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SUMMER 2008
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Essay: Steve Metcalf
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Seasons’
Greetings
Hello Friends & Neighbors,
My favorite time of year has come again. Summer in New England is such a special time. School’s out and it’s wonderful to spend time with family and friends, to kick back and slow things down a bit. This issue of Seasons showcases some of the summertime pleasures of our region. At a time when gas prices are through the roof, it emphasizes activities that can be enjoyed close to home. We take a look at the increasingly popular pastime of vintage base ball (yes, that’s spelled as two words) and the local teams that follow the traditions of the game as it was played in the late 1800s. Essayist Steve Metcalf explains why being “mediocre at best” on the golf course has its compensations. We celebrate the timeless joy of the outdoor picnic with recommended sites, paraphernalia, and takeout shops. If you’ve got a green thumb, garden expert Steve Silk makes a case for growing tropical plants here in New England. All are perfect activities for the newly crowned term “stay-cation.” Last but not least we at Seasons appreciate all the kind words and feedback. I’m so pleased when people comment that this is their “coffee table” magazine. To me that is the highest form of flattery. Please visit our local advertisers because they make Seasons possible. They believe in supporting local businesses and are dedicated to giving back to their respective communities. On behalf of everyone associated with Seasons have a wonderful summer. We’ll see you again this fall! James Tully, Publisher
Cover Photograph: sunflower at rosedale Farms, simsbury By Julie Bidwell Seasons of the Farmington Valley is Published by Seasons Publications LLC, James Tully, President Editorial & Creative Direction by Artbox LLC Designer: Stacy Murray
For information regarding advertising, please contact James Tully at 860-651-9939 or Seasons Publications llc P.O. Box 92, West Simsbury, Connecticut 06092 Visit us online at
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8 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
JEWELRY • CRAFTS • FIBER ART
ummer S
S e a s o ns o f The Far ming to n Va l l ey
page
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Gone Troppo
Artists Among Us
Essay: Steve Metcalf
Growing tropicals in New England
Crafting lives in Connecticut
Golf, mediocrity and me
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The Old Ball Game
Your Table Awaits
The Buzz
Vintage base ball in Simsbury
Pack a summertime picnic
Be kind to your six-legged friends
“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time” — J ohn L ubbock
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Gone Troppo The Brits have a word for my affliction. They’d say I’ve gone troppo. As in, you know, lost my marbles, gone native, tossed the mustard. S t o ry & P h o t o g r a p h y By S t e v e S i l k
It happened to a few of the Empire’s old Colonial hands, proper gents from Surrey or Leeds serving the Queen in Rangoon, or Amritsar, or Singapore. One day these stiff-upper-lipped bureaucrats were starched and pressed, tallying imports at the customs house, the next they were somewhere upriver, way upriver, half naked and barefoot, eating stinkfruit and living in a thatched hut. Blame the siren song of the tropics. Mad dogs and Englishmen, most of them anyway, knew enough to avoid the midday sun and so hang on to a shred of gentility. But not all of them, and not me either. Sorry mates, as a gardener, I’ve gone round the bend. After all, it’s not every place in the Farmington Valley where you can find a banana tree. Or a whole grove of them, like the one in my back yard. Not to mention my palms or the tree ferns. Ever since I first laid eyes on the outlandish plants that are most at home in those parts of our planet nearest the equator, I’ve been struck by their bold architectural features, their often outlandish colors, and their sheer exuberance. Theirs is a drama unknown to the more sober specimens native to our climes. And these hot plants are key building blocks in the creation of dramatic outdoor spaces for lounging, dining, or just plain enjoying. So I’m not about to let a simple accident of geography — such as the fact that my home is in Farmington rather than Bali — dampen my enthusiasm for living and gardening in the tropics. To my surprise and delight, I’ve discovered that tropical12 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
style gardening in Connecticut is not only possible, it’s a cinch. From early June to about mid-October, the weather here in the Farmington Valley is lots like the weather in, say, the highlands of Java, or Baños, Ecuador. We’ve got the heat, the sunshine, the humidity, and should the rain fail us, we can just turn on the hose. In short, it’s tropical. All you need are the plants, and somewhere to put them. You can, as garden writer Dennis Schrader suggests, have hot plants in a cool place. A tropical garden in Connecticut wakes up in mid-May, and gets better with each passing day. Angel’s trumpets produce wave after wave of blooms, with each flush of flowers more numerous than the one before it. Cannas send up their floral freak flags of bright colors, to wave like banners over paddle-shaped leaves of lurid hue. There are crazy quilts of coleus, growing bigger and brighter with each hour of sunshine. Palms wave their frilly fronds, sweet potato vines threaten to take over the neighborhood, and the dahlias bloom their hearts out, until the late season garden is a riotous swirl of color, form and fragrance. The plants grow so fast you can almost hear them. It’s a sensory experience bordering on delirium. Gone troppo indeed! Compare that to a typical perennial garden, which wakes up slowly in spring, provides a burst of color in early May, followed by a second salvo in June, followed thereafter, all too often, by
Continued on Page 12
A red Abyssinian banana and Chinese fan palm set a lush scene for the outdoor patio.
S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 13
Gone Troppo
Continued from Page 10 slowly unwinding decline. Oh sure, there are daylilies in July, black-eyed Susans in August, and, finally, a few asters in September, but let’s face it, for most gardens, the summer show is over faster than the Fourth of July fireworks. When you look at it that way, a tropical garden is easily worth a little extra work and expense. Outlays of both brawn and bank account holdings can be extensive, but needn’t be. You can always start small. My tropical garden began with a single plant — a red Abyssinian banana my wife Kate brought home and plunked down on the patio. We spent the rest of the summer in a state of slack-jawed amazement, marveling at its massive leaves, exotic burgundy shadings, and the alluring gloss of its ebonylike trunk. This was a plant with presence, and I was hooked. I grew that banana in a pot, and realized that containers were the easiest way to have a tropical garden in this part of the world. These plants grow FAST, and one way to accommodate their vigor is by growing them in pots, which allow you to move the plants about as they get larger and larger. Pots offer design flexibility, too. If a plant doesn’t do well or I
Continued on Page 26 Above: Bold foliage and bright colors help establish a tropical ambience even in the New England garden. Right: Place angel’s trumpets near seating to best enjoy their heady fragrance. Here they are paired with purple princess flowers. 14 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
The Old Ball Game
Members of the Simsbury Taverneers vintage base ball team line up as the National Anthem is played. 16 S e a s o n s of t he Fa r mi ng t on Va l ley SU M M ER 2008
In Simsbury, Vintage Base Ball Revives the Sport and Sportsmanship of a Gentler Time By E l a i n e L a n g P h o t o g r a p h y By B r a d l e y E. C l i f t
Continued on next page S e a s o n s of t he Fa r mi ng t on Va l l ey SU M M ER 2008 17
O
n a sunny afternoon on Independence Day weekend in 2003, John Lucker was pressed to find an activity for visiting family. A search of area events revealed an intriguing sports tournament in Bushnell Park that offered a little something for everyone: local color, historical interest, and real live baseball. Lucker and his relatives enjoyed watching the Hartford Senators and other local teams playing baseball old school…. really, really old school. As in, old enough to call it “base ball” kind of old school. The tournament featured vintage base ball, an increasingly popular pastime that involves playing the game according to the rules that evolved after it was invented during the mid-19th century. Lucker Above: Dressed in 19th-century garb, former New York Yankees pitcher Jim Bouton announces the beginning of the game through a megaphone at last summer’s Vintage World Series in Westfield, Mass. Bouton, also a famed author of the book Ball Four, is one of the founders of the Vintage Base Ball Federation. Behind him, the official umpire checks the field before play begins. Right: Simsbury’s Taverneers prepare to take the field with a rousing team cheer — “Huzzah!”
18
sought out some of the Senators for information and advice about getting involved in the sport and was soon convinced that Simsbury needed a team of its own. A few weeks later at a barbecue, Lucker shared an account of the experience with his friend, Duncan Mackay. A few burgers and beverages later, the Simsbury Taverneers was born. After a winter of aggressive recruitment, the Taverneers started to practice in early March 2004, and the team played its inaugural games that summer. The rest, as they say, is history. And, baseball. History and baseball. What could be better? In Simsbury and beyond, vintage base ball is a game with a growing following, attracting history buffs and sports fans alike. Teams adhere to the old-school rules of the game and use only the equipment that was accepted and
available at the time. Most games are played either with the early rules in effect from 1868 to 1871 or by the slightly later rules of 1884 to 1886, which incorporate innovations such as overhand pitching and some protective gear for the catcher. Most notable from both eras’ play is the absence of such modern staples as batting helmets, protective padded gloves, sunglasses, and microphones for the announcers. The growth of the vintage game parallels the emergence of the sport over 150 years ago. By the mid-19th century, baseball had evolved from a simple backyard game into “America’s Favorite Pastime,” and the sport’s development hinged in no small part on its popularity among encamped soldiers during the Civil War. The modern pastime of vintage base ball similarly grew out of the popularity of Civil War reenactments, where history buffs initially drawn to the fun of reliving the period soon found the simple pleasures of old-rule base ball to be among the highlights of the living history experience. Simsbury High School history teacher Steve Patrina is a longtime Taverneers player, and he notes that every vintage game is like a lesson in the evolution of baseball. “As we have played throughout the different eras starting in the 1860’s, it has been fascinating to experience the numerous changes that have taken place, primarily in the balance of power between pitcher and batter. Each rule change was determined to keep the balance even.”
Continued on Page 18
Field lights common to the 21st century are an anachronistic element as dusk settles on a Taverneers game.
“It has been fascinating to experience the numerous changes that have taken place, primarily in the balance of power between pitcher and batter” — Steve Patrina
Taverneers team members and Simsbury residents, from left to right: Duncan “The Judge” MacKay, Craig “Hoss” Haase, and Steve “Hands” Patrina S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 19
The Old Ball Game
Continued from Page 16 Players not drawn by historical interest in the game tend to be former baseball players thrilled to get back to a game they love, whatever the form. Many of the Taverneers played baseball at one time, they coach local Little League or Babe Ruth teams, and also enjoy competitive softball. So, what’s the appeal of a little-known historical version of the game? “It’s baseball,” is the succinct reply from team co-founder Duncan MacKay, “real baseball, where hitting and fielding fundamentals are important because of the vintage equipment we use, and, when we play by 1886-era rules, the overhand pitching is very challenging. Softball is a fun sport, but it’s a lot different than vintage base ball. Most of us grew up playing baseball, and it is baseball [or base ball] that we like to play the most.” Vintage base ball is unique in other ways, too. Games are won by more than brute strength or a powerful swing. The nature of the old rules emphasizes strategic elements of play, and, indeed, familiarity with the old rules can be an asset on the field. “Without the infield fly rule, sometimes it’s smartest to let a ball drop rather than try to catch it outright,” says co-founder Lucker. “And plenty of new players will forget that overrunning first base was
Continued on next page 20 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
Above: At the end of a game, Simsbury’s Taverneers salute their opposing team, the Hartford Senators, with three “Huzzahs!” Below: Vintage base ball fans are sometimes known to dress in period costume. Here, three girls playing the part of 19th-century newsboys were handing out programs.
The Old Ball Game variations of which are permitted under old-school rules but forbidden in the modern game. Hidden ball tricks, quick pitches, not allowed in some versions of the rules in the 1800s and find fake tags, and intentionally dropped balls make every vintage themselves tagged out just a few steps past the bag.” game an adventure in the unexpected. Often, the more freeFor players and fans alike, vintage base ball has a unique wheeling aspects of the game are as entertaining as the straight culture that can be in short supply in other competitive sporting play itself. Patrina recalls a match against a Boston team where he groups. “We all play with a full effort,” Lucker says, “but it is pitched to an unprepared batter. “He swung and missed and the definitely not a win-at-any-cost mentality.” The gentlemen who bat went flying out of his hands towards our third baseman, who play vintage base ball generally behave like actual gentlemen, ducked, and then let the bat lie. Since we can quick pitch, I even by 19th-century standards. The sport’s “gentlemen’s rules” didn’t have to wait for him to get the bat, and I quickly got the carry over into the spirit of the modern competitors and, in an ball back and threw another strike and had the ball in the air for era of trash talk and fan hooliganism, the 19th-century practices a third as he raced back to the batter’s box with a new bat, and can be refreshing and relaxing. The camaraderie of the group is he desperately threw his bat at the ball.” Not surprisingly, the strong, as the vintage community is a small one. The honor hapless Bostonian missed, but spectators and players alike were system of genteel sportsmanlike conduct dominates the treated to the blend of sport and lively entertainment that makes behavior of “ballists” at area matches and tournaments. When vintage base ball what it is. an umpire’s call is contested, for example, the other team will ask In an era where players from around the world collect the player involved if they were out or safe. All of the Tavernmillions of dollars for a few months of running the bases on an eers we spoke to were proud to say that the level of honesty in Astroturf diamond, vintage base ball in the Farmington Valley these situations has been impressive. recaptures the sense of innocent fun that first inspired the hearts The community of players and the supporting cottage of players and fans across America. An afternoon at a Tavernindustry that produces vintage-quality equipment is a close-knit eers game embodies the summery joy of a gentler time and one, and many devoted spectators join in the historical fun, place, when nothing could be better than a sunny afternoon, a dressing and behaving as though it were the 19th century. grassy field, and the humble satisfaction of a well-thrown ball, Spouses, children, students and friends are regular enthusiastic the sharp crack of a bat, and an umpire’s resounding cry of attendees of the games. And, if one wants to consider that good “Sir! You are SAFE!” Valley Edplay_Seasons_Spring - Farmington times and good ball might inspire the Taverneers to spend some The Simsbury Taverneers are always looking for new players and post-game time living up to their name, one might not be too out spectators. Information and a game schedule are available at http:// of bounds. home.comcast.net/~taverneers/. The absence of contemporary attitudes and manners doesn’t mean vintage base ball is devoid of devilish shenanigans, Elaine Lang is a freelance writer from Simsbury.
Continued from previous page
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Artists
Among Us By J a n e G o r d o n P h o t o g r a p h s By M i h a ly P o rt r a i t D e s i g n
Connecticut may not be seen as a magnet for artists, yet award-winning musicians, nationally known painters, and prominent poets whose names are household words in cities such as New York and Los Angeles are living and flourishing here. Continued on Page 28
22 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
Pit Pinegar, poet and teacher of writing, stands at an entrance to the Sunken Garden of the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington — venue for this summer’s much-anticipated Sunken Garden Poetry Festival
S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 23
Artists
Among Us Continued from Page 20
T
Jay Lichtmann of Avon plays principal trumpet for the Hartford Symphony Orchestra
24 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
he reasoning behind their geographic choices may vary, but they share a passionate commitment to craft. Jay Lichtmann of Avon stitches together his living playing principal trumpet for the Hartford Symphony Orchestra, teaching at the Hartt School of Music and performing at the Talcott Mountain Music Festival at the Performing Arts Center at Simsbury Meadows during the summers, among other musical jobs. Pit Pinegar of Plainville writes, teaches writing, conducts poetry workshops and directs the Urban Outreach Program for the Sunken Garden Poetry Festival at Farmington’s Hill-Stead Museum, where she has also given poetry readings. She has other jobs, too. Elisa Tenenbaum of Farmington paints and illustrates for a number of clients, along with teaching at Northwest Community College. Each of these individuals is committed to living as an artist, however they possibly can. Continued on Page 28
Elisa Tenenbaum of Farmington in her studio, among some of her works Photos by Mihaly Portrait Design 25
“Where The Extraordinary Is Ordinary” At CHAPTER 1
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HARTFORD SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA EDWARD CUMMING, MUSIC DIRECTOR
2008 Talcott Mountain Music Festival SM
June 27 - July 18, 2008 Under the stars at the Performing Arts Center at Simsbury Meadows
The Sounds of Summer
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Friday, June 27 Summer Begins! All Mozart
Friday, July 4 & Saturday, July 5 Celebrate America! with fireworks* Friday, July 11 Spectrum - A tribute to Motown and R&B Wednesday, July 16 Classical Mystery Tour - A Beatles tribute Friday, July 18 Movie Classics with Jeff Tyzik
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Gone Troppo Continued from Page 12 don’t like its looks, I can whisk it away and replace it with another. And I can regroup the pots however I want, tinkering with different leaf shapes and sizes, and a rainbow of flower colors until I get just the eclectic effect I’m after. Having a large cluster of densely planted pots on a deck or patio creates a stunning centerpiece, and from there I can continue adding clusters of pots to further the tropical ambiance. I now grow well over 100 pots each summer but then, I’ve gone troppo. So, I took that banana plant and started clustering other pots filled with smaller tropicals at its base. I used lots of coleus — which, contrary to popular belief, are quite happy in full sun, cannas and loads of nicotianas, browallias, salvias, starflowers and other plants commonly grown as annuals, many of which happen to be native to the tropics, so they look right at home with other tropicals. Even varieties commonly considered houseplants can be players — white bird-of-paradise, Chinese fan palms, dracaenas, and rubber plants are all worthy additions. The queen of tropical plants, for my money, is the angel’s trumpet, a fast-growing tree which bears loads of fragrant, trumpet-shaped flowers a foot or so long. Depending on the type, they flower in peachy hues, in pinks, whites or yellows. They grow quickly, too — an 18-inch plant in spring can top 5 or 6 feet by late August. A single plant can bear 80 or more blooms at a time late in the season. Angel’s trumpets are eye-catching as all get-out and, better yet, intoxicatingly fragrant in the evening. Thus, they are the perfect companion for any outdoor dining spot. If only they lived outside year-round. Eventually, I discovered summer’s end did not signal the end of my garden. Over the winter, many of the plants can be grown indoors as houseplants or stored, dormant, in a basement and
“The queen of tropical plants, for my money, is the angel’s trumpet, a fast-growing tree which bears loads of fragrant, trumpetshaped flowers a foot or so long.” kept ready for another season in the sun. Though it may be hard to imagine tropical plants going dormant like our trees in winter, the tropics have seasons as well — two of them, a wet one and a dry one. And as it turns out, many tropical plants enter a kind of dormancy in the dry season, so all you need do is trick the plants into responding to a coming dry season, then get them down to the basement once they are headed toward dormancy. That’s easy. At my house, I cut back on watering in early September, and haul the plants indoors by mid-October, ahead of a killing frost. For tropicals left outdoors in the Northeast, fate is predetermined. On a day around mid-October the grim reaper, aka Jack Frost, comes calling, and his icy death grip chokes the life from my tropical paradise. In a single night, the remains of my thriving garden are reduced to black mush. I wake from my tropical reverie as if from a dream. It’s only temporary though. In a few months the weather warms again, the tropical plants wintered over go back outside and I start the whole thing over again. Once you’ve gone troppo, there’s no going back. Steve Silk is a freelance writer and garden designer based in Farmington. His garden will be open from noon to 4 p.m. on Sept. 14 as part of the Garden Conservancy’s Open Days program. For information, visit www.gardenconservancy.org.
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Artists Among Us Continued from Page 22
Jay Lichtmann
Principal trumpet, Hartford Symphony Orchestra, music teacher, solo artist I grew up in a suburb of Los Angeles, in the San Fernando Valley, and at that time the San Fernando Valley had very strong instrumental music departments at the junior high and high-school levels. My older brother played the baritone horn and I liked the idea of playing a brass instrument, and the trumpet seemed easy. My junior high-school music teacher was special. His name was Tommy Johnson, and he was one of L.A.’s premier tuba players and had this junior high-school job, too. He was on the “Jaws” soundtrack, and in the ’60s and the ’70s, whenever there was a soundtrack with a tuba, it was him. He was a great teacher, had a crackerjack band and was always an inspiration to me. I was in the band in high school, took private lessons and played in a youth orchestra outside of school. By the time I was a senior in high school, I knew that I wanted to be a professional musician. My parents were always encouraging me in whatever I decided to do. They never
discouraged me, either. I did my undergraduate work at the California Institute of the Arts, a small arts school outside of L.A., and went to do graduate work at Yale in performance. I was there for one semester, then won an audition for a job overseas. I knew someone who was playing with the Israeli Philharmonic, and he told me to contact Zubin Mehta because they needed a trumpet player. I auditioned for Zubin Mehta at Avery Fisher Hall. This isn’t the way people usually get their jobs, but it was an instance of networking that helped. It was great playing with a great orchestra and living in a foreign country. I was 22 and it was the first time I had been out of this country. But I got tired of living in Israel, and I wanted to play in an American orchestra. I moved in with a friend in New York City, read the union paper, International Musician, that comes out every month – if you are an out-ofwork musician, you are scouring the union paper every month for auditions — and the Hartford job was advertised. It’s an amazingly competitive field, especially being an orchestral trumpet player. Maybe one or two positions a month come open, sometimes none, and
there are hundreds of players competing for those jobs. I took the audition and won the job, and I’ve been doing it for 25 years. Playing in the symphony is not 100 percent of my income, because we don’t get paid a lot. I teach quite a bit, private lessons and at the Hartt School (of Music at the University of Hartford), and I do a lot of freelance work playing shows – I do a lot of weddings – and I play in a brass quintet and as a solo trumpet. You have to do this if you are going to play. There’s no way to survive playing in Hartford strictly as a musician in an orchestra. The reward is obviously not money; there are an awful lot of easier ways to make money than to be a musician. But the satisfaction of making music and communicating, the satisfaction I get from playing and teaching the instrument, give my life meaning. It’s not about the money. There’s nothing better than the feeling of sitting down in the orchestra and getting to play a part that is really juicy, with a tremendous amount of solos in it such as a Mahler symphony, and then doing a great job with it, really playing it. The feeling of accomplishment — there’s
Continued on next page
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Artists Among Us Continued from previous page nothing that can beat that. I think it can be very exciting to go hear an orchestra, because there is nothing like the sound of all those musicians up there as one. The great thing about listening to a Beethoven symphony, even if you’ve listened to Beethoven’s Fifth a hundred times, is that it still holds surprises. It’s true, you have to acquaint yourself with it beforehand to get the most out of it. You have to do your homework. But great classical music is always interesting to listen to.
Pit Menousek Pinegar Poet, writer, teacher I was born in New Britain, grew up in Plainville. I started out as a dancer. And then when I was 12, my dad who was a doctor, discovered that I had a bone tumor on my right leg and that effectively ended my life as a dancer. I started writing in high school — I had a weekly column in the local newspaper. I worked at The Hartford Courant for a couple of summers and school vacations when I was in college, wrote some book reviews and published
some poems. After college I worked for a woman named Helen Loy who was a true mentor, before women were and had such things. She had a public relations firm in Hartford at the time with an interesting variety of clients. She would teach me how to do something (or send me to someone she thought might be better) and then she simply turned me loose. She never doubted that I could do anything, so it never occurred to me to doubt that I could do whatever it was I’d been turned loose to do. On my first day on the job she sent me over to the city editor at The Courant so that he could teach me how to write a press release that he wouldn’t cut. I learned by doing, whether it was writing radio and TV copy, feature stories, lobbying, event planning, editing, broadcasting. I was in my early twenties, and it was heady stuff. There came a moment when the long hours were going to get longer. I knew exactly what I wanted to do and a six or seven long-day-a-week job wasn’t going to get me there. Helen had given me a briefcase because she thought a briefcase carried the weight of authority, especially for someone as young as I. What I carried in it was stories and fragments of
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stories. And that’s been the story of my professional and creative lives. Whatever the work, there had to be a place for the writing, too. Meantime, my mother had a friend, Doris Miles Disney, who earned her living as a mystery novelist. Her daughter and I were her child consultants. Her editor at Doubleday, Isabelle Taylor, would come to Plainville from time to time, and I remember eavesdropping on the conversations between author and editor and thinking, ‘Important things are being decided.’ During the many months of my recuperation, boxes would arrive from Isabelle filled with books she thought I might like to read. I came to writing through that series of events — an illness that seemed downright tragic at the time, a friend of the family whose job it was to write stories, and an editor whose generosity kept me turning pages when I might otherwise have preferred to sulk. Eventually, when work and kids and the undeniable fact that there were only 24 hours in every day caught up with me, I packed away my dance shoes and guitar and sheet music, and what I was left
Continued on Page 42
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32 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
Your Table Awaits
We wait all year for this – the chance to eat outside, to spread a tablecloth or blanket under the sun or starlight, to commune with the blossoming green world where tender grass, leafy trees and the wild scents of spring and summer flowers nourish dormant appetites.
P h o t o g r a p h y By J ac k M c C o n n e l l
“That faint semblance of Eden, the picnic in the greenwood.” - Herman Melville S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 33
Stratton Brook State Park in Simsbury
Continued from previous page
F
ood consumed outside tastes better, and a meal is inevitably more relaxed. Whether you set out plates on your patio or in the shady recesses of one of Connecticut’s state parks, table manners go on a bit of a holiday — who, after all, can be accused of slouching on a picnic table? Napkins, which should be on laps, have been known to blow away in the breeze. Licking fingers is almost a requirement. Time drifts on the wind. A full stomach encourages an extended nap on a grassy knoll. Life tastes delicious. So grab your hampers, blankets, bug repellant, your friends and family. Don’t come home until the sun has set or the moon has risen high. To help with your excursion plans, here are some of our favorite spots for local picnicking – the majority of which feature accommodations for outdoor dining – from picnic tables and bathrooms to sites with grills, shelters, and special attractions like boating, fishing, ball fields, and hiking. Getting to most of these places won’t burn up much gasoline, and in a summer of record-high fuel prices, that might help promote relaxation of another sort. Also included in the story is a list of shops offering ready-made picnic-style fare along with a recipe for cooks who prefer to make their own. Remember to cart home your trash and to leave the picnic sites as you found them – green and welcoming to all.
Picnic Spots Stratton Brook State Park, 149 Farms Village Road,
Simsbury – Alongside the picnic hamper, you’ll want to pack the swimsuits, fishing poles and hiking boots when you spend a day in this beautiful wooded oasis. Facilities: Picnic tables, picnic shelters for rent (visit www. reserveamerica.com), bathrooms, changing houses, swimming, fishing, hiking. Wheelchair accessible. Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset Fees: Weekend/holiday fees apply Regulations: Pets must be on leashes Contact: 860-242-1158
Fisher Meadows, 800 Old Farms Road, Avon – This 250-acre site bordering the Farmington River provides space aplenty for open-air family activities. Enjoy miles of hiking trails, fishing, and boating if you pack your own canoe, kayak or rowboat. (No motors.) Swimming is prohibited. Facilities: Picnic tables, limited children’s playground, eight ball fields, free parking, portable toilets Hours: Dawn to dusk Fees: None for picnickers; required only for larger parties or pavilion rentals Regulations: No alcoholic beverages without special permit. No dogs allowed in field areas. All dogs on property must be on a leash no more than 6-feet long with handler holding the other end. Contact: 860-409-4332 Website: www.town.avon.ct.us Continued on next page
34 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
Your Table Awaits Continued from previous page
Elizabeth Park, corner of Asylum and Albany avenues, on
Hartford/West Hartford line — Industrialist and statesman Charles Pond left his property to the City of Hartford with the stipulation that it be used as a horticultural park and named for his late wife, Elizabeth. The city hired the legendary landscaping firm Olmsted & Sons to create the park, and the resulting design includes an internationally renowned rose garden, home to more than 15,000 rose bushes, a pond and bridge, expanses of open lawn, a greenhouse, and a picnic grove. Facilities: Picnic tables, grills (on-site grills in the park’s Oak Grove area are available on a first-come, first-serve basis; no grills can be brought into park), playground, basketball court, tennis courts and baseball fields (tennis and baseball require reservations). Hours: Sunrise to sunset Fees: None for small picnic parties; groups of over 40 require a permit. Any structure such as a tent or shelter requires a permit. Outside catering not allowed. For onsite catering, contact the Pond House or bring your own picnic. Regulations: No alcoholic beverages. Pets must be on leashes. No driving on lawns. No fishing or swimming in pond. Use trash receptacles and carry out what you carry in. No picking of flowers or herbs in park. To allow others to enjoy the serenity of the garden, be respectful of noise levels. Contact: Hartford Parks & Services, 860-543-8767. For general information, phone Friends of Elizabeth Park, 860-231-9443. To reserve tennis courts or baseball fields, and for permits for large gatherings or weddings, phone 860-522-4888 x5912. Website: www.elizabethpark.org
Lake Waramaug State Park in New Preston
Kent Falls State Park, Route 7, Kent
— Before you fill up on fried chicken, hike the recently refurbished ¼-mile trail to Kent Falls, a 250-foot drop of water as scenic as it is refreshing. Facilities: Parking, picnic tables, pedestal grills, bathrooms Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset Fees: None for picnicking Regulations: Pets must be on leashes Contact: CT State Parks 860-424-3200 Website: http://www.ct.gov/dep
Lake Waramaug State Park, 30 Lake Waramaug Road, New Preston — Bring along the family canoe or kayak (or rent either on-site), fish, swim, or just sit and enjoy the water views from a picnic table. Facilities: Parking, picnic tables, food concession, bathrooms Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset Fees: Weekend and holiday fees apply Regulations: Pets must be on leashes Contact: CT State Parks at 860-424-3200 Website: http://www.ct.gov/dep Macedonia Brook State Park, 159 Macedonia Brook
Road, Kent — If you favor a more rustic site and perhaps a vigorous hike before tucking into your picnic hamper, hike the Blue Trail over Cobble Mountain and enjoy your feast amid views of the Catskill and Taconic mountains. Facilities: Picnic tables, picnic shelters for rent at www. reserveamerica.com or call 877-668-2267, bathrooms Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset Fees: No fee for picnicking Regulations: No alcoholic beverages; pets required to be on leashes Website: www.ct.gov/dep
Elizabeth Park in West Hartford
Continued on Page 35 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 35
Pack a picnic: Whether you’re going plain or fancy, paper or plastic, store-bought or homemade, here are some of our favorite finds for this summer’s picnic basket. From left, moving clockwise: two-tone votive, Kitchenworks, Litchfield; green glass oil lamp, Pier One, Avon; fern tall glass, and dainty glass, Stonewell Kitchen, Avon; green Cabo 25-ounce summer drink glass, Crate & Barrel, West Hartford; Tag flatware, Built bottle cooler, and Alexandrie pistachio linen napkin, Workshop, Litchfield; small lime gripper bar board, Stonewell Kitchen; kiwi classic stripe dishtowels and green bamboo salad servers, Crate & Barrel; green fringed pashmina, Workshop; Nicaraguan pine needle hand-woven basket, Comina, West Hartford; Olivia short glass, Stonewell Kitchen; Mariposa bee glass, Comina; natural stick votive, Workshop; bamboo dark green basket and acacia wooden bowl, Crate & Barrel; round green plate, yellow-green fantasia bowl, Workshop; margarita green napkin, Crate & Barrel; leaf plate, Comina; Tag tropical green dinner plate, Workshop; wooden cutting board, Comina; Cayman stripe tablecloth, Crate & Barrel. The food and drink: Hosmer Mountain lemon-lime soda, (visit www.hosmersoda.com); Izze Clementine soda, Whole Foods, West Hartford; Prosciutto and Pomodoro Paninis, Pizzeria Pomodoro, Farmington; cranberry trail mix cookies, and crostini, Whole Foods; Mediterranean Eggplant Medley, prepared according to recipe from Noujaim’s, Torrington. Photo by Jack McConnell Styling by Pamela Howard
Takeout Shops LaSalle Market 104 Main St. Collinsville 860-693-8010
The Pantry 5 Titus Road Washington Depot 860-868-0258
Noujaim’s 281 Winsted Road Torrington 860-618-5733
Pizzeria Pomodoro 1019 Farmington Ave. Farmington 860-678-9500
Hall’s Market 331 Park Road West Hartford 860-232-1075
Bantam Bread Co. 853 Bantam Road Bantam 860-567-2737
36 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
Whole Foods 50 Raymond Road West Hartford 523-8500 and 340 North Main St. West Hartford 523-7174
Your Table Awaits Continued from Page 33
Housatonic Meadows State Park, Route 7, Sharon
– A river runs through it, and campers and fly-fishermen are common sights under the tall pines flanking the Housatonic in this lovely riverbank spot. Facilities: Parking, picnic tables in the Hollister Grove picnic area, bathrooms Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset Fees: No fee for picnicking Regulations: No alcoholic beverages. Pets must be on leashes. Contact: CT State Parks at 860-424-3200 Website: www.ct.gov/dep
Topsmead State Forest, Buell Road, Litchfield
– The former summer estate of Miss Edith Morton Chase offers views of her English Tudor-style home and acres of trails and unpaved lanes for hiking and strolling. From June through October, free guided tours of the house are offered on the second and fourth weekend of each month. Picnickers may picnic informally on the grounds, which include the residential lawns. Facilities: Parking, pit toilets. Hours: 8 a.m. to sunset, June through October Fees: None Regulations: No alcoholic beverages, grills, or open fires. Pets must be on leashes Contact: CT State Parks at 860-424-3200 Website: www.ct.gov/dep
White Memorial Foundation, 71 Whitehall Road, Litchfield – The 4,000-acre White Memorial Foundation is situated in the heart of the Litchfield Hills and comprises a conservation center, environmental education center, and nature museum as well as acres of woodland hiking trails, campgrounds, and picnic sites. The foundation is named for Alain White and his sister, May, who created it in 1913. Facilities: Parking, picnic tables, outhouses Hours: Dawn to dusk Fees: None for picnickers Regulations: Pets must be on leashes, no campfires Contact: 860-567-0857 Website: www.whitememorialcc.org West Hartford Reservoir, entrance on Farmington Avenue,
1½ miles from West Hartford Center (for directions and a map, visit www.themdc.com) – Minutes from bustling West Hartford Center, “the rez,” as it is referred to by locals features stunning woodlands and waterside views. Hikers, walkers, joggers, and cyclists enjoy more than 30 miles of paved and gravel trails. Facilities: Open lawn areas and a few picnic tables along the paved pathways, wheelchair-accessible picnic areas, portable toilets Hours: Dawn to dusk Fees: None Regulations: Pets must be on a leash. Contact: (860) 278-7850 Website: www.themdc.com/talcottmountain.htm
Continued on next page
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S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 37
Your Table Awaits
Elyse Ryan Jewelry proudly presents Alex’s Lemonade watches. Alex Scott, founder of Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation, chose the colors to represent yellow and pink lemonade.
Continued from previous page
Recipe: Noujaim’s Mediterranean Eggplant Medley This recipe from Georges Noujaim, owner of Noujaim’s Speciality Foods in Torrington, is easy, delicious and it makes the best of seasonal ingredients. “What’s so good about it is you can have everything from your garden here, all the ingredients could be locally grown or procured,” he says. The eggplant medley can also be served warm, cold, or at room temperature. Serve it with slices of toasted baguette or pita toast, or folded into a soft wrap.
Ten percent of the proceeds will be donated to pediatric cancer research through Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation. For more information go to: www.alexslemonade.org & www.ElyseRyan.com
1½ medium-size eggplants, peeled and diced 1½ cups diced tomatoes 1 red pepper, halved, seeded and cut into strips to make about 1 cup 3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced 2/3 cup olive oil 2 tablespoons vegetable oil Salt and pepper, to taste Pinch Noujaim’s Seven Spices mix (optional) 1/4 cup chopped basil, for garnish
Bill Selig Jewelers presents
Alex’s Lemonade Jewelry by
Bill Selig Jewelers 712 Hopmeadow Street Simsbury 860-651-0555
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a big bowl, mix all ingredients except basil. Place on a parchment- or foil-lined baking sheet and roast in oven for 25 minutes, stirring twice during cooking. Remove from oven and let cool to room temperature. Mixture may be made a day ahead and kept refrigerated. Garnish with fresh basil before serving. Makes roughly 3 cups of the medley.
Blue Heron
ElyseRyan_Lemonade608.indd 1
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Essay: Steve Metcalf
Duff? Good Enough. By S t e v e M e t c a l f
Now that it’s summer I’m naturally thinking about golf. Only this summer, things are going to be a little different.
A
fter years of struggle and denial, this season I have decided to come to terms with one central and ineluctable fact: as a golfer, I am forever destined to be mediocre at best. MAB to you. There. I’ve said it. I don’t mind saying it feels good to get that particular monkey off my back. For those who don’t play the game, it might be helpful to define what it means to be good at golf, and what it means to be MAB. Being good means that most of your tee and fairway shots are struck crisply, rising high into the air on a majestic arc, and advancing toward the pin on a more or less direct route. Once on the green, the good golfer will line up a putt and decide correctly whether it breaks right or left and will strike the ball with the appropriate force so that it rolls, if not always into the cup, at least in closer proximity to it. The MAB golfer will often fall short of this standard, hitting shots that, in the colorful lingo of the game, would fairly be described as “off-target,” or “errant,” or “beyond pathetic.” A more specialized term sometimes used to characterize these shots is “ground ball.” For reasons that are not fully understood, sometimes these kinds of shots will come in clusters of, say, 12 or 14 consecutive holes. Then, suddenly and almost miraculously, the MAB player will have a “decent” hole. Many philosophers believe these latter holes confirm the inherent cruelty of the universe. To come to terms with being MAB is, far from being humiliating or depressing, actually liberating. For one thing, there’s the question of friends who are better at the game than you. For example I have a friend who is a truly fine golfer. My friend is such a fine golfer that he actually carries a one-iron in his bag. As even you hackers know, there is a famous golf joke whose punch line is that “not even God can hit a one-iron.” My friend can hit a one-iron. I used to wonder, Will I ever be able to hit a one-iron like my friend? But now that I am comfortable with my new MAB status, I can say to myself, “No, Steve, you will never, ever, ever hit a one-iron and you should not spend even one more second thinking about it because you are not getting any younger and it wasn’t all that realistic a wish even 10 or 15 years ago. Try to focus instead on the fact that you can play the piano better than your friend plus you have a nicer car.” Are you beginning to see how this works?
Continued on Page 40
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Photo from iStockphoto.com S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 41
Essay: Steve Metcalf Continued from Page 38 Let’s take another example: equipment. Needless to say, I’m a sophisticated person and not the kind of sad, gullible loser who would be sucked into buying any of those golfing aids you see hawked on TV infomercials. Well, perhaps I’ve been drawn in by one or two of those Velcro swing trainers, just for laughs. And come to think of it, also one of those hinged practice clubs that collapse when you take it back “wrong,” but at four easy payments of $49.95 each, it wasn’t like I was taking food off the family table for crying out loud. Let’s not get all crazy about it. The point is that the MAB golfer no longer has any reason to be tempted by these products. Nowadays, when I drop into Golfers Warehouse, just to while away the odd hour or two, I can relax and just casually walk around in a calm manner instead of frantically searching for some mythical massive-headed driver that will produce that extra 75 or 80 yards off the tee that I’ve been searching for over the past two decades – minimum – and which there is no reason on earth I shouldn’t be able to achieve given that I’m a reasonably coordinated grown man with decent strength and medium flexibility and a certain rugged overall athleticism that has always … I’m sorry, where was I? Ah, yes, equipment. Many men feel embarrassed if they do not have a costly matched set of Ping or Callaway irons in their bag. The MAB player, by contrast, is secure enough to carry more modest equipment and is not all caught up in wondering if strangers, including children, are laughing at him. Women, by the way, are very cool about this. Just the other day, as I was warming up on
42 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
It’s not about beating yourself up when your mechanics inexplicably fall apart and you start spraying the ball in every direction despite years of lessons. It’s about trying your best, being with friends, and stifling the impulse to see how far you can throw a six-iron after your divot travels farther than your ball. the practice green (my usual ritual of leaving every putt a foot or so short in order to prepare for leaving my actual putts a foot and a half short) there was an attractive foursome of female players getting ready to tee off. One of them fixed me and my sharp green canvas golf bag with a look that unmistakably said: “Hey, there’s a guy who isn’t afraid to go out with a collection of mismatched no-name irons, and also an unusually large number of those random all-purpose rescue clubs. I like that in a man.” It should hardly be necessary here to point out that the MAB
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Essay: Steve Metcalf Continued from previous page golfer is freed from the sin of being judgmental about other people’s abilities. This is even true of the celebrity amateurs we sometimes get to see on TV. For instance, Charles Barkley, the eminent former NBA star and thoughtful social critic, is one of the most celebrated athletes of our time. Yet his golf swing is a frightening, spasmodic thing that looks like an old newsreel film with certain key frames missing. Formerly, I felt superior to Charles and his swing, but now I can just accept him as my MAB brother, a man simply trying to enjoy the out of doors with a few friends, albeit for a six-figure appearance fee. By contrast, Kenny G, the golden-tressed purveyor of light saxophone music, turns out to be a true golfing whiz. I used to find his prowess irritating. As a MAB golfer, I can now say without rancor, “Good for you, Kenny G! Now try making some albums that are less trite and redundant!” What I’m trying to say is that even if you’re a famous person, playing golf well does not necessarily equate to living a full, satisfying life. Unless of course you have a handicap in the low single numbers, in which case it actually does.
G
olf, in other words, teaches us that the rich man and the poor man are the same, except that the rich man tends to get complimentary tees at his club and also goes home to a much larger house. The MAB player might, for any number of reasons, decide that he would rather not join a private club. One reason might be the steep initiation fee. Another might be that the monthly dues are quite high.
Fortunately, as anyone who has lived in other parts of the country can tell you, this part of central Connecticut is blessed with an unusually rich selection of public courses. The West Hartford/Farmington Valley area alone boasts a number of fine layouts. As it happens, most of these courses — Rockledge, Blue Fox Run, Tunxis, Stanley are among the ones I like to frequent — are exceptionally MAB friendly. That term means they don’t have a lot of water hazards, they have reasonably wide fairways, and (with the exception of Rockledge) they tend not to have those large elevated viewing areas above the 18th green, where, as you butcher the hole, restaurant patrons can look down on you and feel superior, never realizing that your back was tightening up and you really had to find a bathroom. In closing, the MAB player knows that golf, like so many games that originated in Scotland several hundred years ago, is supposed to be fun. It’s not about beating yourself up when your mechanics inexplicably fall apart and you start spraying the ball in every direction despite years of lessons. It’s about trying your best, being with friends, and stifling the impulse to see how far you can throw a six-iron after your divot travels farther than your ball. It’s about having an activity that you can enjoy into your sunset years, and not worrying about whether it’s normal to increasingly use your driver on par 3s. Of course, some of you probably still entertain the hope of becoming good. If so, I have some barely used Velcro swing trainers in my basement that I would let go at a fraction of their original price. Steve Metcalf, music critic of The Hartford Courant from 1981-2002, is now director of instrumental studies at The Hartt School, University of Hartford.
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Artists Among Us Continued from Page 29 with was my pen, or more accurately my Smith Corona portable typewriter. I signed up for a class with the poet Brendan Galvin at Central Connecticut State University and never looked back. I started writing poetry because my ‘life plan’ to write novels while my babies napped turned out to be fantasy and delusion. It’s still an advantage that poems are small things, mostly. But writing poems is a way of being in the world — observing it and being of it, at the same time — that is both endlessly challenging and satisfying. I write because I must. If I go more than a day or two without putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, my mind and body are not fully engaged with each other or with the world. I’d swear my eyesight blurs, that I stop paying attention to details. The kinds of teaching I do require that, too. Four afternoons a week I teach writing to high-school kids at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts, a magnet school in Hartford. Every student I have walks through the door with stories, observations, ideas that are uniquely his or hers.
I also direct the Sunken Garden Poetry Festival’s Urban Outreach Program, conduct poetry workshops for Litchfield Performing Arts Poetry Live program, and I teach short fiction at the Center for Creative Youth, a residential summer program for artistically gifted high-school students at Wesleyan University. I teach or facilitate programs for adults in a variety of venues. I read at libraries, colleges and universities, bookstores; I publish (to date, three books of poetry, hundreds of poems in individual journals, an occasional newspaper article). I participated in a festival of one-woman shows in New York a few years ago, and that changed how I think about presenting work. I read in the Sunken Garden Poetry Festival in its first season and again in its 10th anniversary season a few years ago. To read in the Garden is, perhaps, the best of all possible places to read, and I never miss going to others’ readings unless I have to be out of town. When my kids were 11, 12, and 2, our family moved to Saudi Arabia for five years. One of the ways in which I think about my life — both personally and as a writer — is to think about the moments and experiences that left me different.
For reasons that remain a mystery, I felt more at home there than I have ever felt anywhere else. One of my current projects, more than 20 years after coming ‘home,’ is a book of short poems about Saudi Arabia. It’s taken me that long to figure out how I wanted to say what I wanted to say. One of the things I really love about being older is the ability to see a larger whole. A 16-year-old student said to me the other day, ‘Did you ever stop to think about the fact that sometimes an entire life hinges on something that doesn’t seem at all significant at the time?’ She was talking about her life and how it had hinged entirely on the fact that someone had gotten a haircut and a shave and showed up at court on time. I was stunned that at 16 she had a full awareness of that remarkable truth. Of course, sometimes it’s a large and catastrophic event that changes a whole life obviously and in a moment. That student couldn’t possibly have known that I think about that all the time, that these days I am preoccupied with it. That phenomenon that she articulated so easily is also something I’d like to ‘get
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Artists Among Us Continued from previous page down on paper.’ It’s a process. I’m certain it will be finished at some point — at least as a writing project. If I’m lucky when I get to the end, I may have created something that’s useful beyond whatever its use has been to me in getting from here to there, from now until then.
Elisa Tenenbaum, Farmington Painter, illustrator, adjunct professor at Northwest Connecticut Community College The paintings I’ve been doing for most of my career are moody landscapes in oil, but I’m embarking on some new work: I’m painting on hubcaps. I’ve always liked the shapes, and some of the elaborate ones that have a frame around them. I just got a bunch of them and am going to do traditional images within them. I like the irony of the context, putting something traditional into contemporary, utilitarian objects. I have throughout my career of painting gone back and forth with botanicals, and even some photography. I can even see doing a landscape on some of these wheel covers, or even Medieval studies. I was raised in Atlanta and attended public schools, and I was always drawing, I loved the activity of drawing and I loved escaping into that world and the privacy of it. I had the idea in my head as early as first grade that I was going to be an artist when I grew up. Being an artist is a vocation more than a career choice — you don’t choose it, it chooses you. But you have to pursue it, you have to work at it. I moved to Connecticut to get my master’s degree at the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford, and I just fell in love with New England. I’m a big advocate of this area. I like the beauty and the history and the emphasis on education, and I feel like I’m surrounded by people who think like me. Some of my first landscapes were done from the cornfields in Wethersfield, with the dirt road running through them. I’m a studio painter, so I really reinvent what I’ve seen, take the gist and the mood of it. These landscapes could almost be anywhere; they are a memory of a place. The most influential thing in the way my work is composed is that I have an identical twin. A lot of my work has a sense of symmetry to it, and I think being born with a mirror image makes that happen. She’s in Atlanta, and she can’t even draw a stick figure. We are really the right hand and the left hand. I’m always aware of the other half and using it to be complete. The actual process of visual problem-solving is very satisfying, going between the planned and the unplanned. It’s a thrill and a kind of high to create something that works, and it’s exciting when something surprising happens in the work that seems to come out of nowhere. It’s extremely satisfying and meaningful, too, when the viewer has a connection with the work. My work starts with a visual idea that I want to see expressed. There’s a strong desire to create the image that is in the mind. That image creates the next one, and that becomes obsessive. When I finished with art school, I did a million different odd jobs for money, and always spent time on my art. I worked at The Hartford Courant for a while as the associate designer of Northeast magazine, where I learned a lot about the world of illustration.Tthen I left The Courant and was able to branch out and do freelance illustration. I was very focused on being able to paint full-time and just pounded the pavement. I hooked up with
“Being an artist is a vocation more than a career choice — you don’t choose it, it chooses you. But you have to pursue it, you have to work at it.” the Chase Gallery [a contemporary art gallery in Boston] and I was with them for 17 years. I was able to make a living because Boston is a big art market, and at one point I was with six or seven different galleries throughout the country. I was at the easel 35 hours a week, and I felt I accomplished much more than I ever thought I was going to. But I got sort of burned out. I’m now teaching part-time at Northwest Community College and painting and doing some illustration. I did some textbook pages for Holt Rinehart for an English literature book, and Max’s Restaurant group is using one of my paintings for a wine label. I live here but I have to say I haven’t had a lot of work here as far as sales and jobs. Now I work almost exclusively by commission. All the illustration jobs I’ve done were for the Boston Globe and The New York Times and 90 percent of my paintings that I’ve sold were sold out of state. However, Connecticut is such a lovely place to live and work, and as long as I’m able to sell my work other places, it will continue to work out. Jane Gordon is a frequent contributor to Seasons
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N O T E S O N N AT U R E
The
Buzz Story & Illustrations By K at h y G o f f
Swallows and Flycatchers swiftly and suddenly change direction during flight in pursuit of flying insects. Barn swallows, wasting no time, are able to eat and drink on the wing.
Y
ou’ve probably already had your first mosquito bite of the summer, and there’s little doubt the season would be much more pleasant without annoying biting flies and harassing, disease-carrying pests and crop-destroying no-see-ums. We’re a little more tolerant of some of our six-legged friends. Without insects as pollinators, food crops could not reproduce and grow. Lacking ants and worms, our soils would be poorer. Bees give us honey, butterflies grace our gardens, and fireflies brighten sultry summer nights. But when the hostas turn to “lace” and the roses wither — and we are scratching and swatting on our patios, it’s a good thing to remember that we do have many natural allies to help control pesky insects. If we are smart about pesticide use and make an effort to go natural with garden and lawn care, these creatures will move into our back yards. Take care of those birds and bees — and they’ll return the favor.
The common toad is a great garden companion and will become accustomed to taking handouts from the friendly gardener who offers a grasshopper or worm!
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S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008 49
Notes on Nature
The Little Brown Bat specializes in catching and feasting on thousands of mosquitoes a day when the bugs are most plentiful. In the northeast, it has become big news that these bats are in trouble – suffering from the mysterious “white nose syndrome,” that has left 80 percent to 90 percent of local populations dead in their winter hibernation caves.
The cause is not yet known, but scientists are investigating everything from climate change to pesticide use. It remains to be seen whether this will become an “ecological disaster in the making,” as reported by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. (For more information, visit www.fws.gov/northeast/white_nose.html)
Migratory songbirds such as this Hooded Warbler time their nesting to the emergence of millions of caterpillars that feed on tender new leaves.
Amphibians are highly efficient insect controllers. Tree frogs, wood frogs and spring peepers move into the backyard trees and shrubs to pursue their quarry – especially in pesticide-free habitats.
What luck to find a Ladybird Beetle on the rose bushes! The Green Lacewing is also a voracious predator that specializes in aphids.
Kathy Goff is a wildlife painter and sculptor with a studio at the Farmington Valley Arts Center in Avon. 860-676-9939 50 S e a s o n s of the Fa r ming t on Va ll ey SU M M ER 2008
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