Elizabeth’s Neighborhood

I had a major meltdown yesterday. A started-crying-and-couldn't-stop meltdown. This is very unlike me! I mean, I do cry, it's not that, but this one kind of snuck up on me. It was about 6PM and I was still at work although, mercifully, no one else was. I was waiting till it was time to leave for a 7PM meeting somewhere else, so I was just noodling around on the web.

I miss my dad, so many things about him, and especially at Christmas. He was one of the linch pins in our family's Christmases because he just got into it so much. Since his death in November 2005, Christmas hasn't been the same. It's good again now, but different. That's life, things do change, I know that. I also know it's permissible to get quietly emotional at least once during the holidays, just remembering. But I had no idea the tears were as close to the surface as they were last night until I read something online about children who couldn't be with their parents, and I was off.

First I got a little choked up. Then my eyes started to leak just a little bit. Then, before I knew it, I was face-down in a handful of kleenex, with great wracking sobs, crying so hard I wasn't even making any noise.

It was weird because, while that was going on, a part of me was detached and thinking, "What the hell...? Get a grip on yourself!" but the rest of me, the parts that were dissolving into puddles, had the wheel. It went on for like 10-15 minutes! When I finally ran out of steam, I was exhausted.

Thinking about Dad at Christmas definitely triggered it, and then the general holiday stress contributed to it, but there's the extra and considerable stress this year of having just bought a house a few weeks ago and then doing the big move, etc. I don't know when the last time was that I bawled my eyes out, but apparently I was overdue. Better alone in the office one evening than to lose it at the Christmas dinner table!

Dad seldom smiled in photos. For whatever reason, he preferred to present a more serious face when his picture was being taken and usually couldn't be cajoled out of it. If all you saw were those photos, you might think he was a stern dry humorless character, and nothing could be further from the truth. He was animated, charismatic, and loved to laugh. But because of the way he was about not smiling for the camera, the photos there are of him with his natural grin are highly prized in our family. Here are three:

The first one is from about 1975 or so. He was sitting with his mother and sister and all three of them are laughing at something no one can remember now, but that doesn't matter -- it's the laugh that matters. The second one is from about 1988 at home. The third is from 1993 when he and Mom were on a cruise that stopped for half a day in the town I was living in at the time, so I met them at the dock, and we all had so much fun.  (I have a few others, but these are the ones I could get my hands on real quick.)

When my sister and I were little, every Christmas Eve, Dad would do "The Night Before Christmas" with the first letters of the words swapped out (I think that's called spoonerizing, but am not sure), so it started, "'Twas the chright before Nistmas and hall through the ouse, crot a neature was stirring, mot even a nouse." He could rattle off the whole thing without thinking and my sister and I would be on the floor laughing so hard.

So Chrerry Mistmas, Dad, and Yappy Hew Near! ;)

Thanks everyone for attending the Open House on Saturday! For those interested, here some classes that are still available...

#1005A/B - Introduction To Head Drawing A and B

Instructor: Mario Hernandez
Saturday, 10am-1pm

This course is an excellent opportunity for students to learn the craft of head drawing. It will provide each student with the necessary understanding and experience to draw the human head with authority. Each session will consist of a lecture or demonstration that will guide students step-by-step through the process of drawing from a live model. The traditional elements of life drawing will be emphasized including the structure and planes of the head, the values of light and shadow, edges, portrait composition and drawing techniques. The course will also include exercises and assignments aimed to help students greatly hone their portrait drawing skills.

#1002A/B- Head and Figure Drawing with the Reilly Method A and B

Instructor: Israel Martinez
Wednesday, 10am-1pm

This is an introductory figure and head drawing class, concentrating on the methods of Frank Reilly. You may see a broader explanation of Frank Reilly’s methods here . Using 6 simple lines as the starting point for drawing the figure, Israel Martinez will instruct and demonstrate how to simply draw a figure that is solid and proportional, having weight and balance. Your drawing will improve drastically and will have economy of line. The class will warm-up by drawing 5-minute poses, followed by instructor demonstration, and then 20 minute poses that will teach you to block-in structure quickly.

#2380A/B - Alla Prima Head/Figure Painting A and B

Instructor: Ignat Ignatov
Friday, 10am-4pm

This course will consist of painting demonstrations and lectures covering the important elements of painting such as value, color and edges, as well as composition and design. This class will also cover the limited palette and the amazing advantages that it offers. Each week the artists will paint from life a different model using the Alla Prima (wet into wet technique) and will receive individual instruction and critiques. The goal is to advance your skills in the direct painting method while applying the fundamentals to achieve a solid understanding of painting the human form in various light conditions and settings.

#2367A/B - Figure Painting A and B

Instructor: Joseph Todorovitch
Wednesday, 12pm-6pm

We will paint the figure from life and discuss choices for setting up the pose, composition, color harmony, lighting, pacing, and bringing the painting to a decent level of resolve. We'll also discuss the language of describing paint in order to better understand our mixtures. Joseph will explain his approach and demonstrate by painting along and illustrating his ideas about the approach. Pose lengths will vary from single days to multiple days. Previous drawing experience is highly recommended.

#1122 - Sketching the Figure (Quick Pose/Head/Figure Construction)

Instructor: Sergio Sanchez
Tuesday, 7pm-10pm

The student will receive study in drawing the head and figure, using quick-sketch and longer pose study of the figure and head. This is a broad overview of the many aspects of drawing the figure.

To view our whole schedule of classes, go to www.laafa.org/sessions/calendar . Or feel free to call us at, 818.708.9232. The Winter Quarter starts January 11th!

Bleh, this is starting to get concerning.

One of the nicest of my family's holiday traditions is that we have annual gathering with the extended family.  My paternal grandmother, my Popo in Chinese, hosted the gathering every year. Cousins, aunts, uncles, and family friends returned from college or their lives on the Mainland and the local relatives came from across O'ahu for the gathering.  Over the years, the gathering moved from my Popo's tiny home to various restaurants around Honolulu.  When my Popo passed away, we learned that one of the things she did was to put aside funds in a trust that could be used to continue to host our family Christmas gatherings.  My father, who was the middle of three siblings, passed away many years ago, so our family gatherings are now hosted by his siblings--my aunt and uncle.

For the past few years, our Christmas celebration has been held at the Halekulani Hotel, the only five star hotel on O'ahu.  The food and the service are always absolutely wonderful.  It is the perfect Hawaii mix of casual elegance where you get amazing food and service with a multi-million dollar view while wearing an aloha shirt and open toed sandals, but truly the best part is getting to see all of my cousins and aunts and uncles.  

I know that lots of people find their family gatherings a chore and honestly as a younger man I often didn't value chance to get together with my family as much as I should have, but I have to say that it has become one of the most enjoyable parts of my visits home.  I truly love the chance to sit around and catch up with everyone and I think that it must make my Popo happy to know that we continue to gather and enjoy each others' company. 

I have no way of knowing, but after all of these years I suspect that Popo's original fund is long gone and my Uncle and Aunt host it in Popo's memory, but either way, it is a really wonderful tradition and is part of what makes Hawaii continue to be the place that I call home even though I live and work (and now own a home) in Lala Land.

Merry Christmas, Popo!

Midwestern M-Town Mania!
Mango Lassie tours through America's heartland...hope she brought her puffer coat!

That Time of Year
Too Soon To Tell ruminates on the annual torture ritual of holiday travel.

Holiday Balls
...rum balls. Rum balls! Delicious, spiced dark chocolate goodness. Via anna.

Suggestions?
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S/O and I finally own our new home!  After what must be some kind of a world record three-and-a-half month escrow and a lot of drama our deed finally recorded on Friday--just in time for us to pack up and leave for our annual pilgrimage home to Hawaii.  It is a relief and a wonderful way to celebrate the holidays.  S/O and I won't be exchanging gifts this year as our house is our gift to each other ... And for the next thirty years as well. 

Because the weather was bad and for a variety of scheduling issues with work (I was leaving the house before sunrise and getting back after dark) I don't have any good pictures of the house as it looks now, but here's one from before it was done.

After a lot of stress, I do have to say I love my house so far!  I can't believe it is mine!!!

My leg badly needs a stretch.

My last post was all about how I get these out-of-nowhere and almost always completely groundless anxiety things. If nothing's obviously wrong, I find something. Yesterday I fixated it on Piper who had acted just the tiniest bit out of routine.

Well, as you can see, Piper's fine. She was fine yesterday too -- it was ME who was off the rails.

Tonight when I came home, she met me at the door. The level in the water dish is normal. Her appetite is fine. She even spent quite a bit of time playing like a kitten. Then she decided she wanted some lap time. I was working on a project and tried to dissuade her, but she was persistent and I relented.

The fact that I was working didn't get in her way at all. As you can see, she curled up into a purr-ball... across my forearm. I kept working, although my typing did suffer for it for the 20 minutes or so I had this 14-pound accessory draped over me. That's okay. ~8)

This proves to me, once again, that whenever the anxiety train runs me down, things are almost always still fine in the clean world. It''s still such a PITA when this happens but I am grateful for the fact that it doesn't happen nearly as often as it used to and that I'm better at recognizing what's going on instead of just caving into an emotional flail-fest!!

REVEALER OF HEARTS

Every once in a while, too often to suit me, I find myself dealing with free-floating anxiety. Something's wrong or about to be wrong, and I won't be able to stop it. It's made worse when something really does seem to be maybe going wrong.

Take tonight. I came home from work and was not greeted at the door by Piper, my older cat. When I say "older", that's relative to Lydia who's about 2 -- Piper's about 6 or 7 now as far as we can guess. Anyway, she usually greets me at the door, often enough that it was pretty obvious when she didn't yesterday and then didn't again today. She was on the bed in "her spot". I sat down in the living room and watched some TV and she came up for a little lap time, which was nice, then went right back to the bed. Then she had to be coaxed to eat her dinner. She did eat all of it, but again went right back to the bed. Then I realized that one or the other of them (both?) had been drinking a lot of water today, going by the level in the water dish from when it was changed last night.

So now the anxiety is starting to churn that maybe she's getting sick. Then I remind myself that she doesn't meet me at the door EVERY night, and that there have been times in the past when she's had to be coaxed to finish her meals, and that just a few weeks ago she was at the vet for her annual exam, shots, etc., and they ran bloodwork and everything was fine. And it's been cloudy and rainy and yucky looking and maybe that affects cats like it does us. (That may be a stretch, I don't know.)

And the house is very dry inside -- even with all the rain and damp today the indoor humidity is only 31%. That could explain the water-drinking, IF it was her and not Lydia (who, by the way, seems to be her usual 2-year-old incorrigible self), except that the house is always dry inside, which is why I run a humidifier in the bedroom, so maybe that's why she's liking it in there. But usually at least once in the evening, she'll come out to socialize for a bit and maybe even play briefly with Lydia. Not tonight or last night.

See?? My mind conspires to drive me NUTS. There was a time in my life when this was happening much more often and with a lot less to go on. Realizing it was "all in my head" helped a little but didn't make it go away completely. So now I guess all I can do is see how she does tonight and tomorrow and if she seems no worse, maybe I'm imagining it and just looking for something to hang this worry on. Good lord. How warped AM I?

Something of note is that this is the first time this has happened to me since The Move. I guess, up till now, I've been too preoccupied to look, even subconsciously, for problems I can't stop or fix. That's proof of something or other, right?