Category: Uncategorized

Last Sunday was a glorious warm and clear day.  The weather reports for this week and weekend indicated rapid declines in sun and warmth.  So I played hooky from the studio and photo lab and hiked the 45 minutes each way to a slighty more remote beach.  Being in the chillly Aegean, sleeping in the sun listening to the waves, breathing the salt-filled air did more for my soul than mucking about in paint.  The beach is in the center of the photo just beyond the trees.  Not a single soul besides me was wise enough to partake in this most wonderful portion of God
s magnificent creation.  This Sunday is 20 degrees cooler, windy, and completely overcast…I made the right call! Continue reading “It takes a village” →

We took our weekly hike on Friday.  Again we took the bus from Parikia to Lefkes, but this time we turned uphill.  Really uphill – huffing and puffing and sweating uphill.  We passed this hog farm, the largest on the island.  You could smell it, hear the roosters, see the goats meandering about; but the pigs were safely inside during the noonday sun…unlike the crazy Americans walking by.  Not exactly what this Iowa girl is used to as an agricultural reality. Continue reading “What do you need?” →

As you can see, I finally did have my date with David on my last day in Florence.  The line was only 45 minutes long and the weather was mild so it definitely was worth the wait to see the original.  Since two churches had already been viewed previous to my encounter with this masterpiece, I had reached my beauty limit for the day and just headed home on the train instead of viewing any other possible piece of art.  Continue reading “Ciao, Italia” →

  Slowly life is starting to evolve into a new pattern.  We typically tour one day, have classes the next, and then head out again.  Almost every day is art history from 7 to 8 PM, just before dinner.  The professor loves Renaissance art and is transforming us into masters of discernment of eras and spectacular artists.  I now know Pisian romanesque vs Florentine, Gothic vs early Renaissance – and slowly the brain cells are digging  back into the recesses of past learned knowledge.  Every once in a while a word or concept is thrown to my concious mind.  Monday I went to a 2 hour drawing class, a 1 hour drama class, a 2 hour photography class and then the art history.  After dinner from 9 to 9:30 there is a group of about 10 of us who take turns reading Dante’s  A New Life outloud.  Continue reading “My new normal” →