Our season is even more indeterminate than usual. Weather!
We’ve recently found ourselves caught in a stream of atmospheric rivers. To be so saturated, so early, raises concern for our stability, perching, on a cliff on an island of alluvial fill.
So our garden takes its own rhythm. Some parts have expired with the
simple lack of sun, while much has “hung on”, if not exactly “thriving”
toward some protested ending. I can only cerebrate nature’s wisdom…
however many times I prove myself not wise enough to observe her
learn-teaching/teach-learning. She dances smack in the middle of climate
change. Adaptivity & survival inside maelstrom.
Autumnal energy holds forth beauty of unreliable promise.
Another classmate & friend, who lives in St Louis,
generously retuned to Elsah to bring us back into the city, where we had
a reservation for our last evening’s hotel…’just across the street from
our favorite museum, which we’d planned to visit after making an
exploration of the city’s famous Botanic Gardens. Because it was a hot
day we happily found shady benches near the Buckminster Fuller geodesic
domed tropical greenhouse… the Climatron. There Stephen could
comfortably check into a scheduled weekly Zoom call & I could
catch-up with my mail after the busy time at the reunion.
After spending a satisfying hour or so inside the tropical spaces of
the dome, we discovered we’d lost the time to have lunch at the cafe…
but we certainly wanted to see the Japanese garden, having visited so
many of such when we were there. This one is still relatively quite
young, so we could only imagine how it might evolve after such time as
the centuries the ones we saw in Kyoto had been tended. We must come
back… this unexpected botanical treasure deserves much more time &
attention!
Still, we both were happily anxious to find a Lyft driver who was a
lively & fun woman to drive us to the Last Hotel, which, knowing its
location in the old shoe manufacturing district, close to the City
Museum we were to see next, clued me to understand that this was named
for a “shoe last”, instead of an act of desperation! It is a very nice
boutique hotel with a timeless lobby spanning spaces defined by handsome
12 foot columns.
The guest rooms are carved out of the industrial space of a shoe
factory under the scarred concrete ceilings telling stories inside a lot
of drapery to shade the hyper abundance of large industrial windows. We
took a morning swim next day before we finished packing for the flight
home. All in all it was a good “do”!
ONE UNIQUE MUSEUM…
However, The City Museum is quite another sort of architectural
wonder. We would not miss returning here on any visit to the city! We
walked almost immediately around the corner to this fabulously quirky
& unique museum. This was our third visit. We were introduced to
this venue by our cousin Anjana when we visited to attend a Bell
Convention. “It is a jungle gym for adults” was her description while
acknowledging that this is an all family adventure.
It, too, was a historic shoe factory of 8 stories, now filled with an
eclectic variety of collections from any & all possible interests
or “tastes”. Much of which might be considered junque… old
signage & side-show art. Rooms full of activities for all ages: a
gallery filled with innumerable large sponges inviting youngsters to
play or build with. There are nooks housing small cafés or ice cream
shops. There is an old pipe organ installed in an air shaft. Cases full
of oddities like antique porcelain doll parts, for instance.
However, some of these earlier “filler” exhibits seem to be evolving
over these years. New consideration & work is constantly being
incorporated to finesse this raw mélange since our first visit. Many
tubular structures of steel or newly handsome welded iron allow brave
souls to pursue clambering adventures, sometimes up or down into other
floors. A grander excitement experience is a conveyor/slide, originally
designed for sending the shoes down toward other finishing processe, but
now rebuilt for allowing humans to slide, on rollers with smooth &
swift action all the way several floors to the lobby. This place is
certainly a wild adventure!
My strong favorite, from the first visit, is a collection of stone
& terracotta details salvaged from demolished buildings in Chicago
& St Louis. Originally decorating corners & cornices high above
street level… too far out of sight for easy study, these were at first
simply rather haphazardly piled in a raw room, but now becoming featured
in an evolving state, gradually being imaginably “reinstalled” as
exhibits noting the history or becoming parts of venues being readied
for weddings or social events.
The upper parts evolve into an amusement park in the sky, with even
more adventurous climbing, several plane fuselages & a Ferris wheel!
Such a generously exploratory… & still evolving… public facility! We look forward to a next visit.
We attended Stephen’s 50th college reunion the last week of
June. I had gone with him to his 45th & written about another
earlier visit to the campus here: https://www.grbbells.com/a-visit-to-principia/
Principia is a Christian Science school located about 35 miles up the
Mississippi River from Saint Louis on the Illinois side. The campus,
perched atop high limestone bluffs, overlooks the broad waters between
the confluences of the Illinois & the Missouri rivers. Floods of
history!
The architect Bernard Maybeck planned & designed the campus
during the 20s/40s using the concept of a rural English village in order
to create an intimate atmosphere for students, who were well removed
from the city. The result is effective & lovely. For me personally,
the buildings are the best reason for me to enjoy returning.
This view is of the living room of the dorm, where we found the room
which we were assigned, looks like a baronial hall with massive carved
wooden beams, but closer inspection revealed that those are cast
concrete! The leaded windows are genuine, as are the lovely rugs &
comfy furniture. Maybeck’s concept still works, becoming ever quite
permanent, bringing one to at least some fantasy of home.
Yet, this was my second of his reunions, so I was better prepared for
his disappearing, quite naturally, to spend time with old friends. That
first reunion was early in the College’s more officially open
acceptance of our being a gay couple. We had felt comfortable & I
happily met many friends of his. This visit, I relished such
opportunities to engage on my own, particularly with those lingering
with me at the breakfast table. I found myself merging into what often
became long conversations. Sometimes with other spouses, finding
ourselves in similar situations, or with people who had known him as the
editor of the student newspaper. I am seen… I am listened to. Not only
that, but I am having a good time!
I got to meet & chat with Tom, married to one of Stephen’s deep
friends, Wendy, whom I’ve met several times over the years. He also is
not a “Scientist”. On another morning, I chatted with a classmate Joel
Selmeier who is a designer of Peace Poles, one of which is installed in
Tacoma, very close to the condo we are moving into next year. A third
such encounter introduced me to a fascinating writer, Brad Newsham, who
has two books published about his traveling lifestyle, but — more
interesting to me — a book about his time as a cabdriver in San
Francisco. I will write more when I can snag time with the copy he sent
us to share.
While Stephen had expressed surprise when I agreed to make this trip
with him, I explained that I too was ready for a little travel as well…
since the last time we’d flown together was our trip to India two & a
half years ago. We have a great history of happily traveling together
& I was looking forward to more of the qualities of potential
closeness during this time. Some of that became true, even as he was
never quite as ready for that as I. His capabilities to multitask also
take to the air!
After the closing chapel service & a last lunch
we stayed another night at a B&B just a mile or so down from campus
in an old riverboat town named Elsah. Several classmates have become
faculty members & bought homes in its historic precincts. We were
treated to a walking tour guided by one classmate who introduced us to
the local museum & a general store with dozens of “antique
reproduction” soft drinks.
Eventually, our meandering through the village brought us to have
impromptu tea with yet another classmate who had not attended the
reunion. We found dinner at a casual dive on the river… certainly some
sort of experience, but certainly not a memorable meal! It was,
however, the first time after the morality of the campus that we could
enjoy a celebratory cocktail & a glass of wine… albeit served in
plastic!
There is another chapter to this trip. I will write about our next day & last evening in Saint Louis.
Even as I might complain about months of very cold soggy conditions, I
am reminded, when I get out into the garden for the variety of relief
beginning to develop, albeit too-slowly.
I see the bed of mache, which I’ve tended closely since it began
sprouting in January, start to fill-out again. This very early green has
a rich flavor & sturdy tooth, even as that comes with a fairly
irritating effort to rinse off the bits of compost & soil splashed
by the rain into the handsome muscularity of its squat growth of tight,
small-leafed rosettes. I harvested a great & happily fulsome salad
during a warmer spell earlier in January, but it has been slow to regrow
again during this recent return of cold.
So in spite that it has been too cold & too wet, we have enjoyed some spectacular color… nonetheless I am quiteready for spring!