Happy Thanksgiving

(Washington Monument, Washington, D.C., July 2008)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Patriotic sights--July 2008--Part II: The Smithsonian

Smithsonian Museum, Washington, D.C., July, 2008)


Images of liberty

Patriotic sights--July 2008: Part I

(Gettysburg Address, the Lincoln Memorial)

(Lincoln Memorial, Washington, D.C, July 2008)

(steps of the Lincoln Memorial where Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech)


(Jefferson Memorial)

(Washington Monument, White House)

Okay, I'm veering away from the desert a bit...

In July, 2008, I visited Washington, D.C., for the first time. My family and I toured the Capitol area and the National Mall. Though I've seen these sights so often on TV or in the movies, I felt a visceral stir seeing in person the White House and Washington Monument, the statue of President Lincoln, and the Gettysburg Address carved in huge letters into the marble walls of the Lincoln Memorial.

I stood in the exact spot where Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. stood and looked from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to the throngs below to deliver "I Have a Dream." Seeing these amazing sights made me appreciate our country more than ever before.

We toured much of the Smithsonian Museum (clusters of large buildings dotted along the Mall) and the National Archives where the Declaration of Independence is on display in a marble-floored, dimly-lit hall.

At 11:00 PM on our last night of touring D.C., we visited the Jefferson Memorial. The night was still and balmy, the Memorial lit with a pink light. William and I stood on the steps and looked across the Potomac at the Washington Monument, beyond it the White House.

I felt a swell of gratitude and appreciation that we live in a country founded on the great principles written in the Declaration of Independence: "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Maybe it's because it's election year that my patriotism and pride are stirred again. No matter who each of us voted for, I hope that we can march forward in unity behind our new president and work together. I'm glad to be an American.

Happy Veterans Day

(Vietnam Memorial, Washington, D.C., July 2008)

To all the veterans who have served our country, from those we have lost to those who are currently serving: thank you, and Happy Veterans Day.

(On this day in 1982, the newly finished Vietnam Veterans Memorial was opened to its first visitors in Washington, D.C.)

Screening: "Escape to Reality"

Join my friend Ruth Nolan for a reception and screening of "Escape to Reality," a video project she's worked on featuring desert images of 60+ California photographers.

When: November 6th, 6:00 PM
Where: University of California, Riverside--California Museum of Photography
3824 Main Street (at University Ave.), Riverside, CA 92501
phone: (951) 827-4796
Check out the website here.

The video project "Escape to Reality: 24hrs @ 24fps" borrows narrative elements from Mabel Dodge Luhan's memoirs combining them with the poetry of Palm Desert resident Ruth Nolan, images from Eadweard Muybridge's 1870s Palo Alto motion studies, post-modern music, tourist travelogues taken in New York, California, and Pearl Harbor in 1930s, along with the images of photographers who roamed Joshua Tree National Park for a 24-hour period in May 2008.

"Escape to Reality" montages time periods and styles marking the transition between East and West, day and night, sophisticated urbanity and isolated desert, class comfort and new realities, war to peace, still camera to cinematic, from analog film to digital device.

Happy Halloween from Gold Point Ghost Town

(William the Assayer)

(Sheriff Stone and us)

(our lodging)

(Gold Point Ghost Town, Gold Point, Nevada, 2005)

In the spirit of Halloween (no pun intended) I'm posting photos from our trip in April, 2005 to Death Valley National Park to see the 100-year wildflower bloom. I hemmed and hawed about taking a last-minute road trip without overnight reservations to a destination six hours from home."I'm going to see the wildflowers!" William said. I wasn't about to be left behind.

Death Valley was packed. Every campsite, motel, and hotel for miles, full. We found a room on Friday night at the Amargosa Opera House Hotel (that deserves its own blog post) at the park's outskirts. With the help of a hotel clerk we located lodging for Saturday night at the closest place we could book: a bed and breakfast 50 miles away off of Star Route 30 in Gold Point, Nevada.

Gold Point, a former mining town set on a high desert plain, with a magnificent view of distant snow-capped mountains, turned out to be a ghost town. Population: 27 (living folks, that is). Sheriff Stone runs the Gold Point Bed & Breakfast & More. He served up delicious chow (including homemade ice cream for dessert) and even better conversation, and almost convinced me of the existence of an animal that prowled the plain called a jackalope.

We dined with other guests in the sheriff's main house then retired to an old miner's cabin to sleep. The picturesque shack was a little drafty and a bit spooky, but fun!

After the trip Juliana, then 11, said, "Staying in that ghost town was the best part!"

Driving to Nevada and staying overnight in Gold Point was one of those pleasant surprises that happen on a spontaneous road trip. I'm glad I went along.

For more information about Gold Point or Sheriff Stone's B & B, click here.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

boulders at Joshua Tree National Park

(photos December, 2007, Split Rock area)