Erratic Blogger

Mark's Woodpile Summer 2011

Maybe you noticed I added something to my blog heading--"erratic blogger." I thought about sporadic blogger but decided erratic was a better description of me. This way I can blog daily if I want to, or monthly, or as it seems right now, not even monthly. I think about it...but I don't seem to get there. Mark's summer woodpile shows the seasons here. Another round has started and we are drying out the wood we will need over the winter. Last year we actually had enough wood in the basement to skip a new pile, but this year's stack seems to be generating lots of neighborhood comments. All positive--it is an impressive form.

Jessica Smith and Bhakti Ziek

This week seemed to bring Lawrence, Kansas energy into my life. I realized that I am living my Lawrence, Kansas Victorian house dream in Randolph, Vermont. A good example of not getting what you want when you want it, but if you persevere you might get it in another form down the road. I love this house, and the way I am working in it -- seriously creating new work absolutely reminds me of my days as an undergraduate in Lawrence. Something about working in such a diligent way brings so much hope and insight into my life. Jessica Smith, who teaches at Savannah College of Art and Design was one of my graduate students when I returned to Lawrence in 2000 as a teacher at the University of Kansas. She came up here to hike and I was lucky to have visits on both ends of her camping trip. I loved having her be the teacher now, and me the non-teacher. Her work is amazing and I am going to show it at the workshops I am teaching next week for the New England Weavers Seminars (NEWS). So I guess sometimes I am still a teacher, but not too often.

Mark Goodwin, Bhakti Ziek and Gail Moran

Just after Jess left to continue her travels, our friend Gail Moran showed up. We know Gail from Lawrence, Kansas also--but from those undergraduate days in the late 1970s. We remember going to a waterfall with her in 1983 in New Mexico, when we were travelling across country after 16 months in Asia, and she was living in Albuquerque. She doesn't remember that but remembers visiting us in Philadelphia when her eldest son was a baby and her 18 year old son wasn't even born. We remembered that visit but not the Philadelphia part. It was so great to catch up, and also go down memory lane. She said I was passionate about weaving back then, and I still am. In fact, I just finished a weaving today that I am really excited about. I am working towards an August two-person show that will be at BigTown Gallery. I will post about that later, sometime, sooner than later.

Randolph's Fourth of July Parade

Like the woodpile, the Fourth of July Parade is another marker of time. The parade comes right past our house so we always have front row seats. This year seemed especially nice--and though the oxen were missing, there were a few small horses, chickens, and sheep, as well as tractors, old cars, and lots of fire engines. I told Gail she was going to experience quintessential America in this parade, and I think she wasn't disappointed.

Did I ever announce that I finished a website for Mark? You can click HERE or go to this website if you want to see his work.

www.markagoodwin.com

Later this summer, or early fall, after the workshops at NEWS, after Michele Wipplinger's Color Institute Workshop which I am taking at Long Ridge Farm in a few weeks, after tutorial teaching, and after my exhibition at BigTown, then I plan to do a new website for myself. Maybe I will blog in there too--but now that I am an erratic blogger I won't feel guilty that my posting is unpredictable.