A whirr of wings Motionless, as if perched on an invisible precipice Along with owls, hummingbirds are my favorite family of birds. They belong to the avian family Trochilidae; their closest relatives are swifts. The almost 340 hummingbird species are found only in the Americas. Traveling beyond the “New World”, the niche of nectar-sipping birds […]
My Passage to India Keoladeo National Park, Rajasthan I thought long and hard about traveling to India — the difficulties of the journey, health and safety concerns, the thought of being immersed for ten days in a totally unfamiliar society and culture, whose people have suffered so much poverty and exploitation, where suppression of women […]
When at last I found Ithaca’s shore, I gave it all I had and all I have been. For like the poet, Sara Teasdale, I understood that in life one must barter…. “Life has loveliness to sell, All beautiful and splendid things, Blue waves whitened on a cliff, Soaring fire that sways and sings, And […]
Astonishing Topiary of England and France Topiary is the art of clipping hedges and trees into ornamental shapes. Topiary is ostentation, whimsy, a compulsive impulse to have nature resemble geometric contours or animals. A fine madness of human creativity; however, the opposite of Japanese niwaki, which seeks through minute pruning and training to create the […]
My Journey to the Lost Garden of Heligan, Cornwall, England There once was a place, a lost garden, that evokes Pete Seeger’s poignant song about the never-ending waste of human lives we call war: “Where have all the soldiers gone? Long time passing Where have all the soldiers gone? Long time ago Where have all […]
The Quetzals of Monteverde, Costa Rica Somewhere on this earth, a place calls out to you, with an emotional power that could only be real. That place for me was Monteverde, Costa Rica in 1997. I came to Monteverde with the hope of seeing a rare, beautiful bird, the Resplendent Quetzal; during mating season, male […]
Georgia O’Keeffe’s Flowers Some artists speak directly to your heart, not just through the subject matter, but also in color, form, light, and viewpoint, an entirety of invention that awakens a personal meaning and delight for a lifetime. Georgia O’Keeffe (1887-1986) is one of those artists for me. A print of her work called “The […]
My Journey to Charleston House, the home ground of the Bloomsbury Group I set off on a day trip aboard a sluggish train from London’s Victoria Station to the south of England. My destination: Charleston House, located in the village of Firle in East Sussex, not too far from Brighton. Charleston House hosted and housed […]
This post will be rather different. I felt compelled to write this piece and share it with you, given what is happening in our country. Your thoughts gratefully appreciated. I was born in 1946. WWII was over. Soldiers weren’t the only ones killed. No, this was a total war on civilians, and ten million Jews, […]
Making a garden is a form of art and escape from human woes, letting nature carry, subdue, and astound us with its boundless beauty. Each garden reflects local culture and its individual gardener, a human creation that always should be organic and protective of wildlife. Of all garden styles, the Japanese garden is designed to […]
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