Tag: light

delivering a month of special light

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
Marsh Light Manor at Lookout Hollow created by Lori & Edward Lenz
10.12.12 ~ Florence Griswold Museum, Old Lyme, Connecticut

Luka built this manor house for his wife Inza and their family of light fareies at the base of this tree from the river rocks and marsh grasses. He created porches and windows to view and capture the light as it dances across the water. Mirrors and magic help Luka and his wife to “bottle” the light. Each of the children take turns delivering a month of special light to the plein-air artists who capture its distinct glow in paint.
~ Wee Faerie Village: Land of Picture Making

Now that some of the excitement has passed by, at least for us, I hope to share a few more fairy house posts in the coming days…

Auntie was transferred to a rehab center last week, a day or two after the storm. She’s able to walk a little and is making some progress in physical therapy there. We finally got up to see her yesterday and were grateful to know that she had some visitors in the hospital and at the rehab center.

Dad is on antibiotics now for bronchitis and we stopped by to see him, too, and showed him our storm pictures on the TV screen. He was somewhat impressed, but decided that the Great New England Hurricane of 1938 he survived when he 16 was far more destructive. He wasn’t feeling too well, but it was good to visit with him anyway.

We are overflowing with gratefulness for the gift of a wonderful young woman named Chelsea, who was hired to help out with Dad and Auntie’s care in September. What an awesome blessing she has been to our family! She has sat with Auntie in the hospital and at the rehab center, and darted back and forth between those places and the house, to give attention to both of the ancient ones. She has been a cheerful, hard-working, kind, calming and pleasant presence to have around and has gotten us through this difficult stretch, even coming in the evening and on the weekends. Thank you so much, Chelsea!!!

miakoda

10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut
full moon ~ 10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut

Miakoda is a Native American word for the power of the moon. The gravity from last night’s full moon added 2 to 3 feet to Hurricane Sandy’s storm surge at high tide. We are safe and sound!

10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut
10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut

You may have heard of survivor guilt. I am suffering a case of power guilt. For some reason we cannot fathom, we never lost power from the super storm, even though the lights flickered here at times and the neighborhoods surrounding ours lost theirs.

Apparently I fell soundly asleep early last night and Tim went out to take storm surge pictures at high tide without me. He says I said good-bye but I don’t remember it. Amazing I could sleep through all the excitement! The pictures of the surge didn’t come out so well, but he got some amazing shots of the full moon in the storm clouds!

The full moon sailed bright through that Ocean on high,
And the wind murmured past with a wild eerie sound.
~ Emily Brontë
(The Complete Poems of Emily Jane Brontë)

10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut
10.29.12 ~ Groton, Connecticut

photos by Timothy Rodgers

lure of life

"White House at Night" by Vincent van Gogh
“White House at Night” by Vincent van Gogh

Tonight, the moon came out, it was nearly full.
Way down here on earth, I could feel it’s pull.
The weight of gravity or just the lure of life,
Made me want to leave my only home tonight.

I’m just wondering how we know where we belong?
Is it in the arc of the moon, leaving shadows on the lawn?
In the path of fireflies and a single bird at dawn?
Singing in between here and gone?

~ Mary Chapin Carpenter
♫ (Between Here & Gone) ♫

a mysterious tune

“The Moon over a Waterfall” by Hiroshige

Everything is determined by forces over which we have no control. It is determined for the insect as well as for the star. Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust – we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible piper.
~ Albert Einstein
(The Saturday Evening Post, October 26, 1929)

Go out of the house to see the moon, and’t is mere tinsel; it will not please as when its light shines upon your necessary journey.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
(Nature)

We tap our toes to chaste love songs about the silvery moon without recognizing them as hymns to copulation.
~ Barbara Kingsolver
(High Tide in Tucson)

The moon is quite a show off given the chance. The stars make a sound when they shine so bright. Water so blue and so black.
~ Dave Matthews
(Twitter, February 16, 2009)

an adventurous world-traveling faerie

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
Sakuyu, a Japanese Faerie Garden created by Bobbie Padgett,
DeeDee Charnock, Gay Thorn, Teddi Curtiss & Sheila Wertheimer

Bella, an adventurous world-traveling faerie, changed her name to Kat-Sura after visiting the famous garden in Japan. So enamored with Japanese culture that she returned and built a Japanese-style faerie house complete with tea house and stroll garden. A leader of the faerie community, Kat-Sura invites all the faeries to stroll (or flutter) through her Japanese garden to learn about the plants. They also experience a tea ceremony in her tea house.
~ Wee Faerie Village: Land of Picture Making

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut

If we opened our minds to enjoyment, we might find tranquil pleasures spread about us on every side. We might live with the angels that visit us on every sunbeam, and sit with the fairies who wait on every flower.
~ Samuel Smiles
(Thrift: Or How to Get On in the World)

Oh my! Hurricane Sandy is coming up the coast from the south, there is another early winter storm approaching from the west (remember the Halloween Nor’easter last year?), and arctic air is rushing down from the north, and some meteorologists are telling us to brace ourselves for another “perfect storm.” Remember the one in 1991???

And so the excitement begins – Sandy’s going this way, no, she’s going that way! Where will she make landfall? Will she still be a hurricane when she gets here? On Monday “something” will be happening here on the Connecticut shoreline. So will she threaten our son and his family in Georgia on her way up here?

My sister called this morning wanting to know what our plans are. I worry about them up there in the woods surrounded by trees that might fall on the house. She worries about us down here by the sound and vulnerable to the storm surge. We know where to find higher ground, though, and the evacuation plan is in place should it be needed.

There’s concern over the full moon on Monday, and how it will pull even more water into Long Island Sound and cause major coastal flooding and beach erosion.

I love storms, as long as they don’t get too exciting. We will go out tonight and stock up on bottled water, peanut butter and crackers and canned sardines, just in case. And we’ll be keeping our eyes on all the weather reports!

faerie in charge of droplets of dew

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
Dew Drop Villas created by Cathy DeMeo ~ 10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut

Dewey Greenleaf is the faerie in charge of droplets of dew that appear early each day on the garden’s flowers and plants. He knows that Impressionist artists love to paint the reflections of light, sun, and sky captured by delicate dew and soft mist. So each day at dawn, before any painters arrive, he collects and freezes the glistening drops that form on his multi-level home to preserve their beauty for everyone to see.
~ Wee Faerie Village: Land of Picture Making

The fairy poet takes a sheet
Of moonbeam, silver white;
His ink is dew from daisies sweet,
His pen a point of light.
~ Joyce Kilmer
(Fairy House Handbook)

faerie goddess of green-growing things

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
Mihashirano’s Tea House created by Anita Walsh
10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut

Mihashirano, the faerie goddess of green-growing things, works hard alongside her mom, Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess, to help things grow along the river. The plants work hard purifying the air and water as well as supplying food and shelter for many creatures. Their work also benefits the artists in many of the same ways, including natural beauty that inspires their paintings. The location for Mihashirano’s tea house was chosen by a bird.
~ Wee Faerie Village: Land of Picture Making

10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut
10.12.12 ~ Old Lyme, Connecticut

Janet, all bundled up to brave the elements, located the mystical bird and Mihashirano’s sailboat at the tea house out on the water by using binoculars provided by the fairies on the shore. It was a very wet, raw and windy day especially down by the river.

We didn’t feel anything here in southern Connecticut, but last night at 7:12 pm there was an earthquake centered in Maine, 4.6 on the Richter scale, which was strong enough to shake homes as far south as northern Connecticut. Auntie is supposed to come home from the hospital today – I wonder if they felt the tremor up north there last night… And today would have been my mother’s 81st birthday – Happy Birthday, Mom!

sunshine peculiarly genial

"Autumn Glory" by Willard Metcalf
“Autumn Glory” by Willard Metcalf

There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant an effect on the feelings, as now in October. The sunshine is peculiarly genial; and in sheltered places, as on the side of a bank, or of a barn or house, one becomes acquainted and friendly with the sunshine. It seems to be of a kindly and homely nature. And the green grass, strewn with a few withered leaves, looks the more green and beautiful for them. In summer or spring, Nature is farther from one’s sympathies.
~ Nathaniel Hawthorne
(The American Note-books)