Rabbit

I meant to post this a while ago and forgot. I imagine that this is the most bizarre Macy's Parade balloon ever, Jeff Koon's "Rabbit."

Mexican Buddha

The Buddha Clay bought in Tijuana and the elephant lamp I bought at Target

She's An Excellent Helper!

Desie helps Mom and me make apple pie

*Thanks to Clay for pointing out my grammar error*

Lovely Foliage

Trinity Church

The Sphere

"The Sphere" and Eternal Flame in Battery Park

"The Sphere" by Fritz Koenig used to stand in the courtyard at the World Trade Center. After 9/11 it was recovered and placed in Battery Park as a temporary memorial.

R.I.P. Little Glass Tree

My plan was to continue with my "What I did for Thanksgiving" series, but circumstances intervened and my beautiful new Christmas ornament was accidentally destroyed. I'll probably pick up a replacement tomorrow since I'll be near Bryant Park after work and can run by the Holiday Shops. Still I wanted to immortalize my poor glass tree because it was so beautiful while it lasted.

The background is a hand painted card that Jenny sent to Clay for his birthday. Thanks Jenny!

The East River

One last shot from Top of the Rock

A Man and His Reflection

A Solitary Clay at Top of the Rock

Top of the Rock Is Awesome!

Central Park from Top of the Rock

I can see my house from here!

A Sea of Playbills

We recently redecorated the living room and changed out the framed playbills on the wall. The only sensible way to do this obviously was to spread them out on the floor so we could see everything. No this is not all of them.

Desie and George helped for a while but eventually gave up.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Mountains Are The New Sunset!

The Smoky Mountains off the Blue Ridge Parkway

Fuzzy Fuzzy Branches

A very mossy tree in Cataloochee Valley

I Don't Know Where The Spider Is

This is a web that Mom and I found while exploring Cades Cove. The sunlight hit it just long enough for me to take this. I started to take another shot to make sure I had it and the moment had apparently passed. This small image really doesn't do it justice. Please click on it to get a better look. Or if you're at my apartment ask to see the original print!

Elk!

Hanging out in Cataloochee Valley.

The Riverside Church Tower

At the moment it's completely covered with scaffolding like the windows. I know it needs to be cleaned once in a while, but it's kind of depressing.

Three Junes

I’m sorry to anyone who has actually been waiting with bated breath to find out what I read next. I had a very bad cold that made it impossible for me to think, much less write. Anyway, after Midwives I picked up another Amy recommendation, Three Junes by Julia Glass.

Three Junes is made up of three stories that span ten years in the life of Fenno McLeod. The first story is told from the perspective of Fenno’s father Paul, who has gone on a trip to Greece to try and move on after his wife’s death. Paul contemplates his relationship with his wife and sons and meets a young woman named Fern, who he winds up confiding in. In the second story Fenno travels to Scotland for his father’s funeral. In flashbacks he tells the story of his friendship with a man named Mal, who Fenno cares for as he dies of AIDS. The third story is from Fern’s perspective. She meets Fenno while visiting a friend in the Hamptons. He opens up to her just like his father did in Greece ten years before.

I didn’t love the first and third parts, but I really enjoyed the middle, and longest, story about Fenno and Mal. Glass does an amazing job of painting her characters and their complex relationships; Fenno and his father, Fenno and his brothers, the brothers and their parents, Fenno and Mal. Three Junes is an excellent character study, allowing the reader to see Fenno from various angles and perspectives.

That is what I liked about the novel. My problem with the story was the tidy way in which each story wrapped up. Each story had the central character take a break from regular life, think over the life altering events of the past and realize how to move on and truly live life. Fenno’s story doesn’t wrap up quite so tightly, he’s not entirely healed when shows up again in Fern’s story, but he has learned his lesson about being afraid of life and love.

This comes across as very uneven, which is a pretty accurate picture of my thoughts. My opinions were all over the place while I was reading, but I think I finally came down on the side of really liking it. The language is beautiful and as I’ve said repeatedly, I love a good character study. I’d recommend it to anyone who has similar tastes.

Midwives

After The Lovely Bones I moved on to Midwives by Chris Bohjalian which was lent to me by Amy. This may actually be the first time that I’ve read an official Oprah’s Book Club selection. I’m not saying that there’s anything the matter with it, but it’s interesting to me. In any case, it was good, not great, but a solidly good and interesting novel.

Midwives is the story of Sibyl Danforth, a midwife who is charged with murder after one of her patients dies in childbirth. It’s told through the eyes of Connie, Sibyl’s now adult daughter, as she looks back at the trial and the events leading up to it and tries to make sense of what happened.

There’s not a tremendous amount to analyze about the story. Like I said it was interesting and solidly written. Whether Sibyl should be held responsible for Charlotte’s death is an interesting question, the evidence is put forth slowly throughout the book giving the reader time to decide. I didn’t and still don’t know a tremendous amount about midwifery and enjoyed getting a peek into the world of women who deliver children at home. I thought that all of the characters were well fleshed out, especially Connie, the bewildered teenager, first watching her family fall apart around her and later performing a very daring act to try and protect her mother.

Spoilers Follow

I can’t claim to be any kind of expert on the subject of childbirth, but it did seem to me that Sibyl’s actions were justified. Even though it does appear that Charlotte was likely still alive when the c-section was performed it seems that it came to a choice between saving the child and letting them both die. I felt that ultimately Sibyl was stuck in a series of very unfortunate circumstances.

I have to say I was truly surprised when Sibyl was acquitted, as I’m sure I was supposed to be considering all the buildup leading me towards the opposite conclusion. The device of having Sibyl’s journal entries scattered throughout the story worked very well and the very last one had the appropriate impact and shock value.

Before finishing this I checked an archive of Oprah’s book club selections and found that I’m wrong. To date I have read 4 other book club books: The Deep End of the Ocean by Jacquelyn Mitchard, Gap Creek by Robert Morgan, As I Lay Dying by William Falkner, and White Oleander by Janet Fitch. Again, this is not to say that there is anything inherently wrong with Oprah’s book club, I just found it interesting.

Smilin' Des

Yay More Whales!

Beluga Whale at SeaWorld