ocean, where I encountered sandpipers known as the Least variety, we headed back to FRG's mother's house for dinner followed by a birthday cake. Alas, it was not the cake pictured here, but I was caught up in the celebration and did not take a picture of it! Hence I'm using this web image by an unknown source, for the candles featured in it remind me of a shopkeeper who constantly says, "Don't ask me my age, how much I weigh, or how much rent I pay."  — And that's something to keep in my mind with this Tuesday's truism, no matter what month in which one happens to be born.

Monday's Musings OR Madness?

Where's a BIB when you need one?

Sometimes, on my Blogger Pages, I like to pick up where I left off on a given post before moving on to another topic. Perhaps this is because I've written novellas, short stories and even a play, all of which, to some extent require a continuity with a given character. "Your reader deserves to know if you got the part," Mr. C. Michael Curtis once said (in a letter) to me in response to an essay I submitted to the Atlantic Monthly. The essay discussed how an audition for a Broadway play (that I had with Dustin Hoffman) led to an understanding of a childhood trauma, and, no, dear reader, even though Mr. Curtis praised my writing, he did not publish my essay.

Another Year Older and Deeper in Debt

The image accompanying today's posting may look familiar to some of you as I posted it last year on TLLG's Blogger Pages in a post about the "appearance" of mushrooms in my urban garden.

This picture was taken on my fifth birthday, and I'm including it today as it's my birthday. I was born on my maternal grandparents' anniversary, and since I am their first grandchild, they would often say that I was their anniversary gift; but, if truth be told, they were my best birthday present, and are what gave me, at an early age, an appreciation for the elderly, which is the driving force in my project on indiegogo.

And with that I'll end for the day, as at "press" time on Blogger, I'm distracted with the news of a shooting today near the Empire State Building and can hear media helicopters buzzing all around!

"Doesn't God know its my birthday?"

The photograph posted above is of yours truly with one of my sisters. Today is her birthday, and being born in the month of March, her birthdays have seen springlike temperatures as well as bitter snowstorms. I will always recall one such birthday when inclement weather ruled the day.

We were children, and a raging snowstorm turned to heavy rain and caused power wires to come down, endangering the safety of our neighborhood. My sister, anticipating her party favorite — Angel Food Cake and Peppermint Ice-cream — looked forlornly out the window and inquired, "Doesn't God know its my birthday?"