I climbed up (and down!) this staircase…during a recent visit to the Shelburne Museum in Shelburne, Vermont.
It is located inside the Electra Havemeyer Webb Memorial Building. Named after the museum’s founder. The building is a recreation of 6 rooms from Mrs. Webb’s 1930’s Park Avenue apartment in New York City. Complete with her collection of French Impressionist paintings and unique furniture.
Electra Havemeyer Webb founded the Shelburne Museum in 1947. This building was completed in 1967.
Nancy Merrill is hosting a photo challenge. The prompt this week: View
IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO OF YOUR FAVORITE VIEW OR VIEWS.
~~~
Look at this view!
My dear friend of almost 40 years pointed across the lake from her new summer home on Lake Champlain in Vermont. One sunny July day in 2010.
Look at it!
She and her husband had recently moved in…when I first visited this magnificent spot. The dining room, situated at the back of the house, faced the lake. Seats at the table…arranged for maximum view potential.
My husband and I recently returned from a wonderful 3 day visit. Enjoying their company. The conversation. The shared meals. Walks along the lake. A trip to a museum. A few games of cards.
“Barbra: The Music, The Mem’ries, The Magic” Boston, MA
“The Three B’s”
Bette (Midler), Bonnie (Raitt) and Barbra (Streisand)
My concert bucket list…
For over 30 years.
Bette…check! Bonnie…check!
The last holdout?
Barbra.
I figured I’d never be able to check her off my list. Sigh.
Why?
She rarely, if ever, toured.
Tickets would be horrendously expensive and impossible to get.
August 16, 2016 changed all that…when I received an early Christmas/Birthday gift from my daughter, son and son-in-law. Thanks to my daughter’s herculean skills at navigating multiple internet browsers. To score tickets. The instant they went on sale.
Floor seats to a Barbra Streisand concert extravaganza in Boston. Complete with a light show beyond anything I had ever seen before. As cliché as it may sound, I was transported by the music, her one-of-a-kind voice, the showstopper after showstopper. Including my favorites – which was just about the entire set list – the super fan that I am.
Radiance on all levels.
One of my all time bucket list dreams finally came true.
Post inspired by Lens-Artists Challenge #51 The prompt: Unique
My friend AR came into my life when we were 15 or 16. I met her when I joined “PF” (aka “Pilgrim Fellowship”) – a Congregational Church youth group. Basically a group of high school kids who met on Sunday nights. We formed committees. We planned activities, trips, coffee houses and spaghetti dinners. It was a friendly and welcoming group.
AR and I attended the same high school – a regional school drawing students from 4 towns – so we may not have ever crossed paths if not for the church connection. She was quiet, shy and…I was to find out…brilliant. And talented. Some may have added…eccentric.
We were both the oldest in a large family. She was the oldest of 6. I was the oldest of 5. We both had difficult childhoods; although at the time we didn’t openly discuss the darker places we later found out were eerily similar.
The summer we were 18, she embroidered a swatch of denim (~14″x18″) with words from one of our favorite songs by The Rolling Stones. I don’t remember what the occasion was – or if there was even a specific occasion that sparked her creativity – but I still treasure this unique piece of art. It is framed and hangs on the wall over my desk.
You can’t always get what you want…
Now isn’t that the truth.
Crewel Embroidery on Denim – 1972
AR and I went our separate ways to college. We kept in touch with frequent letter writing. Letters I still have – with her tiny perfect script – detailing her struggles with making ends meet, making friends, experimenting…and…charting an uncertain future. Always signed: Your loving and sincere well-wisher.…
Shortly after we graduated from college, I lost track of her for a few years. Until her letter arrived telling me she was now Sister M.
My Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan loving friend had converted to Catholicism and joined a cloistered community of nuns. Beginning her new life in a monastery.
I have visited her off and on over the past few decades. We chat as if we were still those two goofy teenagers at PF meetings. Her eyes are bright as they look back at me from beneath the white habit she now wears. Denim a long forgotten thing of the past.
Once I showed her a photo of the beautiful detailed embroidery she made for me.
She was incredulous.
Nancy Merrill is hosting a photo challenge. The theme this week: Flower
IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO FEATURING FLOWERS OF ANY KIND.
Immigrant Iris
As anyone who lives in a condominium may know, there are rules. So many rules. As a former homeowner they have sometimes been difficult to accept.
However, I knew going into this new lifestyle what was expected. I signed the papers. By-laws. Rules and regulations. Blah blah blah.
I don’t regret the move, but sometimes I do let my mind wander to what was….
And one of those mind wandering destinations is flowers.
As anyone who reads my blog knows, I loved the flowers and flowering shrubs & trees at my former home. Where I could plant whatever I wanted. Whenever I wanted. Anyplace I wanted.
I could also shovel snow. Snow blow the driveway. Hack ice off the eaves. Rake leaves. Fertilize the lawn. Chase down wasp nests. And so on.
But I digress.
One of our new condo friends had the foresight to save a collection of iris bulbs from his former home. Where his gardens were spectacular – as he showed us in photograph after photograph.
One day in the fall of 2017, he stealthily planted several of these bulbs amongst the legal bushes around our building. They popped up the following spring.
As iris do, they spread…this past spring there were a few more.
They are…almost…an exact match to the ones I left behind.
On a recent trip to visit with two dear friends, I spent the better part of a bright sunny day at the Shelburne Museum in Shelburne, Vermont.
I highly recommend it.
The museum is actually a collection of close to 40 buildings. Filled with unique exhibits of America’s past. Plus the permanent home on land for the Ticonderoga – a 220-foot sidewheel steamboat.
Many photos were taken! I could have easily returned for another full day and still have more left to see.
Twenty-two gardens are planted on the 45 acre site. These antique chairs were shaded from the sun under one of the many trees…an open invitation to sit for a moment. And rest.
This post inspired by V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #53: Lottery
Life is a lottery that we’ve already won. But most people have not cashed in their tickets.
Louise L. Hay
Have I won some kind of life lottery?
Unknowingly playing the right numbers at the right time?
What are the chances I would live as long as I have?
What are the chances I would give birth to two healthy babies?
What are the chances I would be born healthy for that matter?
I am convinced…life is not random.
Everything does happen for a reason…
What about that split second miss at the stoplight
Or…
When the accelerating lumber truck nearly T-boned my car
Or…
The hitchhiking car ride…locked doors, high speed, narrow road…when I was 17
Or…
Was it chance or divine design or perseverance…or a lucky combination…that made it possible to emerge from a dark childhood hell. Finding peace…blinking in the brightness.
I am eternally grateful and thankful I beat the odds…whatever they were.
one letter UP ~ diary 2.0 