Category: Creating Support Networks

Fashion vs. Art

KBB Times Tour 2016-04-19 16.48.46 — The stone lady to my left is part of my *Fashion in Art* tour at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The still is a clip from the NT Times OpDoc piece, *Fashion vs. Art*

One of my coping strategies straddles support groups as well, too, because of the “family feeling” when you serve as a volunteer at the Met. You feel as if you really belong, and the great works of art that you pass on a daily basis welcome you like old friends.

I give a tour entitled Fashion in Art which looks at highlights from the Museum’s collection from a novel point of view. What is the subject wearing? What does it say about the person (or people)? What does it say about the world in which they live? What does it say about how the artist portrayed them?

This still photo is a clip from a documentary about the big Museum splash, the First Monday in May when the Museum is closed so the glamoratti from all over the world can attend the red carpet Costume Institute benefit. In this OpDoc, the film team followed my regular Fashion in Art tour and included several portions of it in the finished documentary.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/15/opinion/fashion-is-not-trivial.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Ffashion&_r=3

An Extended Family 4th of July

“Make new friends, but keep the old!
One is silver and the other gold.“

This couplet is a from poem by the Welsh poet, Joseph Parry (1841-1903). Now best known as a round, it made its first appearance in the 1925 Girl Scout Song Book . This link is to a YouTube version where you can hear a present-day performance of it.*

07 July 4 1.19.44 PM — Three families gather over July 4th to celebrate big birthdays and each other

There was a jolly clamor for this 4th of July weekend celebration.Three families, three eighty-year-olds and three sixty-year-olds are tossing our hats in celebrating a friendship that began more than 65 years before. All these people know each other because two grandfathers both worked at Time, Inc. long ago. One of the grandfathers was in the wedding party when my husband (the other grandfather) and I were married in 1954. Both grandfathers and one grandmother are now gone, but remembered with many great memories and hilarious stories.

Our families always spent Memorial Day weekends and the 4th of July together, adding a third grandfather, known universally as “Uncle Bun-Bun”, along the way. Our children grew up together as cousins, and now the grandchildren are carrying on the tradition.

I celebrate old friends,the fact that my children (four daughters) are all friends, and even better, that the men in their lives all get along. This Senior Warrior counts this joy as a major piece of luck – a significant victory, even.

* The song also appeared in an episode of the TV Series, Boardwalk, a very dark, violent series based in Atlantic City during its mob-controlled heyday.

Three kitties, no waiting!

Three kitties, no waiting IMG_0831

Here’s all three of us, Yin, Yang and me after a long hard day.

I sent this selfie out as a text to all my daughters and the et als, and got back great responses from them all within minutes. The lesson? Don’t sit home “All Alone by the Telephone” …

Some more of the responses; Here kitty kitty kitty…,

Yin (the white one) looks innocent as all get-out. Don’t let appearances fool you. He chases after his brother and picks fights like all brothers do.

The Riddle Song

This song came to my mind as I watched my two tiny foster kittens sleeping, because the silence that falls when these two kittens are sleeping is as intense as the the silence of a baby sleeping. It is a different silence than the simple silence of being alone. What gives it such intensity and what makes it so different from the silence of an adult sleeping are questions that pose a true riddle.

I gave my love a cherry it had no stone, I gave my love a chicken it had no bone, I told my love a story it had no end, I gave my love a baby with no cryin’.

How can there be a cherry it has no stone? How can there be a chicken it has no bone, How can there be a story, it has no end? How can there be a baby with no cryin’?

A cherry when it’s bloomin’ it has no stone. A chicken when it’s hatchin’ it has no bone. The story of our love, it has no end. A baby when it’s sleepin’, has no cryin’.

The Riddle Song is a traditional children’s folk song with many versions.This one was collected by Jean Ritchie, a daughter of Eastern Kentucky and “The Mother of Folk,” who collected songs from her native Appalachia and introduced mountain dulcimer music to the outside world. Jean Ritchie, a senior warrior herself, died June 2, 2015, at the age of 92 in Berea, Ky. NY Times Jean Ritchie obituary.

SAMSUNG — *Cherries Without Stones* – Cherry Trees in the Conservatory Garden, NYC

Warm Cuddly Creatures

Yin and Yang IMG_0822 — Meet my newest “fosters”, Yin and Yang

Although this photo looks quite a bit like a pastry, it actually shows my two foster kittens curled up like a Yin-Yang symbol in their cozy doughnut bed. Yin is the white kitten, Yang the black. My wonderful violist friend, David Yang, has black hair so I chose Yang for the black kitten! Yang likes to drape himself (purring loudly) over my shoulders when I’m working at the computer.

Support networks are critical for older people, whether they live alone or not. These foster kittens are part of the support network I am still creating.

My daughter made a splendid suggestion to help counter my sense of isolation when I was housebound and lonely during the last three months. She suggested that I begin fostering kittens who are waiting to “make weight” (2.5 lbs) for their neutering surgery so they can find permanent homes.

Most of the kittens are strays that have been found wandering in various locations and turned into the Animal Care Centers of NYC. The Center has two main locations, one on the East side of Upper Manhattan, one in Brooklyn. They offer transport and supplies for the kittens, and once you have completed the application and been accepted as a foster facility, you’re set to go.

On the average, I have them for 2-3 weeks, and they are delightful company. People ask me if it isn’t hard to give them up and return them to the shelter. I compare it to grandchildren visiting. You are delighted to see them arrive, and even more delighted to bid them farewell. Learn more by contacting the shelter, but be warned! It’s very hard to resist the photos of these adorable creatures. Animal Care Centers of NYC.