ODE ON A CONCRETE URN

 

Seen at the other end of Tower Grove Park from yesterday's picture. Keats would not have liked my poor joke, but it's what popped into my head. My head should be clearer in a couple of days after I get my lumbar spine blasted on Thursday.                    

VOICES OF SPRING

 

Explosions of tulips in Tower Grove Park. Although it is a city park, there is a private foundation that supports and helps maintain it. Today's background music: https://youtu.be/c3Ywo8Tsyys?si=ckDPPi_brJnDHdff                

BYE TO THE LOU FOR NOW

A last look at tulips in Tower Grove Park before getting back in the air tomorrow. The route is St. Louis - Chicago - Madrid. We have lots of activities booked and the weather there sounds simply gorgeous.              

SAY CHEESE

Nothing wrong with phone cameras these days. Under the right circumstances you can get some very good images. Most of us have heard the saying that the best camera is the one you have with you. Nevertheless, I'd rather have my Fujifilm at my side.

Getting everything ready for the eclipse run tomorrow. The weather looks great. St. Louis will get 98-99% totality but not good enough. We will drive about an hour and a half southeast, where totality will last four minutes. Got my -20 stop solar lens filter. Hope we can find a space.                 

[in Just-]

By e e cummings

 

in Just-

spring          when the world is mud-

luscious the little

lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer

old balloonman whistles

far          and             wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's

spring

and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles

far

and

wee

FAMILY PICTURES

 

Spring is looking pretty good here so far. Tulip beds are all over Tower Grove Park. One area contains fake ruins with a pond and fountain. It is a popular place for individual, family and wedding photography. I was sitting on a bench at some distance with a long lens and couldn't resist this.             

BUT HE WAS GERMAN, NOT DUTCH

This statue in Tower Grove Park is of Alexander von Humboldt, who used to be a Really Big Deal. He was described in the mid to late 19th Century as the last person who knew everything about everything. There are statues of him in many U.S. cities with German populations. His fame, however, has dimmed with the great strides of the sciences.

Here he is surrounded by spring tulips, the quintessentially Dutch flower. I don't think he minds.           

AU PRINTEMPS

West entrance, Tower Grove Park in The Lou. We don't get any nicer days than this.                    

ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT

A well known statue in Tower Grove Park of Alexander von Humboldt. He used to be a Really Big Deal, an idolized figure in the sciences and humanities. You see statues of him around the U.S., particularly in areas with German populations. There is a Humboldt Park near where my son lived in Chicago. He's not so much in vogue any more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_von_Humboldt. I read a fascinating biography of him a few years ago, https://www.amazon.com/Invention-Nature-Adventures-Alexander-Humboldt/dp/1848549008/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1650667258&sr=1-1     

This statue has always seemed a bit odd to me. The pose looks mournful, downcast or simply tired. Don't know what's behind it.

And I don't know what I'll post for a bit. Back in the air this afternoon for some family business. You're probably not interested in pictures of the Philadelphia airport.          

TULIPS IN TOWER GROVE

A shift from Forest Park to my favorite St. Louis park, Tower Grove. It's smaller than Forest Park, the largest urban park in the U.S., but still pretty big, 289 acres / 117 ha. https://www.towergrovepark.org/   It is laid out as a Victorian walking park, full of gazebos, a bandstand, picnic grounds and athletic fields. There is almost always something to photograph.                

JEWEL BOX

This seems to be tulip week at STL DPB. It's the right time of the year in this climate. Now the scene shifts to Forest Park and the Jewel Box, a display greenhouse with an art deco flair. You can rent it for private events or just sit and enjoy the colors.             

THE TULIP HOUSE

The wonderful family in yesterday's post lives not far from us. As mentioned, they grow thousands of tulips around their house and distribute them to the community. The location is no secret - it is in the newspaper article about them I cited. This photo can't show the whole effect. The house is on a corner with gardens wrapping all around. They would make a better neighbor than Mr. Rogers.              

FREAK OF NATURE

I have other photos to show from Ste. Genevieve but this is worth an interruption. It snowed here most of Tuesday afternoon. Our average latest frost is about two weeks ago. Being in the middle of things we get buffeted by air masses moving east from the Rockies, south from the Canadian plains and north from the Gulf of Mexico. This shot was taken from my front porch yesterday. I wonder what the tulips and dogwood will look like by today.             

PANDEMIC IN SPRINGTIME - TULIPS, TWO WAYS

Each flank of Art Hill has a terrace overlooking the sides of the Grand Basin. This year the edges were planted with a riot of crimson tulips. A photographer could find many ways to look at them.  These are just two. It has turned into a glorious springtime week, making it hard to stay inside. I have to go to my office today to work on final details of our stimulus loan application (it's allowed).                

April Is The Cruelest Month

 

So said a very highbrow poet who started out in St. Louis but left as soon as he could.

I was in Grand Rapids, Michigan, yesterday. Why, you might ask? Well, as mentioned Friday, my son Andy and his family are moving in stages to Clare, Michigan, where his wife grew up. Claire and baby Audrey are already there (more about them soon), living with her parents. Andy has to finish the school year teaching in Chicago. So we drove three hours to Grand Rapids, which I knew nothing about, a surprisingly large and pleasant (and cold) town. Claire and Audrey had an hour and three-quarters drive. We spent last night in a house on Lake Michigan owned by the family of a friend of my son, about half way and empty this weekend.

Grand Rapids has this amazing place, the Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park, which I would recommend to anyone. Problem is, they are still getting some snow up here (Andy's car was covered with it in Chicago yesterday morning), resulting in scenes like this. Elliott was a sourpuss but maybe he was right.                    

I (Almost) Never Shoot Flowers

I'm not very interested in nature photography. People and their creations have a stronger pull on me; I'm a city boy. Occasionally, though, something tugs me in the opposite direction. The photographer and teacher Bryan Peterson urges his students to get down on the ground on their bellies, use a wide angle lens, see what's coming out of the earth and what surrounds it. This is a bed of tulips and other flowers at the Missouri Botanical Garden. The photo has a shallow depth of field, out - in - out of focus. I got my shirt a little dirty, according to instructions.

TOMORROW: Arthritis

Valentine, A Day Late and a Blossom Short

This picture technically has something to do with St. Louis. It was shot in my living room. I'm about out of material and need to get out this weekend and shoot some new stuff. Not on the street much during the work week. This will have to do for today.

My first name is Robert so I made my wife a Sponge Bob Valentine card in MS Publisher. I glued bits of sponge to the envelope. She liked it a lot. She got me a book that's a comic look at the many wonders of Latin in the ancient world and modern language. I like it a lot.

By the way, these are tulips, not the traditional roses. Shot with a Lensbaby, of course. I have a set of photos of tulips and lilies, shot over a two-day period, on Flickr, here.