Backyardnotes's Blog

JESSICA HEARTS ELLEN

backyardnotes — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 18:09:57 +0000

OUR FRIENDS HAVE A DAUGHTER WITH BRAIN CANCER and this is her wish:

Subject: I Heart Ellen

From: “Jessica Oldwyn” <jessoldwyn@hotmail.com>

Date: Thu, December 15, 2011 9:48 am

Hi Ladies,

I need your help. Somehow it popped into my crazy brain that I neeeeeed to get on the Ellen show. She’s so positive and fun, hilarious and kind. I want to share my brain cancer story, and inspire others to overcome

challenges, band together with friends, find ways around walls, use nutrition, exercise and anything you can when faced with a medical challenge. And above all, have fun with life. I want to meet Ellen so badly, if I could just get on her show for five minutes I think I could inspire others to believe that they’re worth the effort, and that each day, a hundred times, we make choices. Choose to follow your dreams. My dream is to be healthy and live a long life, and I refuse to give up.

Please use the link below to help encourage the producers to put me on

their show:http://ellen.warnerbros.com/show/respond/?PlugID=10

According to the World Health Organization, a person with my diagnosis has on average 4 years to live. I refuse to accept that. Help me earn a spot

on Ellen and inspire others to look fear in the face and march forward.

Please mention my blog, jessicaoldwyn.blogspot.com. Also, you can include a photo in your message, so I’ve attached one of my favorites if you want

to use it. If you have a different one that you’d prefer, of course you’re welcome to do that too.

Thanks for your help! I really appreciate it!Jess

PS. Please feel free to forward this email on. I have no shame (ok, a little) in asking for help.

Go ahead and contact Ellen’s show. It could make a difference.

HOW DO YOU PAINT A POEM?

backyardnotes — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 17:37:24 +0000

I HAVE BEEN ATTENDING DRAWING AND PAINTING CLASSES twice a week at South Seattle CC since 2004. I learn not only from the instructor, who –has a keen eye and imparts a sense of discovery in each student– but all of the other students as well. It is a community rich with camaraderie and support. Returning students and first time students alike share a love of art, learning and creativity.

About ten years ago the Poetry, Art and Photography professors came up with the idea of an Art-Poetry exchange. In the first exchange, art and poetry students each submit a piece of art and a poem. Each poetry student receives a piece of art and creates a poetic response to that piece. The art student creates a work of art based on the received poem. The second exchange is the big reveal when students see the interpretation of their respective works. I look forward to this exchange of ideas. I find it exciting, stimulating, and challenging to interpret the ideas of another and I have a chance to create something I might not otherwise have thought of doing. (My responses are featured here.)

“Foundation” 2011 Acrylic on canvas

Foundation by Kevin B. 2011

each tree stands on opposing edges of the plain

gazing gazing and growing out worldly

the field is nothing but dirt as their roots spread

and from the branches fall nothing but dry arid twigs

both seek the safe security that comes with greater land

and each fight to muscle out the other

eons pass as the roots meet in the center

and drive forwarde in to opposing territory

the roots tangle together

onto one solid knotted mass

of whtich fills the entirety of the dusty plain

and strains into every last gap of soil

this stress on the trees from underground

draws all their force from above

it pulls the branches back into the trunk

which shatters the tree and buries its splinters

the lifeless roots release their grasp on each other

and lose their hold on the land

the remnants fade into a fog up to the surface

and press with ribbons into the open air

eventually the ribbons will fade away

but for now the field is green

“Babushaka” 2010 Collage

Babushka by Jacoby M. 2010

An azure day

I go for a long walk

clouds sit packed like big

stacks of meringue

I listen to real old music

and I listen to the new

a meld of psychedleic angst

dance from ear to ear

crrash in the center of my mind

kaleidoscope of notes

never played before

the fugue begins to splinter

the cat wants to eat

the dog has to pee

something has to give

She never sees me coming

until I am alomost right next to her

Babushka pirouettes up off the bench

she grasps her chest shoulder raise

hands clench in to fists

her liquid brown eyes

give way to solid black

She stares at the dog

as if she is in shgock

and there is nothing

I can do

My warm smile

it is not enough that you will

be assured and so the dog

and I walk quickly away

Bubushka widow

head covered in black

trimmed in white

like Chopin’s piano

before it became kindling

on its fateful defenestration day.

“Jenny” 2009 Mixed Media Collage on Playing Cards

Jenny by Pedro 2009

We’ve gone through the good and bad.

I’ve helped you when you were sad.

We stayedup all through the NIGHT

Till the sunwas super bright.

We played our computer games.

The next daywe played again.

You opened up that door.

You showed me there was a floor.

We may be an ocean apart.

You’re likefamilyyou’re in myheart.

Days seem to disappear.

You showed me there was a floor.

Holy crap it’s been4 years?

We laughed while we played board games.

You always win and nothing’s changed.

One day we’ll meet for real.

I’ll greet you yesthat’s the deal.

The 2012 Art-Poetry exhibit opens January 5th at South Seattle CC.

NIPPED BY FROST

backyardnotes — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 18:13:42 +0000

YESTERDAY MORNING WE HAD A VERY HEAVY FROST and on a whim I took the camera along on my walk to Lincoln Park and snapped a few pictures as the sun was just lighting up the beach and every frosted thing on it. I am always surprised by what I can coax out of this point-and-shoot.

A fallen madrone on the beach.

Back at home in the vegetable garden, a lovely and frosty red cabbage.

WHAT’S BLOOMING NOW?

backyardnotes — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:44:25 +0000

FALL BRINGS ON THE HARDIEST OF BLOOMERS and keeps the gray days a little brighter. The promise of cooling temperatures spurred this little echeveria runyonii ‘Topsy Turvy’ into bloom early last month. I love the autumnal color of the flowers and hated to consign them to the ready-for-winter coldframe, so I flirted with frost danger and kept them on the deck until yesterday. I nipped off the flower stalks and brought them into enjoy their last blooms.

I like the thin spoke-like petal of this chrysanthemum. It begins blooming late September and is just now beginning to fade.

Nerine lilies always seem an unlikely and exotic color for late autumn, the lavish flowers standing tall on leafless, wiry stems. They have a very long bloom time.

ROSES are not yet ready to give up; I snapped these photos just before gusty winds and 40° temperatures hit on Wednesday. This one, appropriately, is Iceberg.

Chicago Peace

Bill Warriner

This is one of many self-seeding nicandra physalodes also known as ‘Apple of Peru’, that have sprung up throughout the vegetable garden; a combination of seeds from compost and those inadvertently spread by me when removing the plants from the garden. I am finding the seed heads much like those of poppies and columbine – handle with care! On the other hand I love the shape of the seed pods and they become papery as they dry, similar to physalis. The lavender flowers resemble those of eggplant, only much larger. They thrive in the nutrient rich beds of the vegetable garden and easily reach five feet and stalks and inch or more in diameter! They are proving to be quite cold hardy and were still sprouting through much of October.

Rounding out the fall parade of blooms are the cyclamen, pink and white. These are also prolific seeders and quickly form a thick mat of corms. The leaves provide a welcome variety of leaf color and form all winter after the flowers have faded.

TODAY’S WEATHER

backyardnotes — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 23:06:13 +0000

THE FIRST REAL STORM systems of the season are rolling in today.

Totally unrelated to today’s weather is this heron is perfectly silhoeutted at sunset last evening in the fir below our house.