25 March

Still Life: Chickens Dancing In The Woodshed. Lucky To Be Alive In This World.

by Jon Katz
Chickens Dancing In The Woodshed
Chickens Dancing In The Woodshed

I came into the woodshed to stack some firewood, and I was startled to look up and see chickens dancing in the afternoon sun, a ballet on the wood shed. It seemed a still life to me, a painting, but I had my camera with the 50 mm lens on it, the right lens at the right time, and I painted this lovely photo. I closed my eyes halfway and thought I had a wonderful seat at the chicken ballet, how lucky I am to be alive in this world.

25 March

Anne’s Daffodils

by Jon Katz
Dealing With Self Pity
Dealing With Self Pity

We came back from picking up Maria’s wood yesterday to find some daffodils in a green pot by the back door.

“Anne,” I said, and Maria nodded. She hoped it wasn’t too cold for the flowers, she said, rushing them inside.

It had to be Anne. Anne Dambrowski is our bookkeeper and a passionate gardener. She has been scouring the town dump for plastic milk jugs to grow flowers in, she is preparing for her garden. Anne never complains about her life, but it has taken some twists and turns.

When I met Anne, she was part of a group that tended big old gardens like the one at Bedlam Farm. I had no idea how to deal with a big garden like that, and I was deep into hiring people to lead my life. Anne was shy, quiet, she was work in the sun all day and sit under some shade with fellow gardeners and have lunch. She loved to talk with my dogs, she just loved them. She had a glower that could freeze water, and a smile that could melt ice.

The old gardens at the farm, neglected, came to life under the care of Anne – she worked so hard in the hot sun and dirt –  and I was grateful to Anne when I started taking photos of those flowers. She was the reason they were there. I was distracted by the divorce, and my suffocating panic at trying to figure out my finances, something I never handled in my first marriage. I couldn’t figure out what I had, what I owed and the paperwork and confusion and bills just piled up and one afternoon I just thought I was done. That night I got an e-mail late at night, and it said simply “I am a bookkeeper. You look like you need help.” I didn’t know who it was from at first and then I figured out it was this quiet, curious flower loving person who was taking care of my garden. I wondered how she knew, I have never asked her. I said yes, and Anne came the next day hauled out my papers, and returned soon to sit in my office to say quietly, “it’s time to panic.”

I did and we took it from there. Things are different now. I have even less money, and owe much more, but I stopped panicking about it.  Anne has brought order to my financial life and Maria’s, insofar as such a thing is possible  and I was terrified of her for some years, she has become one of those rare and precious friends you trust. She loves animals dearly, and is still waiting to pat Frieda. She loves books as well, and we pass them back at forth. Sometimes, early in the morning, when I am restless and moving about, I’ll get an e-mail alerting me to a comet in the sky, an eclipse. The other morning I got one that alerted me to a shooting start streaking across our sky. Sometimes she asks me what this check was for and what Nik software is. She makes me keep track of my mileage and save all receipts.

I suspect Anne learned that we are plotting a garden, and she offered some daffodils. I put them in the window and it looked like a painting to me. Sometimes when Anne glowers at me – she has the most impressive glower, she would have made a formidable nun or headmistress – it is unnerving, but she has the biggest heart.  She melts at the sight of a barn cat and loves all flowers. She is unusual. She is a fencer and loves to go fencing tournaments and lose to people decades younger than she is. She doesn’t really care about winning, she just loves to fence, and take long train rides with her beloved Bob.

I love a life where your bookkeeper leaves daffodils by the back door. I knew it was Anne. Who else could it have been?

25 March

Meet Some Wonderful Writers May 31 (And me, also)

by Jon Katz
Hubbard Hall
Hubbard Hall

You are cordially invited to a rare literary event – one that promises to be  fun and exciting. On May 31, the writers of the Hubbard Hall Writer’s Workshop will present their art and read from their extraordinary blogs and writing. There will be a reception and exhibit of poems, photos, collages and drawings at 6 p.m.  Then, at 7 p.m., the members of the workshop (I’m the teacher) will read from their work. A pug-loving artist and photographer will read from her writings about the power of dogs. A loving and courageous daughter will tell how Alzheimer’s showed her how to love her remote father; a rural physician struggles to keep her humanity in the face of bureaucracy and corporate medicine; a young writer struggles between her love of the family farm and the call of the outside world; an artist and writer writes with humor and insight on the challenges of parenting and of life; a former milkman uses his blog to understand and capture the meaning of his life.

And I will read a bit from my new book “The Second Chance Dog: A Love Story,” the story of me and Frieda and Maria. The writers in this workshop are nothing less than miraculous. I’ve been working to find the right venue to teach my theories of writing in a positive and useful way. Hubbard Hall is the place for me, they did an amazing job of screening and the chemistry of this group is powerful.  When most people tell me about their writing workshops, it sounds like they’ve just had an enema. This one is fun. I asked them each to start blogs, and boy, have they ever. They also support themselves and have been astonishingly creative. So come hear them and meet them and their wonderful work. I’ll be there, too and Red, the workshop hound.

The evening will benefit the Hubbard Hall Scholarship Fund. Suggested donation is $20. Details on the Hubbard Hall site.

25 March

How Animals Changed My Life

by Jon Katz
How Animals Changed My Life
How Animals Changed My Life

Animals have changed my life.

In 2000, I came to a cabin on a mountaintop in the country with two yellow Labs, Julius and Stanley, to be a search for a spiritual life, and for a meaningful life. They were my companions on that mountain.

More than a decade ago, I began sheepherding to help train my border collie Orson. I fell in love with farms.

In 2003, I bought Bedlam Farm, some sheep and a donkey and came to live there. I wanted to explore the human – animal bond in my writing, my life. Orson led me here.

In that same year, I bought Rose, and she helped me survive the farm and learn how to live there.

Two years later, when I was dying of loneliness and disconnection, I got Lenore and she became the love dog

and kept love alive for me.

When I was struggling with depression, I got Izzy and he brought me into hospice work, and helped me find the human

connections I needed to heal.

When I was looking for a human partner to share my, I met Frieda, and she brought me to Maria. And to real love.

When I was seeking to open myself up, Simon came into my life and helped to open me up.

When we decided to leave Bedlam Farm and began looking for a new home, we could not find one. Until I saw Rocky, a blind

pony who led me to Florence Walrath and our new home.

When Izzy and Rose died, and I was seeking a new dog, Red entered my life, and he is my companion and lifetime dog now.

If you are open to it, animals can change your life. On Facebook, I’d like to ask you how animals have changed yours.

25 March

Pincushion. Fairies and Spirits

by Jon Katz
Pincushion
Pincushion

If you live with an artist, things pop up around the house, on windowsills. I never see them come, never see them go. Pincushions have always caught my eye, I think of them as the tools of fairies and spirits, the things that live and grow inside an artists mind. I imagine when I am not looking the fairies make all sorts of things in a colorful blur.

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