After The Fires... Sonoma County

after the fires... Sonoma County

driving up and down dirt roads where one of my son’s friend lost his place and the whole area in which he lived burned....80 acres.... clearing the landscape...

even burned and brown i can imagine its magnificence prior.... and what i hope in the future will recover ... the land and wild landscape...

it is overwhelming to see what Fire can do.... after being here three times since 2017 after the fires and taking images.. and walking amongst the remains..i feel how deeply painful it is.... it's hard to lose a home.. but it's the belonging of memories.... things that are irreplaceable that are so moving........ one can rebuild, but you can not recover.. family albums. and treasures of history from a life time.. to see the remains of just a standing hearth, pictures on a wall and a found mug, or items on the ground charred . it literally takes my breath away.... i stare with disbelief what mother nature can do....

i am humbled.. and yet honored to come ... and bear witness to this tragedy again and again..not forgotten just because the fire was put out...

coming from the North East.. i have never experienced this....

one nite we lost power for a few days bc of gale force winds.. i packed up everything i had put it in the car and was prepared to leave..... it subsided on day two and we were good to go...blue skies , warm temps as if it never happened........ but i can’t imagine living with this.. being on guard and ready during october.. i guess like they do in the islands during hurricane season....

before 2017 there were no fires for many years..... one can’t know if this is what it will be moving forward.... and should one go or stay.. it would be hard to uproot from a community of friends and a life..

me i go home to NY but to see .. witness ... it lasts like a scar

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Full Of Bliss

Last sunday morning bovina, ny

while a city girl.. i love the country ...the sea just as much......
i spent my college years in New Hampshire... unknown to many, i actually was in Ag school surrounded by cows ...I had dreams to be a vet, then a midwife.. long story why neither happened... )..
and so when i come up here to my brothers i love all the silos and barns..... he has a wonderful old barn..... and property... and i have to say what a break from the insanity of this world. covid,politics, fire.. all things pressing on my chest and creating anxiety.............

here i walk all over the property.. as an eagle soars above.. the fog lifts over the pond.... i walk to the barn. art studio... ride in a golf cart bumping over everything and laughing.. singing..... and i forget..... and I remember what it feels like to be full of bliss...

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i will find the laughter and joy because that is what we must do

since the beginning of the stay at home policy... i have been watching my once hefty ,fully animated ,love of life cat...Poo disintegrate into a skinny , vulnerable version of himself.

for a bit he was still bringing me a chipmunk or bird.... but now he has really gotten worse.. lots of tests.. Cancer.. and not much more than i've already done can prevent the inevitability of losing him

our pets are like our family.. and especially now living home alone during a time of already increased isolation it is going to be so difficult to lose the extreme comfort and companionship of having him around....

but that is about to end.. and each day i try to get used to the idea.. sometimes strong. sometimes crying..... no way around it.. it is going to be a deeply sad for a time... but the best gift i can offer is to let him go in peace and with all the love i have to give..

in the midst of this sorrow and helplessness.. the other day i walked out back and found one tender , seemingly newly being built nest on the ground.. the wind was up the day before so i'm assuming it fell down... later in the day i found one more......what a coincidence or was it.....

i could only feel this so symbolic... a reminder.. that in life there is death.. in death there is life.... like the eggs of new birds that might have used this nest for hatching...

kind of like this pandemic..... it's been a harsh reality on so many levels.... the obvious and what is so undeniably understandable going on beneath the surface...

what i know?? I've survived many things.... in the midst of my greatest hardships i've endured.. found joy.... laughter and life.. and while i will soon say good-bye very soon to my precious poo.. i will find the laughter and joy ...because that is what we must do

My Other Mother

Mother’s day : a re-telling of my other mother :

i am thinking a lot about what it means to be a mother, to have a mother, the many people that nurture others like a mother........ even the faces you looked up into as a child associating caregiving.. nurturing. mothering ...

a couple of years ago i came upon a pretty large group of black housekeepers/ nannies... looking after white babies, in the park... they were all clearly bonded..chatting away, laughing.... and looked very joyous with the children they were taking care of

i spent some time just watching and then talking with them.. ..... taking a few images.. and it made me think a lot about my own early childhood from birth to twelve... when i was raised by a Haitian woman from Port Au Prince, named Jeanne Felix

i was the 3rd consecutive child born to my mother, who was used to living in the city and now having three small children under the age of three was living in the suburbs, a life she admits for a long time she did not relate to.

while she spent two years at home with my brothers, when i was born she decided to go back to school to get her masters in music...( she was an accomplished classical pianist) and my mother while caring, loving and closer to me from college on, was not someone i associated with motherhood early on.....I didn't have some of the same memories others had, not even my brothers.... ... but it was the arms i was put into...... Jeanne... big strong arms, big strong personality....... the person who i spent most of my time with, that i have some of the strongest of memories

i kind of told myself.. or rationalized that it was ok i was being placed with someone else to care for my feeding , bathing, bedtime.. that it was ok..because my parents were humanists.. and they definitely were.. very much so...and I am proud of them for that throughout all of their lives... and at that time they travelled back and forth to Haiti to bring over Jeannes grown children .. who then did make a life and flourish here in NY.....

so then began the largest part of my upbringing with Jeanne.... West Indian markets... Creole songs and folktales, watching Lawrence Welk show on her bed... .... visiting with her family at that time on Riverside Drive, which had a huge Haitian community.. i sometimes even spent the weekend....

it then came as no surprise later on that i had a deep connection to black culture.. especially to West Indian life... where i found myself traveling to many times,as often as i could gather the money to do so.... ...to an obsession with a collection of West Indian and Haitian art... vintage postcards, books...memorabilia........ and to where my photography began......... shooting in Jamaica every few months for several years.. and then on to other islands....countries..... and my consistent desire to always return.. bc it has a special piece of my heart.. that feels home to me in some deep way......... i know it is began from my life with Jeanne.....

so in great part.. Jeanne while not the most affectionate person.. she was the one that instilled a love.. a passion. a sense of being that has remained with me throughout my life.... and in fact she too in some ways was also my mother...

and as i have some discomfort for historical reasons when i see black women raising white babies... (albeit there are lots of latino, european nannies... etc.. ) ......but i guess what I’m reflecting on.. considering... is the mixed bag of feelings i have had about this time period in my life...how it came to be so many came to raise others children, leaving their own at home, in search of a new or better life... to make money .. to send home.. it kind of tugs on me from all different angles.. a bit too deep and complicated for FB...but i admit i sometimes felt ashamed that my mother did that...chose to have someone else basically raise me until 12... but i knew no different... i didn't make that choice.. and she had her valid reasons for continuing on her own path. maybe in the end i was the lucky one.. it taught me tolerance.. acceptance of culture.. religion... (Jeanne was a bit into voodoo)... i think I’ve always been open bc of that to others....

what i DO KNOW.... is that we owe a huge huge debt of Gratitude for all those nannies out there.. many who left places they loved, lived.. to nurture others...

THANK YOU Jeanne felix (that is Jeanne with me in the first photo) .... for taking such good care of me and giving me my love of black culture and the West Indies that has stolen my heart... and to the seed that you planted that has since flourished, and continues to flourish through my photography

Ironic i ended up with a Rasta boy, or is it???

( i have been on a quest to figure out how i can find jeanne’s family in Brooklyn and NY, and to continue some further photographic work with some individual nannies).. in part to tell their stories.. and at the same time in part to discover my own.

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Teach Your Children

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztVaqZajq-I
teach your children

so often during these many months.. ...i think about the generations that come after us...my sons generation and all the
generations that come after him...

What kind of world are they coming into??? what will they inherit from us??

i've had a good life.. and I surely hope for many more years to come.... but i worry about the future i may not be a part of....

part of our legacy , responsibility is to create the pathway..to a better world.. more compassionate, socially just, economically healthier, too much to list..... but i tremble with fear at what is possible if we don't turn out this vote.... stay loud...

sometimes i feel the Democrats are too quiet... but mb they are doing that so we can watch this man strangle himself in his own bile.

I remain hopeful, but realistic... i know we are threatened.. seriously so... this man is planting seeds of a civil unrest.. red and blue...

we need to stay strong.. determined..focused.. united.

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