I've Moved!

After more than six months of paying no attention to this blog except for the nagging feeling that I should be doing something with it, here I am again. In the interim, I have moved from my studio overlooking the bay. After nine years there, I am now back on the ocean side of our little peninsula. In many ways, it was a difficult decision. Nine years is long enough to really settle in, and I was dug in pretty deep...one of the reasons I thought it was time to move. If I had stayed there much longer, I probably would not ever have been able to leave, and it was more than time to move on. The neighborhood, as well as ownership of the building, had changed since I first moved in. Transients, people who rented in our building and moved out again before I had a chance to learn their names. Desperately needed repairs that never got done. Party boats becoming noisier and more intrusive, especially the 'riverboat' whose owner fancied himself a karaoke star and regaled the neighborhood daily from noon to dusk with his renditions of Elvis' and Sinatra's greatest hits.

My new studio is downstairs, an easily accessible 1928 Spanish stucco. Its kitchen is more than twice the size of my old one, and I have a huge clawfoot bathtub, an unbelievable luxury after nine years of showers only. I love being back on the ocean side, walking on the boardwalk in the early mornings (need to do more of this) and sitting on a bench at the edge of the sand watching the sunsets. And even though I miss the barking of the sea lions under the Pavillion, the blast of the Catalina Flyer's whistle every morning, and the stunning view of sailboats on the bay, I am happy with my choice and look forward to the time I will spend here.

Touring the Blogosphere

Now that I have my own space, my clean white piece of virtual paper, I've been looking around the net to see what other people are writing. All my interests, cooking, photography, herb gardening, travel, sailing, needlework, classic cinema and the reading and writing of mystery fiction have been written about on some truly outstanding and professional looking blogs. I am thoroughly intimidated.
I am reminded of a scene in one of my favorite novels, The Caine Mutiny. Willie Keith, the hero, thinks it might be nice to have his own initialed coffee mug. He takes a standard china mug from the wardroom, painstakingly carves out the initials "W.K." and fills the letters in with blue paint. He goes to bed happy with his creation, leaving it on the wardroom shelf for others to admire. But when he enters the wardroom the next morning, he finds that his shipmates have created mug masterpieces of their own. There are mugs with gothic lettering, Old English script, fantastic animal shapes twisted to form initials. Willie's own mug now seems a poor thing compared to these new ones. Disgusted, he throws his mug into the sea.
I'm still not sure what I want to write here, but I know I want to write something. And no matter how awe-inspiring other people's blogs are, I'm not going to give up and throw my mug into the sea.

Why The Swan?

When I was a little girl, The Ugly Duckling was my favorite fairy tale. I loved hearing about the clumsy baby duck, waddling from place to place seeking a home and family, and finally finding it among the graceful swans. I was thrilled for him as he took his rightful place with them, so proud of him as the children on the bank called out "Oh, look at the new swan, he is the most beautiful of them all!"
I was maybe nine or ten when my great aunt Marion took me to see the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. It was my first live ballet performance, and of course it was Swan Lake. Here was a fairy tale being enacted before my eyes, romantic story, gorgeous costumes, beautiful dancing to Tchaikovsky's haunting, ominous score...I was transfixed. I was still in a trance when the matinee was over and my aunt took me to Clifton's and told me over tea and cakes how, years before, she had seen the great Anna Pavlova perform The Dying Swan.
I have continued all my life to love swans. Maybe it was no accident that I have ended up here, in a tiny studio overlooking this lovely bay whose mascot is a black swan. So whatever else I decide to write here, I will continue to post photos and drawings, stories and poems about my totem animal, the swan.