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At the Visionary Art Museum with Founder Rebecca Hoffberger by Jim Dissette

January 21, 2020 by James Dissette 1 Comment

Recently, the Spy crew trekked to Baltimore in search of a pigeon skeleton. Yes, really. But there was a method to our madness: the skeleton was on loan from Chestertown resident Pat Trams Hollingsworth and placed as an iconic symbol greeting visitors to the new environmental exhibit at The American Visionary Art Museum.

American Visionary Art Museum Founder and Director, Rebecca Hoffberger noticed the skeleton while visiting Hollingsworth’s home in Chestertown and knew instantly that she wanted it to be part of the new 25th annual exhibition she was curating.

“Rebecca saw the bird skeleton —a learning tool I once used to prepare for a dreaded veterinary tech exam—and off she went with it. It was one of those eureka moments, and she has lots of them. I was fascinated with how she was going to include it,” Hollingsworth says.

The Spy team found the bleached and brittle armature accompanied by a porcelain pigeon in a glass case installed along the entry corridor to the amazing American Visionary Art Museum. The placard above it recalled Hamlet’s existential question, “To Be or Not to Be, That is the Question”, an elegant choice given that AVAM’s new exhibit, “The Secret Life of Earth: Alive! Awake! and (Possibly Really Angry!),” challenges visitors to engage in critical questions about our relationship to the environment that sustains life on Earth.

Chestertown’s Trams Hollingsworth’s pigeon skeleton to illustrate the core message of the new environmental exhibit.

But first: if you have never visited the American Visionary Art Museum, it’s unlike any museum you’ve experienced. You won’t find the trained classicists or hear the reverential whisperings of art admirers. Instead, AVAM is dedicated to art that is rowdy, poignant, haunting and joyous, a collection of unschooled masterpieces from the hearts and minds of individuals who worked out their visions with materials at hand. For example, a centerpiece for the permanent collection has a detailed 15 ft. replica of the Lusitania made out of 200,000 toothpicks as two human figures shaped out of hundreds of wood and felt piano hammers convene silently together.

Johanna Burke’s “Another Green World” mixed media of dry plants, seeds, beads and glass was originally designed for a window at Bergdorf Goodman’s New York store and donated to AVAM.

However, the new environmental exhibit is not a bludgeon wielded by political or environmental activists. It is a collection of personal visions by individuals who would not even consider themselves artists, using materials at hand. It is an invitation to explore our environment through alternative perspectives and along the way to muse over the simple scientific facts of the challenges we face if we continue to ignore the ecological emergencies at hand. Even the ramp to the exhibit begs a fundamental question—hundreds of plastic items collected from a single beach in California are suspended from the corridor ceiling. On the wall, a text panel history of plastic. How will we deal with with an ocean choked by discarded plastic and drinking water suffused with hidden threat microplastics now being detected in humans all over the world?

The Spy was lucky to have as their guide Founder, Director and curator of the exhibit, Rebecca Hoffberger whose knowledge about each of the “artists” and their works reveal the depth of her dedication to the exhibit at hand and the overall mission of AVAM. Hoffberger led us through the labyrinth of exhibits describing their origin, the artist, and how she felt it shaped the conversation we must have about our environmental crisis.

But what are we looking at when we see giant green gorillas fashioned from fiberglass, beads, and plants, or a wax rubbing of a crosscut of a tree compared with a human fingerprint, and why does it move us so different from the art spaces of other museums?

Understanding AVAM’s mission is to understand Hoffberger’s original interest in creating a space for art created outside the classical world of classically trained artists. In her mission statement, she wrote, “Visionary art as defined for the purposes of the American Visionary art Museum refers to art produced by self-taught individuals, usually without formal training, whose works arise from an innate personal vision that revels foremost in the creative act itself.”

In the mid-eighties, Hoffberger was employed as the Development Director of People Encouraging People, a program of the Department of Psychiatry at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, and it was there she became impressed with patients’ elaborate imaginations. She wondered how she could showcase these alternative visions, not as an illness but as a strength. Were there galleries or museums showcasing this kind of personal vision? She and her future husband and museum co-founder LeRoy E. Hoffberger decided to visit French artist Jean Dubuffet’s Art Brut Museum in Switzerland where the largest collection of anti-cultural Art Brut (raw art) was exhibited, including the intense and intricate work of psychiatric patient Adolf Wolfli. Impressed with the collection and its simple exhibition style, the two returned with ideas for a museum that would widen and redefine the “outsider’ genre to include “intuitive creative invention and grassroots genius.”

Adolf Wolfli’s “General view of the island Neveranger,” 1911. Wolfli, a psychiatric patient for most of his life was championed by French painter Jean Dubuffet and became one of the first artists associated with the Art Brut or “outsider art.”

Intense fundraising efforts were begun. The City of Baltimore helped with acquiring a place, Senators Barbara Mikulski and Bob Dole were early supporters of the effort including getting a Congressional resolution designating the museum as America’s official national museum. The museum design was created by architect Rebecca Swanston and artist and designer Alex Castro who later became Director of Washington College’s SandBox project in Chestertown. AVAM held its grand opening in 1995 and the accolades have poured in ever since. CNN described the museum as “…one of the most fantastic museums anywhere in America…”

“The Secret Life of Earth” exhibit of 88 artists is a perfect manifestation of AVAM’s mission. Johanna Burke’s mixed-media “Another Green World” shares equal billing with every other artist from Brian Pardini’s found driftwood sculptures to Santiago Navila’s video installation “Untitled” and Julia Butterfly Hill’s journal entries from her 738 consecutive days perched in a California redwood tree to defy a lumber company and its threat to clear cut old-growth redwoods. There is no promotion of gender, race or ethnicity, and Hoffberger is adamant about keeping it that way.

The Spy found the delicate pigeon skeleton from Chestertown and it pointed the way to an extraordinary and personal journey guided by visionaries whose directness and self-taught raw talent stunned us into a visceral connection to the primal network of life we threaten with our abuse and denial.

Pioneer in time-lapse cinematography Louis Schwartzberg once said that “beauty and seduction, I believe is nature’s tool for survival, because we will protect what we fall in love with.” The American Visionary Art Museum’s “The Secret Life of Earth” exhibit is no less than an illuminated path to the heart of our environmental dilemmas. It’s a braid of science and raw vision without sermonizing and dedicated to the awakening of all who long to curate, protect, and love the world we need to survive.

James Dissette a contributor to the Chestertown Spy and Talbot Spy, a Washington College graduate, and was awarded the school’s Sophie Kerr Prize for Literature in 1971.

“The Secret Life of Earth” special exhibit will be available until September 6, 2020 For hours, ticket prices and more information about The American Visionary Art Museum, see their website here. The Spy and the Academy Art Museum will host a lecture by Rebecca Hoffberger on February 21th starting at 6 pm. For ticket information please go here.

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Snapshots of Daily Life: Canes by George Merrill

January 19, 2020 by George R. Merrill 1 Comment

My mobility has returned slowly, but steadily. I’m now able to do basics, but no quick moves or heavy lifting. I’m pleased.

I’ve had a cane for a while. After the worst of my back ailments, I used it around the house. Then I abandoned it, doing well without it.

One day, recently, I took an extended walk around my neighborhood. Not being confident of my gait, I considered the practicality of using the cane to avoid falling, but my pride resisted it mightily.

“Why not get into the practices appropriate to the next phase of my life,” I lectured myself half-heartedly. “Consider the cane a kind of warm up for the future.” I only hoped no one would see me. Taking the cane turned out to be a good call, but not without some lessons.

I walked up the driveway out onto the street. I noticed that the cane assisted me in making a surer footing. This increased my confidence. It had been shaken in the last few months. Now, with the cane, I walked longer while experiencing little pain. I was getting into it; placing the cane deliberately to the ground, listening as it struck the ground, tapping rhythmically in synch with my stride; it seemed like a dance. It was neat.

Walking along smartly, I felt proud; wasn’t this like my good old days? Emotionally buoyed, I tucked the cane under my left arm, fancying myself a Marine officer in a movie I’d once seen. He carried a swagger stick. I picked up my pace confidently. I felt jubilant, imperious like a Commander reviewing his troops, the measure of his authority and command resting tidily under his arm. Was he cool, or what? Was I cool, or what?

I didn’t see the rock.

I stepped on it. It turned my foot abruptly. I stumbled just enough to throw me off balance, but not to drop me to the ground. I retrieved my step. Humbled, I returned the cane to its proper use. I’d thought more highly of my new mobility than I ought – or perhaps more accurately, thought of myself as someone I simply wasn’t. I was neither walking in the light I had nor taking the stride that was proper to me.

During this period of my increasing mobility, something else had also been going on within me; the difficulties I experienced in finding my new stride, which I had regarded as limitations for all these months, even humiliations, were not diminishments at all, but another way of being in my world. It was an oblique imperative to slow down and live with increasing awareness of what I was doing in any moment.

Some years ago, I’d done several yoga practices. It was portentous that the walking meditation then was the one exercise that made me the most impatient; it drove me nuts. I was far more of a fidget then. Whether it was walking or doing anything else, I simply wanted to get on with it. I fought against the slow, deliberate measured steps required of the yoga walking meditation. But that’s the only way I can really feel the ground under my feet, the only moments I will ever commune directly with what is always holding me in place no matter what I happen to be about; literally, the ground of my being.

As a younger man, I was an unconscious but willing participant in the frenetic velocity modern culture drives us. I moved quickly, drove fast, walked hurriedly, and wolfed food down – sometimes not even bothering to sit at the table. I answered questions barely taking a breath. I rapidly dispatched anything I was about, getting it out of the way as soon as possible so I could go on to something else. My governor had been stuck for years at full throttle. The challenge to my mental lifestyle began imperceptibly years ago when I first read one of Thich Nhat Hanh’s pithy aphorisms: “When you wash dishes, wash dishes. When you put them away, put them away? I remember reacting to this with a dismissive, “Right, whatever.” However, I never quite shook his thought.

My world view was simple and practical then: dishes were there to be washed and dried and put away swiftly so I could get on with more important things. What was Thich Nhat Hanh getting at anyway?

When I took the cane from the ground, tucked it under my arm and turned it into a swagger stick I lost awareness of where I was my world. I surrendered my alertness to enter an illusory world where I didn’t belong nor ever had I. In the here and now where I walked, my world was in fact right under my feet touching it at every step. Then, too, the more I noticed my steps I also noticed how the ground was strewn with small affirmations of life, past and present. Some were very endearing, like the undulating bodies of the Woolley Bears, executing their tasks of crossing the road to find a place of refuge for the winter.

Others were cryptic. As wind blows hard, Conifer trees broadcast pine needles everywhere and they fall onto the macadam road where I walk. They form curious patterns like Chinese pictograms. The configurations that their thin and supple lines formed demanded my attention, like half completed puzzles. They seemed to express a language of their own as if having left their last habitations on the tree limbs and fallen to earth, and now had a message to communicate to me, something from the life in which they participated as part of the tree. I was a man reading tea leaves.

All very fanciful to be sure except for this: I finally stopped playing soldier that day and got real, and resumed walking with the cane. When I walked, I walked; when I stopped, I stopped; and when I looked at the ground, I looked to the ground and I knew there was no place, at least for those moments, where I wanted to be, except right there where I was.

Columnist George Merrill is an Episcopal Church priest and pastoral psychotherapist. A writer and photographer, he’s authored two books on spirituality: Reflections: Psychological and Spiritual Images of the Heart and The Bay of the Mother of God: A Yankee Discovers the Chesapeake Bay. He is a native New Yorker, previously directing counseling services in Hartford, Connecticut, and in Baltimore. George’s essays, some award winning, have appeared in regional magazines and are broadcast twice monthly on Delmarva Public Radio.

Food Friday: Cabbage is the New Kale!

January 17, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

All hail the cabbage! Humble. Long-lasting. Tasty. Crunchy. Overlooked. Packed with Vitamin C and calcium. (Red cabbage is loaded with anti-oxidants.) So long, kale! You have outstayed your welcome.

I’m still flushed with enthusiasm for New Year’s Resolutions, which always include saving money and eating better. And I’d like to cut down on my carbon footprint. Luckily the grocery store is under 2 miles away, but if I only head in there once or twice a week, it is better than making a daily errand destination. It’s bad enough that I am going to stop off at Target later…

A cabbage is cheap, and packed with nutrition, as well as being versatile and large. The last cabbage I pulled out from the heap weighed 4 pounds, just brimming over with meal potential. You can easily spice up your weekly menu without spending lots of money. And cabbage doesn’t have to be just the stinky accompaniment to corned beef once a year. There are lots of new and enticing ways to prepare cabbage. I’ll bet you that right this minute someone in Park Slope is experimenting with an artisanal bespoke organic cabbage smoothie, infused with saffron and CBD.

Here is a lot of practical and basic info from the geniuses at Bon Appétit: https://www.bonappetit.com/test-kitchen/tools-test-kitchen/article/cabbage

When winter rolls around we tend to think of oven-baked meals as a way to keep the kitchen cozy and our little bellies full. Whenever we do pork chops I always think of cole slaw and apple sauce as good side dishes. Samsin Nosrat (Of Salt Fat Acid Heat fame https://www.saltfatacidheat.com) has a better idea than my mother’s 1950’s Hellmann’s mayonnaise-inspired slaw dish. You should try this: Samin Nosrat’s Bright Cabbage Slaw. It incorporates cabbage and apples, without the fat and calories from nostalgic mayonnaise. It is a bright treat on a dark winter night. https://www.pbs.org/food/recipes/samin-nosrats-bright-cabbage-slaw/ You can pretend you are in California. (This is originally Michael Pollan’s recipe from Chez Panisse.)

Nigella’s Sweet and Sour Slaw is a little more time consuming – it might be perfect for a Saturday night meal, and it is quite festive and tasty. http://www.sweetpaulmag.com/food/nigellas-sweet-amp-sour-slaw

Now you can take your new knife skills and try something fun for Taco Tuesday: Not Your Traditional Korean Tacos. Our friends at Food52 always have a tasty and clever solution for dinner, and these fresh Korean tacos will set you apart from the salt-laden Old El Paso-recipe dependent households. https://food52.com/recipes/17897-not-your-traditional-korean-tacos

An even more sophisticated take on cabbage and wraps comes from Bon Appétit: One-Skillet Hot Sausage and Cabbage Stir-Fry with Chives. https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/one-skillet-hot-sausage-and-cabbage-stir-fry-with-chives Mr. Friday is always buying Italian sausage, and we wind up using it just for sausage and pepper dishes, or as pizza topping. This adds another meal to our burgeoning repertoire for 2020.

And where would we be in the midst of winter without a scrambler recipe? That is, a recipe where everything is already on hand; in the fridge, in the pantry, in the larder, ready to roll: Pasta with Cabbage, Winter Squash and Walnuts. This will take care of a lot of leftovers, particularly that half bag of walnuts from the Christmas baking. No need to go out in the snow! https://food52.com/recipes/78397-pasta-with-cabbage-winter-squash-and-walnuts

Cabbage probably won’t ever be the fleek media darling that kale was, but it is always dependable. Like an old friend, or an old pair of jeans. You remember it fondly and it soothes your soul.

“Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.”-Mark Twain

Culinary Miracle on Idlewild: Bombay Tadka Comes to Easton

January 16, 2020 by Spy Agent 9 -- 00 Section 1 Comment

One of the most anticipated happenings in Easton in the past few months is the opening of Bombay Tadka Restaurant. Currently, Bombay Tadka is enjoying success with its Cambridge location on Race Street thanks in part to the innovative ideas of owner, Rohit Shinde. In August, the restaurant held an Indian Street Food Festival to a sold-out and appreciative crowd. Shinde plans to explore various ways to introduce the Eastern Shore to new and delicious food choices through events and specials in Easton, as well. As he says in the interview, “Easton has people with different taste buds.”

Meanwhile, fans of the Cambridge location will find almost the same menu in Easton, although Shinde will be adding some Southern Indian cooking, which includes a stronger focus on vegetables and seafood over the Northern Indian attention to meat and dairy. Future plans also include opening the restaurant as a breakfast destination.

A departure from Cambridge will be the daily buffet that the Easton location plans to feature. Shinde says this will allow him to serve those in the surrounding area who don’t have a lot to time for lunch and will also let new fans taste a variety of dishes. He looks forward to giving recommendations to customers who are interested in mild flavors and those wanting a spicier version of a menu item.

Bombay Tadka will be open from 11 to 9 pm. They are located at 508 Idlewild Ave.

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Stealing the Nest at Blackwater? By Val Cavalheri

January 13, 2020 by Val Cavalheri Leave a Comment

This was supposed to be a story about eagles. We were going to cover the installation of a camera above an eagle’s nest at the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) in Cambridge, one that would follow the progress of an eagle couple returning to their nest.

Well, this story is now about owls. Maybe.

Back in 2004, the Friends of Blackwater (Friends), a nonprofit citizens support group founded in 1987, began broadcasting still images from a bald eagle nest at Blackwater. The nest had seen 25 eagle eggs hatch, but after a couple of failed nesting seasons, it appeared to have been abandoned. About a year ago, a search was conducted, a new nest was identified, and a decision made to install a streaming cam, similar to the osprey and waterfowl cams being used at the refuge.

Both the waterfowl and this new cam are the creation of Harry Heckathorn, VP of the Board of Directors for Friends. He designed, built the infrastructure, and coordinated all the participants (electric company, construction assistance, Refuge staff assistance, etc.) that were involved in the project. Another board member, Bob Quinn, stepped into the role of IT support.

Quinn, who had retired as the IT Infrastructure Manager for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, manages the IT equipment both at the Blackwater Visitor Center, as well as in the field. Lisa Mayo, also a board member with Friends, is the webmaster who ensures that the stream is seen at the Visitor Center, on the Friends of Blackwater website, and their Facebook page. The actual installation (as seen in the photos) was done by Craig Koppie, a biologist from the US Fish and Wildlife Service who clearly is not afraid of heights.

“The camera above the nest is a ‘PTZ’ (pan, tilt, zoom) cameras that I can move around depending on the circumstances,” says Quinn. “If we are lucky enough to get chicks, we will be able to zoom in close to get a good look or zoom back out to see the parents nesting or feeding them. As they get older, we’ll be able to view them growing, stretching their wings, branching, and eventually fledging. The second camera is not PTZ; it is what is known as a “bullet” camera. It can zoom in and out but cannot pan or tilt.” This camera was installed in a nearby tree pointed at the nest.

Motion detection was also set up on the PTZ camera, allowing Quinn to be alerted whenever there was activity in the nest. What he was seeing, though, was only one eagle making irregular visits to the nest. “We expected to see both eagles and some bonding behavior,” says Quinn. Bonding includes bringing in new nesting material and rearranging sticks, beak rubbing, and the male bringing food to the nest for the female as a way to display his skills as a provider.

Instead, Quinn started to notice frequent visits by another raptor, a couple of Great Horned Owls (GHOs)! GHOs, who don’t build their own, will use another bird’s nest, a crevice in a tree, or other natural cavities. “We’ve seen some of the same behavior with the owls that you see with eagles, such as beak rubbing and food delivery,” says Quinn. “We’ve been seeing 2-3 visits per day, although yesterday I think I counted four, and they seem to be getting longer. So, signs are positive that we may have a nesting pair of GHOs.”

It’s not that there are not enough eagles at Blackwater NWR. During the annual Mid-winter Eagle Survey last week, a total of 176 eagles were counted at 14 survey points on and around the refuge. So, what happened to the eagles that should be occupying this nest? Quinn speculates that something happened to the male. “Another possibility is they chose to build a different nest because of the human activity around the net (us), although this is less likely since we saw eagle visits after we completed our work, and we finished before nesting season.”

Whatever the reason, the GHOs don’t appear to care and seem to be considering moving into their new rental. Since the refuge has a no-intervention policy, if the eagles don’t defend the nest, the owls may use it for their nesting season in January/February.

And if the owls decide to extend their lease? Would another eagle’s nest be located and equipped with a camera? Quinn says he’s not sure, but any decision wouldn’t be made until after the nesting season. Meanwhile, we can all take part in the guessing game and observe first-hand what will happen with this nest. Live cams can be found on the Friend’s website, Facebook page, Instagram, or the TV monitors in the Blackwater Visitor Center. (Talbot Spy will update this story in the future.)

Be advised that the live feeds do come with a warning:

Our two cameras display live views from a wild bald eagle nest at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Maryland. The cams will display raw, unfiltered nature that might include wildlife interactions and weather calamities that we cannot control. We have a no-intervention policy, as we are just observers.

Val Cavalheri is a recent transplant to the Eastern Shore, having lived in Northern Virginia for the past 20 years. She’s been a writer, editor and professional photographer for various publications, including the Washington Post. Photos courtesy of Bob Quinn Photography.

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Snapshots of Daily Life: Mist by George Merrill

January 12, 2020 by George R. Merrill 1 Comment

There are those of us who, through life’s exigencies, are forced to temporarily leave the sanctuary of Tilghman Island and regions surrounding Saint Michaels. We travel to the big city as some might consider Easton or the outlets in Queenstown. Personally, I find the drive a drag.

Still, it falls the lot for us to spend enormous amounts of time in a car. Household and personal needs will require us to go beyond this haven of tranquility in which we live. If we are young and strong we might like walking the road, at least partially. Some local health nuts and exercise freaks may be seen garbed in florid colors, swinging their arms with rigorous determination. They resemble boxers, not with gloves, but with water bottles firmly in hand, taking determined strides, and defiantly heading to unknown destinations. I’ve seen stalwart souls walk the road, not for exercise, but out of necessity. They carry shopping bags from Grauls back to town – some occasionally walk in the rain. I’ve picked up some. In any case, the St Michaels Road is a busy stretch.

I find driving the road tedious. It demands my full attention, or more accurately, numbs it. For an aging man who, for starters, has a limited attention span, and concentrating on the road takes all I’ve got. But in rare moments of deliverance, there are stunning exhibitions of natural beauty that dazzle me and make it all worthwhile. Driving early one morning to make an appointment in Easton became one such occasion.

Getting beyond the Philistine monuments to commerce that block the periphery of St. Michaels, and proceeding just beyond Grauls, the land begins opening up and I can still see the remnants of the region’s agricultural past. Its simple charm is the openness; its expansiveness has a way of reverberating through the spaces of our hearts, those interior regions where Buddhists tell us we find the boundless space of our being. For some, this might seem an overstatement, but I’ll still stand by it: being next to wide open fields is a liberating feeling. It evokes a sense of freedom and possibility. And It sure beats looking at big boxes.

For the season, it was warmer that particular morning. The sun was edging its way above the trees as mist began materializing maybe thirty feet high on either side of the road. I was driving southeast into the sunrise. The developing moisture in the cold air, precipitated by heat from the sunrise meeting the cool earth generated the early morning mist. The mist was illuminated by the sun’s back lighting, so it glowed the way light shines through translucent glass.

The trees, which of course I knew full well were rooted in the earth, I now saw otherwise. It was as if they were growing like hydroponic vegetation, not from somewhere rooted in the earth, but levitating from the surface of some water in which they’d been floating. Their branches appeared as though they were lines drawn from a charcoal pen on a silver canvas.

I proceeded along the road. These ghostly apparitions came and went, but why they appeared in one field and not another wasn’t clear to me. The display did this much for me that morning; the normal tedium of that drive dissipated as some of the mists did, but alternately enchanting me all the way until just shy of the Easton bypass. Unexpected differences lend spice to life.

If I had to abandon the wilds of our rural shore and trek to the big city, this was the way to go.

The drive from St. Michaels to Easton, although it varies some, is effectively a west- east trek, or the other way, an east-west drive. Coming east in the early morning points me directly into the rising sun. I’ll find myself frequently flying blind since such brilliant light obscures my ability to see the scenery in detail or even see it at all. Coming west towards the evening sun, the same sort of thing occurs; creating moments when I can see nothing but a sheet of pure light.

It’s curious how light’s properties are associated mostly with what they illuminate for us; ‘shedding light’ on things is common parlance. How this same light is just as able to blind us as it is to illuminate our path is paradoxical. I have thought of this before in other connections; that is, how darkness and shadows we think of as obscuring our landscapes, keep us from seeing what we wish to, but in fact reveal what we do well to see. Experience has led me to believe that in the last analysis, shadows are as important to seeing the big picture and to apprehend the whole landscape, as is light.

I’d note here that the regulation of climate differences forms the mists that delight us. Mist is tiny droplets of water suspended in the air, formed when warmer water in the air is rapidly cooled, causing it to change from invisible gas to tiny visible water droplets. Temperatures must have sufficient differentiation for the phenomenon to occur.

I see immigration for America in a similar way; peoples of sufficient differences –– whether they are color, nationality, ethnicity, language and unique skills –– when brought together in common cause create a new and vibrant landscape for us all.

I suppose it’s a little like the day I had to leave my usual and familiar comfort zone –– my sanctuary just outside of St. Michaels –– and travel the road to another place: then I could see clearly how the regulation of differences creates new and infinite possibilities.

It’s a beautiful thing, really.

Food Friday: New Year’s Resolutions

January 10, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

I’m going to check back in three months and see if the enthusiasm I currently feel for for all my new 2020 rules of clean living are still true. It’s easy today, ten days into the new year to be proud of my new, adult approach to life. But as my daughter, the former Pesky Pescatarian has observed, sagely, that all this adulting is hard work.

Luke the wonder dog and I have been taking two walks every weekday. It’s been easy, so far. Sure, it’s been chilly in the mornings, but bright and sunny in the afternoons. No excuses have been sought. I’m trying to maintain that lofty goal of 10,000 steps a day, and so far, every day this week we have been successful. I don’t know what we will do on a rainy day, though. Luke hates to get his feet wet in the rain. Never mind that he loves pools and oceans and rivers. No; he does not like to go out in the rain. I’ll have to leave him here while I go off trekking.

Dry January is a little trickier. This is the second year that Mr. Friday and I have joined in Dry January – no alcohol for the month. We didn’t realize how much we like that glass of cheap white wine when he comes home at night, or choosing the right wine to pair with Friday Night Pizza. This abstinence is good for the liver, pocketbook and waistband. I’ve lost 2 pounds since Christmas, which included inhaling city blocks of créme pat in the Christmas cream puffs and acres of homemade peppermint bark. Plus a whole flock of Champagne; some really nice Veuve Clicquot Rosé, too. Weight-wise, it has been an excellent New Year, so far. https://www.npr.org/2020/01/06/793895415/dry-january-the-health-benefits-from-taking-a-break-from-alcohol

My dentist is sang froid and easy-going. She is just pleased that I wander through every year. Her martinet of a dental hygienist is another story. Every 6 moths I get Miss Minchin’s soul-crushing assessment. She knows that I don’t floss every single bloody night. Not so in 2020! 9 for 9! So far! And I replaced the head of my electric toothbrush on January 1. Who says I am not serious about oral hygiene?

Santa brought me a nice pile of books that I haven’t been able to find at the library, so I will not be indulging in an impulse buys on Amazon for a few months. I even tidied up the stack of waiting books on my bedside table. Now, if only the New York Times would call to see what I am planning to read this year. Among them are: Virginia Woolf’s Garden, Nigella Lawson’s At My Table, Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret, Penelope Lively’s Life in the Garden, Nigal Slater’s The Christmas Chronicles, Donald Hall’s On Eagle Pond, and The Old Success by Martha Grimes. Murder, gardens, food, poetry, gossip and more food. (I’m thinking I might re-read Little Women, too. I know just where my well-thumbed copy is, too!)

Which brings us to the kitchen. For the most part our kitchen is fairly well organized. There are drawers dedicated to potholders and trivets, rolls of aluminum foil, parchment and waxed paper. A drawer for baking tools: cookie cutters, measuring spoons and cups, offset spatulas and icing bags. A drawer for tea towels, another for silverware, one for matches, straws, razor blades, twist ties, and other rarefied junk. There is just one for all the key cooking utensils. Mr. Friday and I have a lot of repeat items. I have two turners I like, thin and sleek and metal. He prefers a few of icky, clunky black OXO silicone pancake turners. I like an old fashioned, easy-peasy cork screw – he likes a fancy battery powered one. (Luckily that isn’t an issue this month!)

We have two sets of indoor cooking tongs, and an outsized pair for outdoors. We have cheese graters, micro-planers and a nutmeg grater. We are down to one garlic press, and one can opener. Several slotted spoons. Lots of sterling serving pieces. A basting brush. Two cooking forks we got from our mothers, that are exact matches, which makes us suspect they were both acquired through the assiduous application of child labor pasting S&H Green Stamps into books, as we both have vague recollections of being entertained as tots…

My next character improvement is going to be organizing this shambles of a kitchen drawer. Wish me luck. Luke says it is going to rain this weekend…

“One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries.”
-A.A. Milne

Spy Chat: The Talbot County Council Winter Update with Corey Pack

January 8, 2020 by Dave Wheelan

The Spy tradition of keeping up with Talbot County government continues with our January conversation with council member Corey Pack. In our latest chat, Corey highlights what’s before the Talbot Council in the next few months, such as the Comprehensive Water and Sewer Plan, and the equally important start of a campaign to change the County’s property tax cap. He also provides an update on longer-term projects like the impact of the Kerwin Commission study on school budgets and moving forward on the possible addition to the St. Michaels Library.

This video is approximately thirteen minutes in length.

Don’t miss the latest! You can subscribe to The Talbot Spy‘s free Daily Intelligence Report here.

Not Your Grandmother’s Club: Talbot County Women’s Club in 2020

January 6, 2020 by Val Cavalheri

From each other’s homes to school auditoriums to their own ‘clubhouse’ (a historic double-house on Talbot Lane), the Talbot County Women’s Club is no stranger to having to change meeting locations to accommodate membership numbers. But although settings may have changed, commitment to their goals to support worthwhile local causes through service projects have not.

Established in 1930 by a small group of Easton women, the non-profit organization is guided by the Club’s objectives: community service, a lifetime of learning, and long-lasting friendship. Board member, BettyJo Constantino, explains, “People do better in a community setting, and that’s why our club exists.”

In its 90 years history, the Club has supported numerous programs in Talbot County, including Easton Volunteer Fire Department, Shore Regional Cancer Center, and Talbot County Social Services, to name a few. They have provided baskets for the holidays and for Easter for the Department of Aging. They also took part in knitting and crocheting approximately 80 red hats for the Little Hats, Big Hearts campaign for the American Heart Association.

This past year, the Club donated 50 fully stocked backpacks to those in need from Easton Middle School. “We connected with the school staff, the teachers, and the principal and found out how great the need was,” says Constantino. “We were able to fill the backpacks with 30 pounds of material. There were colored pencils, regular pencils, pens, spiral notebooks, loose-leaf paper, three-ring binders, erasers, etc.” The involvement of local businesses is critical to their success. “Staples was phenomenal; both donating items and lowering their prices,” she added.

Local businesses are also involved in the Club’s latest “Chopped Talbot” fundraiser, which features six local restaurants competing for the title of Champion, as voted on by attendees. For a $60 ticket price (which includes tip), guests are served a three-course dinner: entree, appetizer, and dessert. Part of the ticket sale proceeds benefits the Club and its mission. At the end of the competition, around April, a winner will be declared.

So far, Osteria Alfredo, Marker Five, and Eat Sprout have participated. Coming up will be Bistro St. Michaels on January 13, 14, 17, and 18th; Wylder Restaurant & Hotel on February 22, 23, 29th, and March 1st; and T at the General Store on March 11, 12, 18, and 19th.

Lately, the Club is focusing on building its membership. When current members noticed that meeting hours were a detriment to working women, they restructured to allow women to find the time that best suited their schedule. “We’re trying to capture and reach out to a different audience, not just retirees, says Constantino. “So, we have our lunchtime meeting at noon on the second Tuesday of the month, and we also have an evening meeting at 6:30pm. The evening meeting is shorter, less formal. Just hors d’oeuvres and a glass of wine!”

These meetings are not just social events, they are also meant to be educational. Guest speakers are invited to inspire and inform members about local and national current events. Recent guests included Jayme Dingler from Talbot Interfaith Shelter, Mary Wilson, a former White House staffer, and Bill Peak, who discussed how to write a memoir.

The Club is always searching for speakers, says Constantino. “We want something that would be interesting, intriguing, and add value to our members. Somethings health-related, something cultural related, something historical. I also would love to have separate special events, outside of our monthly meetings. A featured speaker who knows a lot about what’s happening in this area, for instance.”

No mention of the Talbot County Women’s Club would be complete without a peek into their meeting space. Dating back to the 1600s, the frame home eventually ended up in the hands of James Price in 1795. The Prices added a brick segment and moved into the newer section, never connecting the two dwellings. It passed on through generations until 1946 when for $4,000, the Club purchased the property. But the purchase came with a legend that was resurrected. Supposedly, James Price had a neighbor who, unbeknownst to the Prices, buried gold and treasures under the brick cellar floor as it was being built.

After the Club signed the deed, trespassers broke into the cellar and dug for gold. Whether something was found or not is unknown; however, the entire cellar floor had to be redone. This was only one of the many expenses the home needed to make it fit for occupancy. Through the efforts of many benefactors, donations, and sheer will, 18 Talbot Lane is the wonderful and quirky place it is today. It is worth a visit.

Meetings are posted on the Talbot County Women’s Club website, as is additional information about becoming a member. Guests are always welcome.

Snapshots Of Daily Life: Streetlights by George Merrill

January 5, 2020 by George R. Merrill

I am a creature of darkness.

Friends and relatives tell me that they regret seeing the days of lingering sunlight ending when daylight savings time ends. They have happily basked in long days of the late spring, summer and early fall light, and now mourn their passing. Not me. I find refuge in the cover of darkness

It’s not as though I’m a goth person who likes sinister things. I haven’t worn black clothes since my early days a parish priest. Yes, I have a melancholy streak but I’m not creepy about it. The darkness is different for me, a positive thing. It’s like this: there is nothing I find more satisfying than, in the latter days of October, laying a fire just after sunset, mixing a libation and sitting by a blazing fire with only one lamp lit in the room, a light just bright enough to read my book. Then I feel as though I’m in tune with the world. Indeed, I may well be. Darkness serves our well-being as much as light does: we are diurnal creatures. Darkness doesn’t usually get the kind of favorable press that light does.

In this regard I’m in good company, if not necessarily everyone’s favorite company; a vast variety of our planet’s other inhabitants like insects, bats, rodents, opossums, badgers, many birds and turtles, and certain kinds of vegetation find refuge in darkness. For them, too, it’s a positive thing. They go about their business in the same way I do, only spending their nights as if they were my day, traveling about from here to there with daily chores. In the case of many plants, they grow mostly at night. I remain sedentary, fixed in a chair. Each of us, in our own way, is glad to be under the cloak of darkness. Darkness, however, is coming under assault in the postmodern world. The assault is called light pollution.

Light pollution is now encroaching on our precious darkness. Excessive night-time lighting that’s misdirected (up and out rather than down) and artificial (think large parking lots and stadiums) lights that appear in many quarters of population centers, disrupt the diurnal rhythms of the natural world. Too much light pollution also washes out starlight in the night sky, interferes with astronomical research, disrupts ecosystems, has adverse health effects and wastes energy. The ubiquitous presence of streetlights has become a significant factor in light pollution.

Whoever could have imagined that light shining in the darkness could become a liability. Any good thing when in the hands of man, is often made toxic.

I recall how the streetlights of my boyhood were unlike today’s streetlights that cast mostly cool light. Back then, the streets threw a light that had a soft, orange hue, different than the lighting of today’s streets, office buildings or big boxes. There’s a cold chill to present lighting, perhaps reflecting the less kindly milieu that surrounds us, today. However, I must say that the gentle ambience of softer light did little to temper my boyhood social conduct.

Neighborhood street lights consisted of large, disc-like shades that were metal, round, scalloped and with a large lightbulb in the center. They provided neighborhood boys a vulnerable target to practice our marksmanship. Which of us kids could hit the bulb first; it was a matter of honor among us. It was total misbehavior, to be sure, but in the passage of time, I can see where my malicious conduct may have, in the big picture, served a greater good. Actually, I may have been, although inadvertently, an early activist addressing the evils of light pollution.

It was not that I set out to do mischief every night or to address the problem of light pollution. Popping streetlights happened randomly, like weather, and for no reason I can identify. It would predictably occur on hot summer nights when a few of the neighborhood boys would roam nearby streets not initially to do harm, but just wander around aimlessly as I’ve seen bats and insects swarm in circles around the streetlights. Then, during one of these casual sorties, one kid might suggest we try to knock out the light at the corner down the street. That streetlight, while in the vicinity of our homes, was far enough away that we felt sufficient anonymity existed there to get away with it. The attempt organized itself sufficiently so that each boy took turns – one rock per person – while the rest of us watched.

As I recall this, my actions may have been inspired as much by the allure of the darkness we created as it had to do with my fascination with spectacle of dying light. In a perverse kind of way, my actions were preserving the integrity of the night.

In any case, what followed was thrilling: after several attempts, my rock hit the light. The light actually grew brighter when hit. The bulb flared up for a matter of seconds, sputtered, and in its death throes, sprayed sparks into the night like fireworks, and then slowly went out, hissing all the while as it finally surrendered to the darkness of the summer night. I was experiencing how the thrill that being intentionally malicious is pleasurable; misdeeds may reverberate through the human heart like the tremulous musical notes that shiver along our auditory faculties. There’s something neat about being bad. Forbidden fruit is sweet.

We remained momentarily still, awed at the strike. Then we scrambled and ran in all directions, like cockroaches fleeing for the cover of darkness after the kitchen lights are flipped on. The streetlight episodes remain imprinted in my mind as does the recognition of how willful wrongdoing can be a thrilling business, and paradoxically may even address an evil that has not as yet been identified.

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