Travel Journal: San Diego November 27-Dec 6

There was fabulous frost forming everywhere the morning we left to drive to San Diego.

I had packed the night before; Bernie had some business to attend to.
 We would leave sometime in late morning, which scheduling allowed me a  small window of time in which to enjoy the scattered frost spangles before departure time.

So which is it:
Lace?
Embroidery?
Fine jewelry?

I thought this design looked particularly like a diamond brooch.
Nice use of baguette shapes, God.

It would have been even better if I had take the time to set up tripod and paid attention to settings while I was taking the shots.
I just wasn't sure when Bernie would be done with his conference call so I kept the photo shoot simple.

There will be frost again....
:-)

Frost again this year on dandelion puffs?
Well, who can say.

I suspected that this might be the last of green + frost for this year.
Winter will come to Salt Lake while we are gone.

Then we were off, driving south and west, through the desert valleys where fog lingered late in the low areas.

It is a lovely part of the drive back home.
A night was spent in Las Vegas, breakfast was consumed and in the morning we were on the road once again.

Each trip "home" is different and yet the same.
The feel of the visit changes slightly each time.
We lived in San Diego for "all our lives", that is, all our lives, up until fifteen years ago.
My parents, and Bernie's remaining parent, his Father, still live in San Diego.
As long as they are there, San Diego still is home.

My focus, emotional and visual, ranges between old familiar territories and spaces, and new territory, places, spaces which beckon me to come explore.

Something as simple as a garden globe reflects the house that Bernie grew up in, and where I conceived our son and where we raised our children for four years...
I am that twenty something woman raising those babies again in my mind.
 That baby boy who is now bringing his own baby boy over to the house to visit with Bernie's father, the boy's grandfather, the baby's great grandfather.
I am the young mother.
I am also now the grandmother.
In the layers of focus, I am both.

The visual image is as layered as my mental image is of all that this time and place holds.

I am in the center of the picture...the sky, the sun, the house, the pool feed me memories of years gone by.
Like all memory places, the mental reflections are also layered around me.
Getting perspective takes time, truing the perspective takes longer.

I enjoyed being outside in the late autumn sunshine, while also ruing the fact that once again, I had neglected to heed the inner voice of wisdom that suggested I bring along a tank top and shorts when I packed, even though the weather channel claimed San Diego would be unseasonable cold.
I borrowed a tee shirt from Bernie to wear.
It flaps around me, hiding my form as I lean into the outdoor space.

Standing back, I mostly see the sky reflection.

What will I and my camera find to capture this trip?
Which memories, what milestones will this visit present?

In San Diego, it is autumn still.
 I am in San Diego, a place where it seems that winter never truly comes.

 

Celebrations: Crimson Harps

And so it begins...

The Salt Lake City yearly Christmas season of free celebrations!

Our Sunday newspaper has an entire section devoted to the arts and the listing of weekly events around town is already lengthening.

My calendar could get full very quickly.

It is simply a matter of making the small effort to go to the free events and enjoy, rather than stay at home lounging about as usual.

Last Wednesday was a free harp concert at the University of Utah.

 

Six student harpists playing an assortment of music ranging from traditional carols to the Casino Band Song, which was the background music in the first Star War movie's bar scene.

I had clipped out the announcement and gotten Bernie on board with going. This time I double checked my day and time, and airily told him the concert would be held up on Presidents Circle, which I believed was near the State capitol building.

Good thing he check that location information as actually the concert was held on the University campus, which isn't even close to the State capitol.

Once we made it to the Presidents Circle we were forced to ask passing student where the specific building was; two of them pointed to the other side of the circular roadway and told us it was one of two buildings.

We parked and walked in the misting rain up steps to one building and then to another where the concert was found in progress.

The picture above was my view upon opening the doorway to the Thompson chamber music hall.

The University's colors are red and black, hence the groups name being Crimson Harps.

Rather poetic name, don't you think?

The six students looked angelic and so lady like in their black dresses.

Gentlemen accompanied them on cello and trombones for some pieces.

Cello and harp is such a rich sound combination.

The non-traditional Santa hats and light strings let us know that they were quite merry.

Here's a brief video from the concert:

The music was heavenly.

The musician's hand and body movements were so graceful as they played.

It was hard to imagine that these were all student musicians.

Don't they all look happy?

I could hardly wait to get up close to the instruments after the concert.

Note card worth scenes.

I could picture any of the harps being the subject of a Christmas card picture.

The carving....

We kept looking and looking at all the details.

The painted details were beautiful as well.

I was able to talk a bit with this harpist.

She explained that the harps stay in the music rooms, and are rarely taken home.

I asked how old she was when she got her first harp.

She was eight.

She carefully explained that her first harp was what was called a lever harp which required manual tone shifts.

This harp had the pedals on the floor.

Another person standing by was laughing about how during one song the pedal action had all the girls nearly bouncing as they played.

Her fellow musician likewise got her first harp at age eight.

That just blows my mind.

How cool would it be to have a daughter playing the harp in the background in one's  home?

A young friend or relative came forward to bring tribute flowers to the young musician.

There were quite a few children like this girl attending, children with various developmental disabilities.

They all seemed spellbound by the music, just like we were.

The Chamber Music room was beautiful with gilded trim and tall windows.

Now that we know where this room is, I think we will be going to other Chamber Music concerts when they are offered.

Can't beat the price...we just had to pay 50 cents for parking in front of the building.

The rain had picked up a bit as we drove away.
Rain on pavement at night makes for such beautiful light reflection.

The University is above the city.

The night cityscape scene will only get better as the Christmas season progresses with more and more Christmas lights added everywhere.

Our date night ended with a fro-yo run.

Root beer float flavored frozen yogurt is delicious!

And for anyone interested, here is what was played at the concert.

 

(A side note:  My iPhone, which I usually use to read blogs, is currently not allowing me to comment on other blogs. It seems to be another dratted Google+ related issue. I am reading blogs regularly, and if you are wondering at my silence it is due to the issue rather than from lack of interest your blog.  Hopefully I can get to the bottom of this issue soon!)

November's Note Card Party

It is unusual for Hannukkah to begin on Thanksgiving, but that is going to be the case this year.

So here is my

"Happy Thanksgivingnnukkah"

note card!

This year our family will be celebrating Hannukkah as always.

It is a little unusual for Christians to do that, but then again Christ himself made a point of attending the Feast of Dedication:

"And it was at Jerusalem the Feast of The Dedication (Hanukkah), and it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon's porch" John 10:22-23 (KJV).

Can't really come up with a good reason not to celebrate something HE celebrated!

Even our cats enjoy Hannukkah!

We originally began lighting candles because Bernie had gone to Israel before we were married and returned home with this Hannakkiah, or Hannukkah candle holder.

Once we were married, and had kids, I thought we might as well use it.

Cultural, Biblical exposure for the kids, if you know what I mean.

Candles, some chocolate coins, some spinning tops...how hard could it be to do Hannunkkah?

Later we studied some more and came to a deeper appreciation of the Feast.

You might know the back ground story:

The Greeks, and more specifically, the Greeks who were inhabiting Syria, began to persecute the Jewish population in Israel.

The persecution culminated in the Syrian Greeks entered the Jewish temple and desecrated it with pigs blood and placing a statue of the Greek god Zeus on the Temple alter for worship.

This was the final insult.

An old priest and his sons decided to fight against the Greeks.

They rallied the Jewish people.

The Syrian Greek army was the top army of the day while the Jewish people were a small population untrained in warfare.

It took more than 20 years but eventually the Jews won.

The first thing they did after defeating the Syrian Greeks was to re-enter the Temple, cleanse it, and light the Glory lamp that shone day and night.

They only had a sparse amount of the kind of refined oil needed for that lamp and it would take eight days to make more pure oil.

The sparse amount miraculously burned eight days.

Sometimes I wonder what it would take for us to finally fight back when our Holy places are desecrated.

I think we Christians are a very small band now and our spiritual warfare skills are weak.

Hannukkah reminds me to trust in God.

As we light the lights, we remember...

"And God said: Let there be Light"

"There was a pillar of Light by night"

"I am the Light of the World"

"You are the Light of the World"

The scriptures are full of  phrases about Light.

Each night as we light our candles, we mediated on Light, from the Creation of Light in Genesis, until the Light that replaces the Sun and the Moon in Revelation.

The Battle against Evil has been won.

And yet we are still in the midst of the battle.

I blogged our yearly Hannukkah meditations HERE.

I am already getting excited about our Hannukkah celebration this year!

Maybe this year you will want to enjoy Light along with your Thanksgiving!

I am linking to Vee's Note Card Party, do drop by her blog and enjoy seeing what other "note card" photos folks are sharing this month!

Nice try Tate.

Two snowfalls are forecast for this weekend, sent down here by our friends up in Western Canada.
Yes, you.
You know who you are!
(Good thing I like snow, right?)
I am thinking the last of the fall colors will be done for in our garden after these storms. 

Surprisingly to me, our coral bark Japanese maple is still pumping out bold colors out in the north facing front of our house.

We only have one coral bark out front despite my oft stated request that we have at least three, and preferably five out there.
They tend to be rather spindly trees and so Bernie keeps putting me off saying he is waiting to until he can find robust specimens for us.
Me...I just want them for their red bark which looks so great in snow, and the vibrancy of the foliage, and I want them NOW.
(Good thing one of us is patient...)

My front window view includes our across the street's neighbors tree, where birds perching at sunset becomes a silhouette art form.

Snow has already fallen five times here.
The chrysanthmuns are none the worse for wear for being trimmed in the white fluff.

Kind of a pretty alternate look, yes?

Last snowfall left about two inches on our deck for the day.
Silly old Tate went out and raced up the ash tree, then when he stopped, he was apparently baffled by the snow.
Acted like he had never seen the stuff before.
(He's our one cat who routinely goes out to race around in the stuff when it is up to his shoulders.)

He mewed pitifully for help, easing a white socked paw down a few inches then backing back up again.

It was a total performance on his part.
I've seen him leap down from there without a blink many a time.
This time...oh the sad story of snow and cold and so scared.

This went on for quite awhile.

There was absolutely no way we were going to get out a ladder out on the snowy deck to "rescue" him, regardless of how sad he mewed.
Bernie and I watched for awhile then went inside for coffee.
Deprived of his audience, Tate scrambled down the tree and came inside too.

That last snowfall...is pictured above.
The two coming ones could drop a lot more snow according to the "special" weather statement for here.
Now this is a fine howdy doo.
Bernie is golfing in Charleston with his work buddies this weekend (and if it wasn't a "work" related weekend I would have gone to Charleston with him!)
I told him I was up to shoveling the driveway three times, and after that I plan to fire up our new snow blower.
He gave me directions on how to start it, directions that included references mechanical parts that I have never heard of before.
Oh oh.
Well, maybe I can plead to my son for assistance, using that "your old dear mother needs help" routine if need be.
(Tate isn't the only one who can do drama around here.)
Jeff's never used our new blower either. 
This could get really interesting!

So how does your weekend look?
Is Canada sending anything "special" your way?

PS:  This morning I was listening to a talk radio show where the hosts were quizzing folks about general topics.   When asked to name a country that began with the letter "C", one fellow named Syria.  
The other three people really struggled to come up with a country too.
 I think Croatia got named. 
I think Canada needs to do some more advertising in America?
Or is this snow a way to remind everyone about the big "C" country to our north?