Through the windows of the Alpha Chapel

Many of you saw my previous post on Bethania, The Black Walnut Festival, etc. Today I had the chance to run up there again, this time I took pictures from inside the Alpha Chapel that was built in 1894. Most of the glass is still original and offers an interesting perspective on the world outside.

Leopard Seal encounter

As a photographer and a SCUBA Diver, this would be amazing.

1972 BMW 3.0 CS: Yes, I am very shallow.

I went to pay a visit to Gertie and PEAK Auto Restoration who is putting her back together. They have some neat stuff in their shop, so watch the slides, sound on.

PEAK also handles maintenance work on all makes, but specializes in European cars. Cheaper and faster than the dealer. - 919-363-8589.

My previous post on my car.

On set with "The Gatherers" UNCSA film production

We were invited to tag along today to see the filming of "The Gatherers" a production by 3rd & 4th year film students at the UNC School of the Arts here in Winston-Salem. My thanks to John LeBlanc for including us. There are some amazing things happening here in our town, most notably is that this film is utilizing one of the ol RJR Tobacco factories.

University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

More from Brookberry Farm (The stables are aka Redtail Ridge)

I took these over at Brookberry Stables, known to most as Cozy Fox Farm and now renamed Redtail Ridge under new management. As I mentioned in my short memoir that I posted along with my slide show, I learned how to ride horses as a boy among other things. The smell of the horses, the way they gently rest their head on my shoulder, the curious twitch of the ears and the inquisitive snort as they smell your hand hoping for an apple or carrot. There really are no other animals like them. My first pony at age 6 or so was a Shetland named Sharon. She was all of maybe four feet high and she HATED me (all humans actually). Our first outing together, she took off at full cantor and if it weren't for the fact that we were in an indoor ring, we could very well still be sprinting off somewhere. Then came Corn Pone - a normal sized pony, white with black speckles. He was great except for the fact that he could not/would not stop eating. I could not take him on trail rides because he would stop and graze and short of beating him half to death, nothing would get him to get moving again. Lastly, I had Periwinkle. We found her in field in Kernersville and she was perfect. We rode and showed up and down the east coast until I was 12 and left home for boarding school. She was sold to a family in Connecticut. The young woman was clearly destined to have her as she went on to win at Madison Square Garden every year up until she retired. They actually had the ceremony at MSG after her final win. I have very fond memories of those days and I regret to say that I have not been on horseback since I was 16. Sometimes it seems I was living another person's life back then. It's kind of like remembering a great movie - you are glad to have seen it, wish you could recapture it, but know that you can't.

11-02-2009 Full Moon WOW

I just took this out front of my house - Anyone else feeling like they are growing fangs and wee but hairy?

In all seriousness, seemed appropriate to return to one of my favorite poems:

Under the Harvest Moon by Carl Sandburg

Under the harvest moon,
When the soft silver
Drips shimmering
Over the garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.

Under the summer roses
When the flagrant crimson
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions.

Spring in Reynolda Village and Gardens

Now that the time change is here, the leaves are past their peak of color and soccer practice for the kids has been backed up to 4:30 - I miss spring more than ever. There is no place quite like North Carolina in the spring. I may have posted these two pictures before, but I thought they were worth revisiting as reminder of what we have to look forward to.

Reynolda Village

Reynolda Gardens


A Prayer in Spring

Robert Frost (1915)

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.

And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.

For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.

Fall For Art at Flow BMW Tonight

Please join me for the annual Fall For Art event to support Associated Artists here in Winston-Salem at Flow BMW from 6-9.