Self Portrait with Gnomes

I took this picture last weekend at Rock City; it was in that store near the entrance--what's it called?--where they have all the gnomes and fairy house stuff. It's my reflection in the mirror behind the gnomes.

The store is called Woodland Wonders; I just looked it up on the Web site.

The Real Live Brady Bunch

I found this recently, stuck in a book (I often use ticket stubs as book marks). I was given a pair of tickets to see "The Real Live Brady Bunch" at Center Stage as a reward for something or other at my job at ExecuTrain. (I saw quite a few shows this way in the early '90s, in fact, including "Brigadoon," starring one of the guys from "The Dukes of Hazard.")

Anyway, it was 20 years ago today that I saw this, for whatever it's worth. I don't remember it being particularly great, but for a show I didn't have to pay for, it was okay.

And the dreams that you dare to dream...

I went outside last night to check the mail, and when I turned around I saw this double rainbow right over our house.

A Trip through the Great Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg, and Pigeon Forge

Since the summer is almost over, at least in so much as Anna has to go back to work next week, I took this opportunity to go on a drive for a couple of days. So, I set out yesterday morning at 7:00 for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, and Pigeon Forge.

I had a wonderful drive up, even if I did miss my family some of the time. I made it to the Oconaluftee Welcome Center at around 11:00, bought a T-shirt, and drove to Clingman's Dome--which was very, very busy. I made the whole walk to the observation tower (there are some pictures below), which is no mean feat for a guy in my shape. (I need to work on getting in better shape so I can do that walk with my kids someday, hopefully in two or three years.)

After that, I drove north through GSMNP to Gatlinburg, which was insanely busy. I had thought I might stop, but the number of cars and people and shops all crammed into a relatively small space filled me with anxiety, so I kept going towards Pigeon Forge.

Pigeon Forge was also busy, but is more stretched out and has a four-lane road, so it doesn't seem nearly as crowded. Still, I didn't stop anywhere except a place called Book Warehouse.

I did stop at the Books-A-Million in Seveirville, where I bought Robert A. Heinlein's The Star Beast, a novel I read thirty years ago and remember loving. I've been looking for it for a while, actually.

I spent the night at the Quality Inn in Clayton, Georgia, which is where I am right now as I type this. Since I need to check out in 20 minutes, I'll end here, with the addition of 15 pictures I took yesterday:

Self Portrait, July 7, 2013

Not the most flattering picture of me, but this is what I look like, wearing my blue Stone Mountain T-shirt and sitting in the rocking chair in front of the blinds.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park -- A One-Day Road Trip

This week my wife and daughters are spending most of their days at the Girl Scout Camp in Lilburn, so I took advantage of my free time to go on a one-day road trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Anna and I went through GSMNP on our way to Gatlinburg thirteen years ago, and I remember loving it and wanting to return. On Tuesday I did.

It's every bit as wonderful as I remembered, as is the trip up through north Georgia and North Carolina. I headed out at about 8:00 Tuesday morning, about the same time the girls left for Girl Scout Camp. I made a quick stop at the library in Flowery Branch, which is right on the way and is also the closest place I could locate the book I wanted (The Gay Talese Reader; in a strange dream I had over the weekend, it was suddenly very important that I read Talese's 1966 Esquire profile, "Frank Sinatra Has a Cold.") After that, I didn't stop for about 100 miles, which is unusual for me, but I wanted to make sure I actually made it to the Smoky Mountains instead of spending the whole day wandering around small towns along 441.

I did stop for lunch in North Carolina. First, I browsed for a few minutes in City Lights Bookstore in Sylva, NC, but didn't buy anything, then, deciding I really wanted some barbecue, I went back into Dillsboro. The lunch I had at the Dillsboro Smokehouse was great--very good barbecue and macaroni and cheese, and excellent onion rings. Tea that wasn't nearly as sweet as I'm used to in the south, but good anyway. As I ate I read the first few pages of the Talese article. After I was done, I got back in my car and didn't stop until I made it to the Oconaluftee Visitor Center at the southern entrance to the park on U.S. 441.

I spent about two hours in the park, walking, driving, taking lots of pictures. After spending about half an hour walking around at the mid-point, Newfound Gap, where you can, among other things, straddle the North Carolina/Tennessee border, get on the Appalachian Trail, and read about the Rockefeller Foundation's $5 million donation to help complete the park, I turned around and went back to the entrance and, after driving by a couple of large elk who had stopped traffic in the other direction, got on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Someday I plan to drive the whole thing; Tuesday I only drove about 15 miles of it.

After that I just meandered slowly in the general direction of home, resisting the temptation to stop in any of the shops in Cherokee, NC, but stopping at a few other places. I had dinner at a Chick-Fil-A in Demorest, GA, and spent the night at a Quality Inn in Oakwood, GA. I finished reading "Frank Sinatra Has a Cold" before I came home Wednesday morning. It's really good. You should read it.

Here are a dozen pictures from my trip, starting with one of the cabins in the Mountain Farm Museum at Oconaluftee:

Detail of the floor of the cabin's porch--I find great beauty in such utilitarian details:

Detail of a wagon wheel, which was leaning against another building:

The buildings are all roofed with wooden shingles:

Detail of the gears on a piece of farm equipment:

Xx:

I have no idea what these are, but I love the texture of the wood:

Pitcher and basin inside one of the cabins:

This is the Rockefeller Memorial at Newfound Gap, halfway through the park:

Another view of Rockefeller Memorial; it looks like these two women are taking pictures of each other, but they're really not:

A panoramic view from Newfound Gap:

And another; in this one, you can see one of the park roads winding around a mountain:

Expending My Feelings on Flowers and Birds

Last night before I went to bed I was looking for something short to read before I went to sleep; I picked up THE ESSENTIAL HAIKU, edited by Robert Haas, and after flipping through it for a couple of minutes, settled on re-reading Basho's travel sketch "The Hut of the Phantom Dwelling" from 1690 (translated here by Burton Watson), in which appears this wonderful, typically Basho-lonely and Basho-thoughtful, line:

And when the sun has begun to sink behind the rim of the hills, I sit quietly in the evening waiting for the moon so I may have a shadow for company, or light a lamp and discuss right and wrong with my silhouette.

and also this:

I've worn out my body in journeys that are as aimless as the winds and clouds and expended my feelings on flowers and birds.

Sounds like a pretty good way to spend one's life, if you ask me.

The book also contain these two haiku, which I can relate to:

Deep autumn--
my neighbor,
how does he live, I wonder?

Even in Kyoto--
hearing the cuckoo's cry--
I long for Kyoto.

(I've never been to Kyoto, but I know the feeling of missing the place where you already are.)

Self Portrait, Late March 2013

Cheer Up, Sleepy Jean

This week is my wife's Spring Break. Today we picked up the girls from school, and, on our way to Stone Mountain for the afternoon, we stopped at Moe's for lunch.

As we sat there eating our burritos and tacos, "Daydream Believer" by the Monkees came on, and I suddenly found it incredibly sad that Davy Jones is no longer with us, and sadder still that I am no longer a ten year old boy just home from school and settling down in front of the television to watch the afternoon reruns of "The Monkees" on Channel 17.

Cheer up, sleepy Jean, indeed.

Happy Birthday, Mister Rogers

When I was a little boy, Mister Rogers encouraged me to be creative and curious and patient and kind. That encouragement was a wonderful gift to give a sensitive little boy. But of course, it wasn't for me alone; it was a gift he gave to many millions of people over the thirty-five year run of his PBS TV show.

Those of us who watched him every day when we were four or five or six are unquestionably better off for his influence; for his absence, the world is unquestionably poorer.

Had he lived, he would have turned eighty-five years old today. I'll be wearing a red sweater in his honor.

Reminders of the Corporate Life

More than 15 years ago, when I still worked in the corporate world, I was given this business card holder/clock as an "Attaboy!" for some work I did on a project:

Now that I've been out of the corporate world for almost a decade, and haven't worked full time in that long, too, these little reminders of my former life mean a lot more to me than I thought they would. Much to my own surprise, I find I miss my working life more than I expected.

When the girls are both in school I plan to go back to work doing something at least somewhat like what I used to do; I find myself looking forward to that. (However, I wouldn't trade my time as a stay-at-home dad for anything. It has been the most wonderful, the most sacred--and yes, the most frustrating and challenging--experience I can imagine.)

Monticello, GA

I went on a little drive today to take some pictures, and ended up in Monticello, about fifty miles from where I live. I found some wonderful colors and shapes and textures to capture.