on being with bees
When in the presence of bees, it’s difficult not to wax on about life, love, and purpose, but they do make you sting with awareness of all things family, work, duty and the all too quick passage of time. Like the honey makers, the keeper quietly hummed in the periphery of so many ladies with a quietness that is unique to the most masculine. And then there was the girl-woman – a hive herself – brimming with busy-ness and beauty.
on bees and perspective
Never have met a beekeeper I didn’t like. They strike me as a breed apart and I believe they think they’re special too. But with a quiet charm and disposition that signals “we-do-tricky-work”. I’d say still waters run deep, but bees rarely rest and I guess keepers have to cut and run not infrequently.
Simmer Down Podcast: Going South of the Border for Cinco de Mayo!
This week on Simmer Down, Libbie and Brenda are South of the Border (in their minds) for Cinco de Mayo! Have a listen and get fun facts about Cinco de Mayo and Napoleon. Two great Mexican recipes and plenty of laughs!
grain-fed
Legs. That’s what they called her. She packed the grinder, her six kids and a bag of barley and headed for a hollow in the hills of Kentucky. Three thousand miles and no food save for some milk souring in her oft-trampled bosom. On arrival, she clamped the metal contraption to a beam that held up the dirt floor cabin, fattened the fire. Her upright children whipped the handle one by one to see who could fill a bread pan full of flour fastest. Pancakes griddled on the wood stove. Legs boiled down sorghum from the cane she had harvested in the fields. After feasting, her heavily biceped offspring hoisted themselves through the glassless windows and leapt into the woods.
Woodcut Artichoke
This week we are peeling back the layers of the dear artichoke to reveal just what it is that makes its thorny heart beat. And what better way to introduce you to the artichoke than through the artwork of SCAD professor Marcia Neblett. She is responsible for the intricate woodcut print before you. For those of you who are a bit sketchy on just what a “woodcut” is, let me clarify this medium a little further. A woodcut is a technique in which an artist carves away pieces from a block of wood. Rather than creating artwork from the pieces taken away or using the wood as a canvas, this form of art, instead, makes the wood itself and what remains of it the artwork. The image that is left may then be covered in ink, as Neblett does so skillfully above, and voila! you are ready to print!
the artichoke as anti-dolt
A woman named Steele taught me that artichokes should be used as divining tools. She postulated that you could discern someone’s mettle by observing their eating the densely armored delicacy. So she served them and often.
A Blush Pink and Strawberry Red Love Affair
Growing up, I was surrounded by strawberries, lots of em! They were everywhere, literally, due to my mother quite innocently mentioning how much she liked them. Her simple preference turned out to be the birthplace of an accidental “collection.” EVERYone for seemingly EVERY occasion began to shower strawberry motif gifts on my mother for EVERY single gift giving occasion. It created something of an unexpected, ecclectic strawberry vineyard in our very own home. I, too, was guilty of seeking out and securing every strawberry knick nack imaginable to honor her with, just waiting with anticipation for the next opportune moment to surprise her with another strawberry delight!
strawberry sauce
We all know the pleasures of eating strawberries and some extol their aphrodisiacal properties, but none so well as Madame Tallien. Born to the aristocracy, given six names, and raised by nuns, this strawberry lover survived a march to the guillotine, bearing the fruit (ten) of multiple lovers and husbands (including the notoriously seedy and filthy Napoleon Bonaparte), several stints in prison and all of the great political and social shifts of the late 1700s. A style maven and risk-taker throughout her life, she insisted on bathing solely in the cure-all juice of strawberries.
In Defense of Carrots
“What’s up, doc?” What’s up is that, much to my surprise, I can scarcely find any fine art that focuses on the splendor that is the carrot. So slender, so sweet and so versatile. Why oh why have the artists forsaken you, my friend?!
carrot tops
The elegant and complex flower of common wild carrots (Daucus carota) could inspire a lifetime of art and design projects. If you’re a writer, you might employ words such as umbel, bract and tumbleweed in describing the exquisite bloom that turns on itself exacting a nest shape as it goes to seed.
