Away, Away

Off to England for two weeks, and I'm unlikely to be able to update my blog from there.  Mentally I'm still on the Kona Coast, so I will be nothing if not massively confused, time-wise and otherwise, much of the visit.



image:  Christie B. Cochrell, Warwick Castle

Alternate Customs Form

Having recently filled out the agricultural inspection form for our landing in Kona, I've come up with the following spoof—

Are you bringing any of these things?  (check all that apply)

___ xylophones

___ trigonometry textbooks

___ drawings of javelinas

___ mercurochrome

___ occasional pieces for glass harmonica

___ unfulfilled ambitions

___ anchovy paste

___ regrets (if yes, please specify)

image:  Memory Suitcases by Yuval Yairi, Laughing Squid.com

From Water to Water

A beautiful ceremony today for my mother, at Kapa'a Beach Park, North Kohala, Hawai'i.  

Pictures and further words to follow, but for now aloha is the word, and this picture of her from her Wisconsin girlhood is the starting point.



image:  June Bailey, Wisconsin, c. 1926

Ode to My Old Camera

"Just back from the word-processing course I say to my old typewriter . . ." (words from a long-ago favorite poem, and from—I think—my very first blog post)

Or, today, just back from transferring the memory card from my new camera, I say to the old . . .

Thank you, dear camera no longer in your prime, for Hadrian's Wall and Durham, for York, for Lindisfarne and Bamburgh, for Hexham, Helmsley, Barnard, Scarborough, Stratford, Kenilworth, Warwick.  And then for Verona, Busseto, Treviso, Venice.  For Mallorca, the third time around.  For London in between.  For our patio, over and over, as I transformed it and it, me.  For quail, melon, and sage.  For kilims and Peruvian lilies.  For Santa Fe, Abiquiu, Yellowstone.  For Lucca, Torre del Lago, Pisa and its wonderful tower.  For Christmas, carnations, and Easter eggs.  For skies and birds and bread; for fallen pale green English apples on a multi-grain pavement.  For Lewes (with pheasants, books), Glyndebourne (with bowties), Cheddar Gorge, and Bath.  For picnics, tortoises, notebooks.  For light.  Writing with light, which I am of course all about, always.

And now I'm off on new adventures with a new camera.  All but identical to the old, my first digital, a Pentax X70, but showing—ominously—much more dust on the beautiful surfaces.  Like when I used to get new contact lenses, and say I saw things too clearly.  Warts and all.  Nothing will get past it, I fear.  Even me.

image:  Christie B. Cochrell, Bear Fetish with Dust