Our family spent a morning along the Potomac River at River Farm, the 25-acre headquarters of the American Horticultural Society. The AHS provides gardening information through programs for adults and children, and is a very lovely setting for a quiet stroll. River Farm itself has an interesting history, which I will cover in more detail in a later post.
Bryant
The story of the Stars and Stripes, as passed down through the family of upholsterer Betsy Ross, is that George Washington visited her and asked if she could create a flag from a sketch he presented. Upholsterers commonly took up other work to keep bread on the table (for a while Betsy Ross also made musket balls for the army). The finished product was adopted by the Continental Congress on this day in 1777 as the official flag of the new United States. I post here a sketch, from the Palisades neighborhood Fourth of July parade, of the Peruvian dance troupe’s young standard-bearer. The scene struck me as so, well, American.
Sometimes when we have breakfast outside, a mockingbird lands on the Japanese maple in front of the house, then hops down to the porch flower box and eyes our plates. After an offering of scone or toast, he/she flies off with it, then returns for more. I wonder if there are little ones in a nearby nest? One morning I had my sketchbook with me.
From my sketchbook. The neighborhood pool has opened, and one of its most attractive features is the large flowering potted plants. They have done well in the recent rainfall. Watch out.
Erna
Here is Al, sketched “without my permission!” as he put it, after a dinner party. Today is his birthday, and he has a life of unusually useful work to celebrate: years as a Civil Rights Movement lawyer in the South (the stories he can tell!), and many more years leading the ACLU’s National Prison Project. He’s usually on the road somewhere, fighting for prisoners’ rights, the abolishing of torture, and the improvement of dreadful prison conditions in the U.S. and all over the world. (He believes prisoners are human beings, which is not a universally shared opinion.)
Although Al may look like (and can be when necessary) Mr. Tough Guy, which has certainly come in handy in his work, under that rough-hewn exterior beats the heart of a cupcake. Maybe that’s a clue to his choice of profession. Also he’s an awesome chef. Happy Birthday, Al! I know you won’t have to bake your own cake.
Al
From my sketchbook. It’s the season of graduations, and weddings, and the perpetual hankie in the hand and lump in the throat.
I pause in the stairwell, hearing From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.
Young as she is, the stuff Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy: I wish her a lucky passage.
But now it is she who pauses, As if to reject my thought and its easy figure. A stillness greatens, in which
The whole house seems to be thinking, And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor Of strokes, and again is silent.
I remember the dazed starling Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago; How we stole in, lifted a sash
And retreated, not to affright it; And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door, We watched the sleek, wild, dark
And iridescent creature Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove To the hard floor, or the desk-top,
And wait then, humped and bloody, For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits Rose when, suddenly sure,
It lifted off from a chair-back, Beating a smooth course for the right window And clearing the sill of the world.
It is always a matter, my darling, Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish What I wished you before, but harder.
—Richard Wilbur
Jude
From my sketchbook. Scenes from the Washington Waldorf School end-of-year senior class production of Peter Pan two years ago. It was terrific—both exciting and hilarious. Captain Hook was played by a tiny fierce blonde. I am a fan of school plays, even those not featuring my own children. But this was an especially significant production, because the class had lost a beloved member in an auto accident, a lovely girl many of us had known since kindergarten and infancy, and the play was dedicated to her memory.
My first job out of college was as a graphic designer at a studio in Arlington, Virginia. On my lunch hour I liked to carry a sandwich and wander the small side streets of Clarendon, which is now practically unrecognizable with its spiffy high-rises, marble-and-stainless-steel condo lofts, and hot night spots. Back then it was an edgy, scruffy (and to me far more interesting) neighborhood of funky, dimly lit antique stores, second-hand bookshops, and family-owned Vietnamese groceries.
In a Vietnamese bakery one day I discovered among the unfamiliar and brightly colored sweets a collection of odd plastic toys meant for…cake decorating? Well, I don’t know, but I bought a bunch of them, and our family has made use of them for years, on birthdays and other occasions. One of them is a rather confused-looking Girl Scout in a semi-seductive pose that my husband likes to put on my cake. Hmm. I don’t know what THAT means.
Sheila
Dorothy
—William Butler Yeats
Ariel and Sam
For two years my daughter has been taking piano lessons from the artistic and ever-cheerful Emily, whose birthday it is today. And so I post a sketch of Emily’s house, one of the secret magic places in the Federal City—a green and flowery bower even in the whiteness of winter, colorful with painting, sculpture, and pottery from her hand and her travels, cozy with paisley and pillows, and suitably furnished: baby grand in the corner, dog napping on his pillow, cat queening it on the windowsill. To repose here through the Wednesday lesson is to enjoy a brief weekly vacation from stress.
Now it’s time for some music: Happy birthday, dear Emileeee, happy birthday to you!
Emily
