Post #199: As long as I can create, I can survive

The air is pure and clear; the sky a cloudless powder blue. It reminds me of the sequence in Walt Disney's "Fantasia" set to Beethoven's "Pastoral Symphony". It's truly paradisiacal (if that's actually a term). My son's bookcase is filled with books on art and architecture plus an entire shelf of writings by Italo Calvino, our favorite author. What more could I want? Well, I do miss my East Coast friends and occasional bad weather. There's a limit to how much perfection one can take.

My grandson and my daughter-in-law came back from their long stay in Patagonia. My daughter-in-law is a clay artist. She will make plates and I will etch drawings onto them. We will take them to market and see what happens. I'll be 94 in a few months and need a last act.. a finale for a long and interesting life.

As long as I can create, I can survive.

Post # 198: Face Time

 

"Looking out to the Sea" - Composition Renee & Ned Kahn

I’ve relocated to my son Ned’s hilltop house in Sebastopol, California. Ironically, my mother came from Sebastopol in Czarist Russia, an idyllic seaside resort on the Black Sea. She remembered it as a Garden of Eden where you could reach out of your bedroom window and pull in a handful of grapes for breakfast. Until the pogroms came - and it turned into a circle of hell. Nothing lasts forever and I‘ve  learned to keep my psychological bags packed, just in case.

The idea of leaving my home of sixty years was almost inconceivable. I had a beautiful studio overlooking woods, with civilization (Dunkin’ Donuts and a liquor store) within walking distance. I’ve always had an open door policy and friends  were welcome to turn up whenever they liked. My late husband (a clinical psychologist) used to call it my “only child syndrome”.  But, here I am in Sebastopol, California, another Garden of Eden like my mother’s home town. Maybe that’s how it got its name; no one knows. Meanwhile, I’ve been kicked out of one Paradise and we’ll see how well this next one goes. Visitors welcome. It’s my last move and I just got a new library card.

> Post #197: Living in Paradise

I am writing this blog from my son’s house in Sebastopol, California, the contemporary equivalent of the Garden of Eden. If it had been left to me, I would still be living on Webb’s Hill Road in Connecticut, my home for over sixty years. But fate and a booming real estate market have determined otherwise. Fortunately, my sons live in the Bay Area and have offered to take me in. They both live in what can only be described as preambles to Paradise.

Beautiful clouds are rolling towards me from the Pacific ocean. I'm currently working on metal collages made up from scraps found on the ground from my son's workshop. If you put a pinback on them, they can be worn as jewelry. Plus I am back to my old paper plates series, multi layered and more interesting than ever.

I miss you all, and my studio in Stamford, however, life is an adventure and let's see where it takes me!

Post #196: Conjuring Up Meyer Lansky

Most of my readers have never heard of him. You need to have grown up in NYC during the 20s and 30s to know the name. He was the Money Man for the mob, on a par with Lucky Luciano. He made them all rich and respectable. My cousin Rose was married to one of his cronies, Willie L., who went from being a bootlegger to a respectable multi millionaire liquor wholesaler with a penthouse overlooking Central Park.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

Anyhow, as many of you know, I work from my sub-conscious, rarely pre-planning work. A few weeks ago, I started a new panel, about 30”x 54” and who should show up but Meyer Lansky, banker for the mob. The one who made them all wealthy. How do I know it’s Lansky? I “googled” him. What else?  Frankly, he’s a monster, a golem, and I don’t want him around. A friend offered to take him home with her with the caveat that she can put the canvas in the dumpster if he causes trouble.

By the way, I looked Lansky up on line and saw that an ex girlfriend wrote a book about her long love affair with him, claiming he was sweet and kind (and very, very rich.) and he looks just like the guy in my painting!