Thanskgivng Day

Unlike past Thanksgiving Days no family members close by and I could not visit any. Nevertheless, the day was spent in giving thanks.

Children are spread around the globe. A son in Afghanistan, his family in Virginia, and a daughter in New Mexico, and brother and sister and their families also spread about the country makes a family reunion difficult. The telephone, however, did unite the family somewhat. The son in Afghanistan tried to call, but did not make contact until Friday. Daughter and daughter-in-law were easier to contact and we talked about children.

After a person gets a certain age holidays and other celebrations lose their impact. The exception being birthdays and achievements of grandchildren. But, the holiday season, as it is now known, means little to me. I am not at all interested in Black Friday or Cyber Monday. I have been trying to think of what I would need that would drive me to stand in line early on a frosty morning and get trampled by greedy shoppers? Can't think of anything.

Nevertheless, I am thankful. I am thankful for a loving family, for longevity, for the comfort and abundance I have and for being able to sit down at my desk in retirement and write stuff like this.

Jannette Walls

If you have not read the two books by Jannette Walls about her family, you have missed reading two extremely engrossing stories.

The first book is the The Glass Castle: A Memoir (Simon & Schuster). This is a story of her childhood and eventual escape from the problems of two very strange parents. To say that Jannette was neglected is not accurate. Both her parents, Rex and Rosemary, loved their children, but dad was alcoholic and mom lived in an unreal world.

Walls tells of her three sisters and brother coping with parents who were unsettled and lived delusional lives. Beginning in Arizona and then migrating to Nevada and on to California then back to Arizona, the family never knew what "adventure" or disappointment was next.

They eventually go to West Virginia, Rex's native state, where life gets worse. The three older children finally find their way out of the poverty and despair of their West Virginia home to find their own lives.

The second book is one every reader will find this a gripping story. However, the second book, Half Broke Horses: A Biographical Novel (Simon & Schuster).  Even more gripping and profound, this story is of Walls' grandmother Lily Casey Smith.

The title comes from the practice of Lily and her father working with horses that had not been adequately broken and suitable to be work animals. She was able to ride and tame them. A frontier woman, Lily grew up in West Texas, the Hondo Valley of New Mexico, and matured in North Western Arizona.

Because of my love of and experiences in New Mexico, this story struck a note with me. The Hondo Valley in Lincoln County is a part of the New Mexico that holds fond memories for me. This is where Billy the Kid and the Lincoln County Wars took place. This is the place of Sheriff Pat Garrett and it is the place of the Coe Ranch. A book about the Coe Ranch kept me grounded in my second year in Viet Nam.

The story of this robust woman is fascinating. She takes on a teaching job in a remote part Arizona at age 15. She gets to the job by riding alone on horseback for over 500 miles. Untrained and not certified to teach, she, nevertheless, does the job. This only the beginning.

Read Half Broke Horses to find the origins Jannette Wall's own story.

Wisdom has Built Her a House - A commentary on Proverbs 9:1-6

To King Solomon, mentioned

            in the Bible,

 Wisdom was his love.

He was true to her and he fought,

struggled, and strove

To let her be his guide, but alas

it came to naught.

"How’s that?" You say. 

"Wasn’t Solomon the wisest

of the ancient kings?"

Yes, with wisdom he would often lay

            to soak in her beauty and her charm

In a futile hope to be like her and fly on her   

            wings of ecstasy.

How could he have gone wrong?

He knew that wisdom had built

            her house of seven pillars

             and she then called everyone: 

The thieves, the merchants, and the millers

to come  to drink her wine and

feast among the seven pillars.

 She called the simple and the stupid

            to her party. But, alas,

            they were not to his liking,                

            the king did not wish to be amid

Those with whom he did not mingle,

He thought he was so very clever, and his

            cleverness made him tingle.

Yes, Solomon was clever, but he

             was neither wise nor intelligent.

             he kept three hundred women

In his palace; some were wives,

             many were concubines

             there only for his pleasure.

Others were there to be a palatial ornament.

All together they were so much wiser

            than he could ever be.

Numbers alone were not what counted.

He faltered because he failed to account

            for the fact that

In their number they became a giant WE

            and that Wisdom is, after all, a she.

The Holiday Season

I am writing this on November 19, a Friday in 2010. Yesterday I rode through the main street of town in which I live and surprised by the Christmas ornamentation that is already up. Probably surprise is not the correct word. Maybe dismay or despair might be better choices. Thanksgiving Day is about a week away and Advent does not begin until November 28. What's the rush? Why is it so important to get into the "Holiday Spirit" so soon after Halloween?

Complaining over the years has not changed anything. So complaining again this year is not likely to change anything either, other than lead me into a gloomy despair over the misuse of Christmas. Once I was asked if I was ready for Christmas and my response was that I had not observed Advent yet. When I said that the questioner was taken back and asked, "What is Advent?" Trying to explain that the Advent season prepared us for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus Christ and it is the four weeks before Christmas did not help. I suppose that my despair is not so much about the misuse of Christmas but the loss a religious culture that gives as sense of stability and slows down the pace of life.

So far I do not have a shopping list, I do not plan on buying a lot of gifts. The children of my family will not be disappointed, however. They will receive what they need and a little extra so that Christmas is memorable for them, but I am not going to add to the over stimulation of the "Holiday Season" that leads only to greed and disappointment.

Maybe old Scrooge was right after all. Bah humbug!

The 180th Meridian

180th Meridian
Water Color
by William F. Bellais
2010

A day gained a day lost

Out to sea to face the cost

Of not being aware

Of what we are or to care

How we got this far.

Out at sea an imaginary line

Is crossed and we toast with wine

The new opportunity we

Thought was lost only to be

Disillusioned again by reality

That the line is an imaginary

Experience and the ordinary

Sailor simply takes in stride

Because it is just another ride

Across an empty sea.

Virga



Virga
New Mexico Ranch Country
Photo by
William F. Bellais



The clouds tower over the desert floor.

Full of promise.

The rains fall from the promising clouds.

The earth is not moistened -- the air is still

The earth is not nourished.

Hope rises in the heart over our desert floors.

Full of promise.

The silver and white glistening clouds billow

Over our parched lives,

        and like the desert

We resist the rain.

There is virga.

Then comes the storm, the wind, the rain;

Like the desert we cannot resist.

The parched spirit is watered,

Soul is nourished.

Rive l'Isle



Bridge over the Rive l'Isle
Coulaures, France
Photo by W. F. Bellais



Bridge over the Rive l'Isle
Coulaures, France
Mixed Media: water color and Ink
by W. F. Bellais

Bridges can be fascinating. Often the big and majestic bridges such as the Brooklyn Bridge or the Golden Gate Bridge are not only impressive feats of engineering but also great works of art.

It is the small country bridges that often get my attention. I am thinking of bridges off the beaten track and spanning small rivers or creeks. In the mid-west of the United States covered bridges are eye catchers. There is only one that I know of nearby but up in Iowa, just two counties north, the bridges of Madison County are famous. Although a covered bridge is only  a few miles away, I have never seen one.

A bridge thousands of miles from home, however, was the subject of a painting and photograph in 2009. The bridge crossed the Rive l'Isle at the village of Coulaures in southwestern France. Coulaures and the Rive l'Isle are part of the Perigord Region that includes some of the most beautiful countryside anywhere in the world.

For several days in September 2009 I stood on the banks of the river and studied the bridge. Apparently very old and well constructed, this bridge also reflected imaginative engineering and artistic beauty.

The bridge over the Rive l'Isle connected the newer section of Coulaures with the old village that included an antique chateau, ancient church, and old homes dating back to the seventeenth century and maybe earlier. The new Coulaures was functional and modern, but it did not have the character and interest that the old village had. I was glad we were living for a brief time in the grand chateau of the older part of Coulaures.

Being there engaged my imagination and I wanted to keep the memory in my mind forever. So, I painted several water colors of the bridge and took several photographs. I am sharing one photo and one painting with you today.

Marc Chagall



In Imitation of Marc Chagall,
W. F. Bellais, 2010



The first two weeks of September were spent on the Cote d'Azur of southern France. The experience included going to ancient villages and seeing the works of renown artists. Additionally, painting watercolors took much of the time. Virtually endless, the subject matter for watercolors included landscapes, odd ideas, and still life renditions of fruit and croissants.

Best of all the trip included a visit to the Matisse Chapel in Vence and and the Chagall Museum in Nice.

Matisse's simple idea of rendering thoughts in unadorned lines. His masterpiece, the Stations of the Cross in the Dominican Chapel in Vence, mesmerized me. I needed to study every panel. The work is highly imaginative and reflects a profound understanding of the Passion Story.

Chagall, however, grabbed my attention and held it. I still think about the paintings I saw at the Chagall Museum. In the museum a show of unusual surrealistic subjects or brilliant reds, cadmium yellow, and cerulean blue first attracted me. However, the permanent display of Chagall's depictions of Hebrew Bible themes enthralled me. The surrealistic depictions of Adam and Eve, the angels visiting Abraham and Sarah, and Song of Songs helped me see things differently (maybe even better).

On returning to the chateau overlooking the Mediterranean Sea I pulled out a piece of water color paper and worked on a parody of Chagall. The highly imaginative and sensual Song of Songs set of paintings stayed in my head. So, I tried to put on watercolor paper the spirit of Chagall.

He used vibrant color. The paintings were often defined by diagonal lines, and he used symbols to great affect. Further, he often included himself in his paintings. The latter feature, however, did not appear in his Biblical renditions; nevertheless, I put him in my parody.

While I do not wish to copy Chagall or Matisse, I do want to have the same spirit in my work.

Antiques Road Show

The Monday night ritual is to watch the Antiques Road Show on Public Broadcasting. Often, at about the half-hour mark, I doze off, but just as often I watch the show all the way through and then doze off.

The people are more interesting than the item they have brought for appraisal. Still there are times when I wish I owned something that has a long and interesting history. I like paintings most of all. That preference probably arises from my own interest in painting and art in general.

Now, here is what interests me most of all. As I have written, it is the people and their reactions to the appraisal. A parody of the show is one of the GEICO commercials that proclaims that a "bird in the hand is better than two in a bush." The commercial moves to a mock up of the Antiques Road Show. The appraiser points out the qualities of, I suppose, a ceramic hand holding a ceramic blue bird. The appraiser goes on to tell the owner of the object that it worth "two in a bush." The owner responds in amazement, "Really!"

Every now and then on the Road Show the response is "really", but more often than not the response is "wow!" Of course, this does not apply when the appraiser tells the proud owner that he or she has been bamboozled and the item is a fake. Nevertheless, "wow" is the operative word.

One evening I decided to count the number of times the word "wow" was spoken by an amazed owner of a valuable antique. The first count was about six or seven (probably seven). Then one evening I counted sixteen wows. So far that's the record. A week ago I counted ten wows. I am looking forward to the day when twenty wows are expressed.

See, there's more to a TV show than just what's presented. Look deeper and you may say, "Wow!"

Veterans Day 2



Ann in her army uniform



Yesterday (Veterans Day) my wife was honored for her service in the Army National Guard.

She served in the Guard for three years. Two were in the Arkansas Guard and one in the Texas Guard's 49th Armored Division.

She was 34 years old when she enlisted with an Army officer husband and two children. Fortunately her mother was with us when my wife went off to basic training at Ft. McCellan, Alabama. The experience was an adventure for all of us. I used to tease the kids that the mother "wore combat boots", which was a small slur back in the 1970s.

My wife was among thirty or so other women who had served in the military going back to World War II and up to the present conflicts. They were honored by a resolution of the Missouri State Legislature. The event, sponsored by the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars, helped the community remember that veterans were not only the "boys over there" but the "girls" also.

Veterans Day

Today I am thinking about all the years I spent in military service. Beginning in 1952 I joined the Marine Corps reserve while in the late months of my junior year in high school and remained active all through my senior year. In September of 1953 I joined the regular Marine Corps and went to boot camp at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, California.

Within in minutes of stepping off the bus at the recruit depot, about 9:00 p.m., I knew I had made a bad choice. I was pushed up against a wall and shouted at by the sergeant of the guard at the gate. When all the men, they were really boys, got off the bus we were marched to a large barracks complex. Nothing much happened for the rest of the night. The next morning was an unexpected hell.

Nevertheless, despite the initial shock of drill instructors and adjusting to 24 hour military life, I was extremely proud that I had completed boot camp and was on my way to being full-fledged Marine. I spent three years in the Marine Corps as combat correspondent. Served in the 3rd Marine Division in Japan and the 1st Marine Division in Korea and Camp Pendleton, California.

After release from active duty in the Marine Corps I remained active in reserve components. I joined the Army reserve and was in a military police criminal investigation detachment as a photographer. Later I entered the ROTC program and earned a commission in the Military Intelligence Branch.

In the Army I served two one year tours in Viet Nam.

The Viet Nam Memorial in Washington is very special to me. I knew some of the men listed on the wall.

Remember all those who have served their country in times of peace and war. The military life is difficult, but the remembrance of friends and places wipes away most of the hardship.

Greetings

The Green Hills  at Conception, Missouri

The Green Hills of Missouri are not so green right now. Fall has finally arrived and there has been little rain for over a month. Nevertheless, the landscape is beautiful and the many trees have retained their golden and brilliantly red leaves.

Probably, by the end of next week when it will be cooler in mid-November, the leaves will be gone and we will set in for the winter.

North Central Missouri is the Green Hills region.

With this blog I want to write and share some thoughts about a variety of things that have crossed my mind over the past several years. Further, I hope to display some of the art work and photography I have completed.

Your comments will be appreciated.