When Buffalo was buried in snow

 We have had only one snowfall this year. It was a big one. 

Now it is safely in the rear view mirror. All we have are the memories.

These were all taken when I was walking in the park.

At least that was the first day. The second day more snow had fallen. And when I tried walking in the park there was no walking to be done! It was the first time I could remember when Delaware Park had not been plowed. A runner agreed with me. The runner and I were the only people in the park foolhardy enough to have a go at taking our exercise under such circumstances. He could never remember the park not being plowed, either.

Since then, no snow. I am wondering if we will have our traditional Christmas Eve snowstorm.

As the Magic Eight Ball would say...

It is decidedly so!

Walking and Talking in Delaware Park

In Buffalo a walk is not a walk. It is an adventure! That is because in our town strangers talk to strangers.

When I go for a walk I do not always talk to everyone. Sometimes I am antisocial. However today is one of those days when I cannot shut up. I think it is because I am a little under-slept. When I could use more sleep, that is when I talk. And I keep talking! 

As soon as I walked into the park I spotted two people putting their skis into their car. I approached them and asked how the snow was for skiing. On account of I had thought about bringing my skis but I had worried the snow was too wet.

I was right as it turned out. "Terrible!" the woman said in answer to my question.

Then we all laughed about times when we had been stuck clumping around on our skis.

Subsequent conversations as I went on my way involved dogs, little kids and that Buffalo classic, the weather. A protester, an Indian guy, was on the pedestrian bridge over the Scajaquada. He was holding up a big sign and drivers kept honking at him. I hung out with him for a while, exchanging views and opinions on world events.

It was windy and when the wind blew, you could almost call it bitterly cold. So there were not many people out. I would venture to say that I ended up talking with most people I passed. 

In between I took some pictures, including the one up above. Is this Siberia? No, it's Buffalo!

David looked chilly standing there in his altogether.

Across the way Mozart had a powdered wig. I did not get to take a picture of that. It was actually not easy to take pictures because the bright light made it hard to see what you were getting in the shot.

The Great Gates of Kiev! I mean of Nottingham Parkway.

I love this iron fending they put up by the Miller Mansion.

And I love the lanterns you pass in the park.

Look at these vistas.

I am so lucky to live where I do!

The unpredictable walk in the park

 

Spring is here. I can tell.

The other day I heard the mourning dove. At first I thought I was imagining it but no!

Then one day it was warm enough so I could open the window for Jeoffry.

I have been walking in the park and the light is different. Today I took the picture up above because I loved the look of the trees against that dramatic sky. It was cold and windy and you can tell from the clouds.

This being Buffalo, conditions vary wildly from day to day. There was one day a couple of weeks ago when we had been buried in snow and the park had not been plowed and what was supposed to be a 45-minute walk wound up being three hours. Ha, ha! That walk in the park was no walk in the park! 

Here are some pictures from that unforgettable day.

Wow, those pictures are cool! They are simple black and white. Even though I was taking pictures in color. That is how you know you are dealing with a classic Buffalo winter day.

The next day the sun was out and all was different.

 

I have never known life to pass as quickly as it is passing these days, I am not sure why that is but it is. Thanks to Google Photos I see that the dates were Feb. 16 and 17.

I am already nostalgic!

From summer to fall

 

Yikes, all at once it is Autumn~!

That ~ symbol ended up there by mistake but I like how it looks so I will leave it there.

Just a few days ago it was warm, sweltering even, and I drew that little sketch up above. Actually the sketch is about a foot long. I drew it in my Long and Narrow sketchbook which I choose to use when I want to have fun.

I did that sketch at Wilkeson Pointe on Buffalo's Outer Harbor. I was there with my friend Ryan and we had noticed how cool these people looked walking on this ridge. They were silhouetted against the sunset and looked like shadows. The woman second from the front was wearing a sari and I did try to get that sari in there. It is fun working in ink because there are no second chances but also you do not erase and fuss over things too much. 

Anyway there it is, my portrait of people walking along the ridge at Wilkeson Pointe!

I like any drawing I did that I can look at and say: That is pretty much what I saw. This drawing does that.

Soon I will be going back to drawing at least some of the time in my car. How things change! The other night I made it to the Outer Harbor but it was, I must admit it, pretty chilly.

Today I wore a scarf when I went walking in the park. I took this picture.

 

 

I met my brother George and he had a knit cap. It was one of those days in Buffalo when you saw people in shorts and people in parkas.

I am working on getting Christmas cards printed! There, I said it ... Christmas.

It is closer than you think!

Skies I have seen

The skies these days have been striking!

In that last picture I did not mean to showcase the sky.

 But just look at it!

The sunset tonight

I had to post this picture.

I was just getting ready to take a peek at the Metropolitan Opera's free opera tonight, which is "Der Rosenkavalier," and you know me and that opera. But suddenly out the window I saw these pink clouds.

All I could think of was, "And you will see the Son of Man coming on a cloud." However these were in the west, not the east.

In any case, beautiful!

I am always watching the sky. When I was a baby I would look for the moon in the sky in the middle of the afternoon. I would spot it. My mother remembered once I was saying "moon" and they thought they were not understanding me right. I was pointing at the sky.

And sure enough!

There was the moon, up in the blue sky.

Anyway, these clouds, this sunset.

They made my day!

Our wacky spring

We are having a wacky spring here in Buffalo! In addition to everything else.

I took the picture up above walking in Delaware Park a couple of hours ago.

When I got home I took this picture.

That was out my back window!

You know one thing, walking in the park I thought how much I was appreciating what I saw.

This is my time of year!

I like weird weather!

Midsummer ... I am child of the summer, born on June 1, but summer is not my time. It would be, maybe, if I lived somewhere else. I love swimming, I love summer clothes, I love being able to walk around in long dresses and sandals. However...

There is something about the brooding weather that I love. The silence. The freedom to be with your own thoughts. The mists.

I cannot help it!

With which we give you Prince, "Sometimes It Snows In April."

Springtime in Buffalo

For a man-made lake, you know, Hoyt Lake is not bad!

I love walking in the park and it takes me about 20 minutes to get to this lake but that is going the long way. If I went the short way it would be more like 10 minutes.

It can get mighty quiet around Hoyt Lake this time of year. A miracle in Buffalo! This is where I learned the chirp of the red-winged blackbird. I love that bird's harsh drawn-out call. That is the sound of summer.

You can see the spring in the picture up above! And in this one.

On the other hand I took these pictures just last week. Heck, not even a week ago! Four days ago.

You will notice there are more wintry pictures than spring pictures. I am afraid I prefer the weather the wintry way when you get down to it. I have many more pictures that I took on cold days than on beautiful idyllic summer days.

I loved taking that wintry walk four days ago. It was colder than a well-digger's ass, as Tom Waits would put it. Well, not quite as cold, but I love quoting that song. And it was just about as cold.

There was nobody in the park! I ran into one gentleman going east when I was going west. We said good morning, as Buffalonians will.

Then he said, "Beautiful day."

And I agreed.

It was!

I am trying to see if I took pictures on the drizzly day I walked this week. Yes! I did!

Another shot.

I do love brooding days! Here is another.

This is a Buffalo spring for you. My brother Tony described it well once. He said that in spring in Buffalo it is as if winter and summer are in a battle for every single day. That is true.

And you know what the say about March. It comes in like a lion and goes out like a lion.

I am fine with it.

The infamous Christmas feast

That picture looks wild but it is just something I snapped out the window on our way to see my sister Katie last night for Christmas dinner.

They live in East Aurora, aka the Snow Belt. They got snow. We did not.

It was exotic to me and so I took another picture.

At my sister's house disaster hit. I could not stop eating!

I started with split pea soup my brother George brought in a Crock Pot. He set the Crock Pot down on the floor near the Christmas tree and you had to go help yourself there.

Then we sat down at table and the food just kept arriving!

My sister's husband, David, is a hunter, and there was venison. Venison like fine steak, pink in the middle and sliced really thin and enjoyed, at least in my case, with horseradish.

There were mushrooms that David foraged. And Katie made some kind of dish involving what I believed to be roasted pears and onions -- delicious.

A platter of turkey showed up. And David is also a fisherman and served the most delicious steelhead trout. Howard thought the trout was the most delicious thing there and that was saying a mouthful.

Speaking of mouthfuls we also had a huge bowl of mashed potatoes, yummy with the mushrooms. A beautiful big salad with pomegranate and blackberry vinaigrette. I cannot remember what else. The thing is, dishes just kept showing up, one after another.

After dessert, which I will not even get into, I was so stuffed I could not move!

I asked my sister if I could help wash the dishes just because I wanted to get on my feet and move. She said no and then brought some cranberry liqueur a friend had made. And we had that.

There was also a great Crock Pot full of Celestial Seasonings Bengal Spice, our favorite. That was the only thing I consumed that had no calories.

As Neil Young sang, ohhhh, the damage done!

Today all I wanted to do was be on my feet. So it being Boxing Day I boxed up tons of things I did not like any more and that were getting under foot and I took them to Amvets. I managed to get out of Amvets without buying anything to take home to replace the stuff I had delivered, which is what I usually do. I parked way across the parking lot so I would have a hike.

Later I thought: Uh, Mary, you could just go to the gym, you know?

Gym? What's a gym?

It is the Second Day of Christmas.

Fa la la la la la la la la.

A walk in the park

I went for a walk yesterday in Delaware Park and I could not stop taking pictures.

The colors were just so beautiful!

I took the picture up above, I think, on my way home. But before that I took other pictures.

The one is slightly different from the one up above. I think it was taken a few minutes earlier.

Then there is this.

Such exquisite pictures! I am sorry, I am not being a big ego. Taking pictures like that is stupid easy these days. You just aim your phone in the general direction and hit the shutter, or whatever it is they call it now.

It is almost a pain because you feel obliged to take pictures wherever you go. Pennario told me that back in the day when he made concert tours all over the world he did not bother. He said, "Because the pictures in my head were so much better than any pictures I would have taken." Which, I totally understand that.

But now that we have these darned phones, you cannot help it.

You have to take pictures!

So you are skiing, or whatever, and all of a sudden you have to stop and fish in your pocket for your phone and take a picture. Well, I have to fish in my pocket. Other people probably have their phones more accessible. Whatever, it is a pain.

Until you see the pictures. I have to say this, I am looking at that sunset picture and I like it.

I am a camera!

Walk in the park

It is amazing how just on a normal morning walk you can take inspirational photos!

I am proud of the one up above. It cries out for a quote.

"And I will go unto the altar of God, to God Who gives joy to my youth."

"Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning."

"Tut tut, I think it's going to rain."

"I think that I will never see/A poem lovely as a tree."

(Well, I thought this tree was lovely.)

"Let the sun shine in!"

What can you say, when you're an artist, you're an artist.

I am an artist!