A tour of Easter blooms for a time of spring, surprise and rebirth.

Yesterday, we walked the Dallas Arboretum. Ours has its trees, but below and all about are aglade with bud and bloom. In any season, swashes of color take the breath away; and in every season, there is the mystery of the unknown that waits beyond the gates.

A background word: this Arboretum was first a dairy farm, then the rambling estate of a wildcatter drilling for petroleum, and now the much and ever groomed domain of local horticulturists. It has moved from milkmaid to oilman to gardeners. Today its bevy of plant persons would make Peter Sellers proud — remember him as Chance the gardener from the 1979 film “Being There.” This place is awash with Pink Panthers waiving their trowels in the air and punching pH meters wildly into the earth to ensure that all is just so.

We were met this beautiful bright sunny morning by the Azalea, particularly the Formosa. This was the first azalea I encountered years ago in Houston, and it is an old and trusted friend.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nearby was a young acquaintance, a violet dancing ballerina of an azalea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I appreciate the many glowing hues of this flower family and their willingness to mix in palette from whites to purples and new-grown pinks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, these beauties are all on the same plant. Amazing.

We move on, past a Wave of Tulips.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The tulips were beginning to fade, but not so the exotics.

How about a Kangaroo Paw for your garden?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Or bird’s nest soup resting amid the strange berry blooms of the Leatherleaf Mahonia?

 

 

 

 

 

 

I soaringly wondered, watching a shy winged purple dragon Helleborus, where its home might really be?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then, back to earth, I bent close to the tear drops on a pretty Sweet William.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And wished well the troupe, too many here to chronicle, yet to name a few more.

Stalking columned Larkspurs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forest padding Dogwoods searching patiently for their masters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And giant puffed Snowballs floating overhead in the blue-skied breezes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are too many. What a glorious chaos of color. And that’s just the flowers. What about all the boys and girls dressed in their Easter finery and dragging Mom and Dad to just the right spot for just the right picture to send to Grandma and Grandpa. I must stop before my palette tips and tumbles and I collapse in wide-eyed wonder at the stunning dance and bursting sun of an exploding Eastered spring. It is enough. We stumble past the waving goodbye of the last orange tulip of parting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And sigh in hope to remember the roses will be out in two weeks and we must return.

May the beauty in your life never end.

Have a Happy Easter!!

Gardener Jim

Now are the times of momentous, memorable and truly exciting events.

The Dallas Quilt Show was only a couple of weeks past.

Here is a favorite from the showing:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This quilt is entitled “Five Ninety Two” and it was done by Mary Beth McCormack of Keller, Texas. (You can take and share pictures but you have to attribute the quilts.) I like this one because it is an old “Pickle Relish” design pattern, and I like and have canned pickles on a farm. Quilt patterns are like that. Stuff around the farm, family and house. Other patterns are “Log Cabin” and “Wedding Rings.” I am sure there are many more, and I am sure many are as down-home as this one.

But not all.

Here is a mini-quilt from this year’s auction for charity:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not your traditional quilt, right? Yep, that is Jupiter, the fifth planet from the sun in our solar system; and appropriately, this little quilt is entitled “Fifth From The Sun.” It was quilted by Daphne Huffman of Dallas, Texas. If you look closely, you can see the word “five” quilted in a number of languages (I counted five: French, Catalan, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian). And of course, you can see the great Red Spot giant storm on the surface of the monstrous planet. And what are those floating balls in front? You got it: the first four moons of Jupiter discovered in 1610 by Galileo peering through his telescope and named by him: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Today, upwards of 69 moons of Jupiter have been sighted and a number of those have yet to be named. So submit your suggestions, and your choice may be emblazoned in the sky and your orb remembered on a quilt somewhere over the rainbow, way up high.

There is much that can be seen and found in a simple quilt.

Perhaps not momentous, but surely memorable.

Now it is the time for something momentous, memorable and exciting. Now is the time to remember and list the best Best Pictures of the first sixty (60) Best Pictures (1928 – 1988) – as viewed, rated and ranked by our EthnoFamilyMovieOgraphy audience. I promised I would do this, and I now share with you the listing of our top Oscar-winning films of the first 60 years of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Fanfare please. Focus your telescopes below:

1. Ben Hur (1959)

2. It Happened One Night (1933-34)

3. The Sound of Music (1965)

4. Gone with the Wind (1939)

5. Casablanca (1943)

6. My Fair Lady (1964)

7. On the Waterfront (1954)

8. Going My Way (1944)

9. The Godfather (1972)

10. Mrs. Miniver (1942)

11. The Bridge over the River Kwai (1957)

12. Gandhi (1982)

Many of you would ply the skyways and probe the planets for bounty such as this. Now you have it in your grasp. And a bonus. You get twelve (12) because the last three tied for the #10 position.

If I may, a word or two going away as we fly back to the real universe. Would this list be different for a different group? Yes, of course, perhaps. This is ethnofamilymovieography, a new and trailblazing area of study. Part of the study is to appreciate, as the lead ethnographer, the elements at play in the selection of the best Best Pictures as utilized by this particular community of viewers and by others, including the Academy voters. It appears at this stage in our study that there are three predominant elements in the evaluation of a best picture: 1) entertainment value; 2) artistic value; and 3) political value. More, of course, needs to be said about all three; but at this stage, it can be recognized that these elemental values may vary in appreciation and application between groups of viewers and the voters of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Here we truly ascend to the outer reaches of our solar system. Suffice for now to have attained the 60-picture level and to have shared with each of you the results of this ongoing study.

May you enjoy your own flights of fancy and may you find in this listing a new map for your adventures.

See you next with #61 “The Rain Man” and #62 “Driving Miss Daisy.”

Until then, have a blast, watch out for the moons, and have a truly momentous, memorable and exciting time.

Astronaut Jim . . . on . . . the . . . way

 

 

Spring is about to “sprung.”

Here is the first dandelion:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The word “Dandelion’ derives from the French “dent-de-lion” meaning lion’s tooth, and as you can see the flower has many not particularly ferocious teeth — but they are a bright yellow. Every part of the dent-de-lion is edible. The wild flower also has herbal uses, which is probably why it received free passage on the Mayflower with the pilgrims to the new world. Bees love dandelions — the blooms are some of the first sources of pollen to the buzzing bands of insects in the awakening spring. To the USA lawn culture aficionados, the dandelion is often viewed as a weed. The bright, welcoming little flowers are so much more; and the yellow teeth make a very passable and memorable dandelion wine. You must try a glass when you are out visiting the countryside in the new spring.

Today, we stand over the little flower and wave a welcome farewell to winter. Yes, I had the flu twice — in October and again in February. And, yes, February was the wettest month ever in the meteorological history of Texas. We had fourteen inches of rain the last two weeks of the month. Two days from now, we may hit 80 degrees Fahrenheit (about 27 Celsius). Stuff is getting better everyday. With the receding rain and ascending sun, we now approach the budding, blooming and bursting time of our young year. Spring is very welcome, very welcome indeed.

Stuff is getting better.

On Thursdays, I attend an early-morning men’s study group. I watch, talk and listen. There is one among us who has a natural gift for words. I don’t think he knows this, but he does. He drops lines as flowers drop petals. They are little gifts. Today, it was: “You KNOW where to go back to.” A budding of universal truth in a few consonants and vowels. We all do KNOW where we have found the calm joy of remembrance. Sometimes it helps to do just that and go back to where we know and remember.

And sometimes it helps to study just that together: to be part of a company and to study ourselves and what we are doing from the inside so that we can document and savor the calm joy of the remembrance of what we did, saw and experienced later. . . . That is ethnofamilymovieography, the just emerging branching of ethnography that we are now doing and have been doing for 60 movies together — with you reading reports of some of those films here on this website.

EthnoFamilyMovieOgraphy is a family of viewers watching and studying themselves and the Best Pictures together from the inside and reporting out the results to a broader audience and to themselves.

Now we are up to the 60th Best Picture awarded the Oscar by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. We started two years ago and we will next be viewing “The Last Emperor,” the  winner for 1987. From 1928 to 1987, members of our company have joined together to squint through the dark at the moving pictures, cogitate their meanings and our reactions, survey the results in the rising house lights, and wander home wondering what we did, are doing and will do. That’s ethnofamilymoviegraphy at work.

“The Shape of Water” won the 90th Oscar for Best Picture among the movies released in 2017. That is our target, our finish point, to have viewed and reviewed the first 90 Best Pictures. We are two-thirds of the way to that goal.

The last two movies in the seriatim were #58 “Out of Africa” (1985) and #59 “Platoon” (1986). For our study, “Out of Africa” ranked #33 of the first 58 Best Pictures; and “Platoon” ranked fourth from the bottom of the first 59 Best Pictures. That’s not the whole story. It’s just the beginning. We hope to move on and learn more. Tonight is #60 “The Last Emperor” (1987). That’s where we are.

There is a simple joy in knowing and remembering where we were and knowing we can go back there.

Next time, we will go back and share a simple snapshot of the top and bottom of our survey results for the first 60 Best Pictures.

It is one thing we can do, fleeting like the first wildflower. It may have little meaning in itself, but perhaps it does herald something more to come. It is somewhere we know we can go back to.

As we hope you do with us at the next post.

Thank you,

Grandpa Jim