A Few of My Favorite Things 3 ~ 21 Hopes

collaboration between
Wayne Stratz and Margaret Almon

1. I hope that when I enter my studio something beautiful will emerge
2. I hope that after a day of teaching I have the gumption to create something in the kitchen
3. I hope that my students will experience joy and just maybe realize how cool science is
4. I hope to celebrate a 50th wedding anniversary
5. I hope to make pizza for 60 people this year or come dang close
6. I hope to commission art
7. I hope to watch friends heal when life makes them weary
8. I hope to learn to really listen to people
9. I hope to one day love all colors even chartreuse and mauve
10. I hope to teach others how to make strudel just as my mom-mom taught me
11. I hope that migrating birds find a safe place to hang out at the other end
12. I hope to never lose the joy of music touching my heart
13. I hope that things worth saving are saved
14. I hope that people experience less hatred
15. I hope that Mosaic Woman can continue to be a stay at home artist
16. I hope that I let my life unfold into the mystery and not try to hard to control its path
17. I hope that my house keeps me warm and dry
18. I hope to see the Oregon coast again
19. I hope that I take the time to watch a bird which has allowed me the pleasure to see it
20. I hope my doubts fade, but never completely
21. I hope to sing these words on many more Christmas Eves at my current church ~

Long lay the world in sin and error pining,

'Til He appeared and the soul felt its worth.

A thrill of HOPE the weary world rejoices, 

For Yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.

March madness ends with tulip blooms

Looking Inside, a tulip by Wayne Stratz

This month was hectic and last weekend's craft show (third in four weeks) drained me, or I let it drain me.  So my physics students and I went in search of absolute zero.  At home I scrambled to keep up with my on-line class to improve my teaching skills while helping Margaret clean up the Hippo Project.  Now all that is left of those major projects is a final paper and photos of the mosaic.

An exceptionally early spring had me scrambling to keep up with weeds at home and dividing perennials at work.   One of my homeroom dudes fell and had to be patched up in a trauma center, so I stopped and created a suncatcher for him.  My sister-in-law flew in from South Africa and brought with her a bunch of joy, a passion for good food, and fun gifts of african jazz.

and before a break could be enjoyed, grades and progress reports were due and I wished I never had created such a hectic month ...

but the tulips provided beauty as I ran out of steam, so I drew a design and cut some glass to celebrate what I took the time to witness in the midst of it all.

 Maybe this tulip will also be celebrated in design.

Lilly white tulip by Wayne Stratz

T is for Tree Views

This photo showed up in my Oregon post this past Wednesday. It's back

I remember the amazement of coming across this scene. and that may be the best way to view it.

But I also have to wonder about the force it took for the water to place it there. The reoded hillside says more about that force. I wonder how intertidal critters have reacted to a tree being thrown into their space. Where did it die? What current brought it to this beach? Was it a storm or just a normal high tide that lifted it up.

And what would an artist make of this. How many other lifted cameras. What would happen if one lifted a brush to paint it on canvas? And a poet, essayist, or story teller would create what if that sat down and lifted their pencils to the scene.

But it is Easter and I am thinking about the spiritual force needed to lift up all men and women.

May scientific, artistic, and spiritual folk continue to see this world and share their responses with me.

And of course one must consider jazz too:

ahh, may your dreams tonight be filled with trees...



...

Q is for Quit, Quality, and Quintet

photo by Baratunde

Quitting can be positive, as one blogger put it recently... Blogging every day about a LETTER is destroying my blog quality. So step way, and they did. I have survived so far by falling a letter behind and doing a few reversals of letters.

We are called to become our true selves and that takes much quitting. The hard part is seeing what habits, attitudes, and people are holding us back. Stoicism seemed like a great friend, and can be, but I may have had a bit too much residing in my soul. Blogging without words about Oregon yesterday reminded me about quitting too. It was there that I gave up what took years to step away from, yes, stepping away, another hard part.

But stepping away brings us quality, which I will not try to explain (if I remember properly, in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig described a mental breakdown he had when he tried to understand quality).

But my life has improved by being a quitter and hopefully people get a sense of that when they meet me (not just the stuff I still need to walk away from).

The Jesuits have taught me to see it this way. Walk towards the people, places, and things that guide you to God. It ain't easy, but you deserve it.

Joy, Hope, Peace, and Love.

And a quintet answers the question, What about me, could my life get better if I quit?



After writing the title to this blog, it reminded me of the title of a favored standard.

10 Hopes For My 2011

Preparing to ride off to the Catskill Mountains, my post college goal

as a follow up to last weekends thought on 2010:

1. Bicycling--- The spirit of the Stratoz that rode a bike from PA to the Catskills (that would be me 10 seconds before the trip) has been emerging. A new blog follower and friends who love bicycling have me thinking that this spring is the time to return to an old passion.

2. The examen--- had faded away from my daily routine. It is back.

3. Thanksgiving--- No Craft Shows!!!! Next year I will take a five day break from teaching and not fill it with a craft show. After three years of doing such things we are done with it.

4. Garden--- As I said in my 2010 post, I was embarrassed by my efforts this past year and I want to return to the days of fresh flowers for Mosaic Woman and a bounty for the kitchen.

5. Hospitality--- Next weekend friends are coming over for a meal. I hope to open our house to friends more often this year. I promised my family a potato pancake dinner this spring and you know I have a strudelfest in mind for the fall.

6. Year of the Mandala--- Last year ended with the making of mandalas and I just completed 2 of my Dr Ed Mandalas. I got a thank you note from his widow thanking me for the continued support of pancreatic research. Some of the most powerful moments of 2010 were customers telling me stories of lost ones and thanking me for supporting research. Soon I am going to open a special Dr Ed Mandala shop so that even more can be donated this year. We are also planning on the possibility of doing an all or mostly Mandala show

7. Jazz--- The teacher screaming for no snow days would be the man who hopes to see part of the Rochester Jazz festival and see great friends at the same time. No Snow! If snow extends the school year we may not make it to the festival, but we will still go see the friends.

8. Leave Space and Come Home--- in 2 weeks Space Science ends and we take on Earth Science during my second and third period classes.

9. Eating in with variety--- Our new balanced budget has us eating out less, but enthused to visit some old favorites to spice things up.

10. Declutter--- could be the biggest change, but it is happening to our 1 bedroom 2 studio house

update: I made another


...

7 for the weekend--- 2010, The Year of The Daves

Rainbow panel mosaic by Margaret Almon

1. Mosaic Woman: After I survived massive lay-offs, Mosaic Woman didn't survive one at her work place. In six months she has not found another job in her field, so for 2011 we are not going to try to extend her benefits, but please do not consider her an unemployed librarian, but instead, Mosaic Woman is a full-time mosaicist! Here is her take on this transformation.

2. Gardening: I recently posted four photographs from 2007. What a garden I created that year. What a disgrace to the garden was I this year. And at work ground hogs, deer, extreme heat, and less time for gardening also led to general but not complete failure in the vegetable garden and led to the decision to no longer fight the varmints. But the flower garden at work, now there is where one could go to remember the joy of getting one's hands dirty:

Pink Dahlias grown and photographed by Wayne Stratz

3. South Africa: Not to say that the World Cup with all those funky horns was big, and not that delving into their jazz legends was majorly cool in 2010... but my sister-in-law's move there to be with the one she loved was huge. Lots and lots of great visits before she left.


4. Fire: Last March I woke to the horrific sounds of a family watching the man of the house jumping from a burning house. Last week I was walking home from church and a car in front of our house sprouted arms that waved at me. It was the man and his wife. They plan to be our neighbors once again this February when there house will be finished.


5. Walking with God: In October I took my stained glass with me on a retreat. Something happened that lit a fire within me. I do believe the purchases and praise gave me confidence that I could be a vital part of Nutmeg Designs and the sales continued to flow through the holiday craft shows and I scrambled to keep up my stock.


6. Doodling with Glass: I made my first mosaic which led to a new style of making suncatchers. I decided to make two more mosaics while on break. Here is the smaller one and the final project to emerge from my studio: (it is hanging in Virago Baking Company till the end of January)

Doodling with Blue Green Glass, a mosaic by Wayne Stratz

7: The Year of the Daves (3 dudes I work with and who became great/better friends in 2010) also included DC's museums, 17 craft shows +/- , women jazz in Harrisburg, Jazz many other places, hope, joy, peace (along with despair, sadness, and anger), Science Teachers conference in Philly, new friends here and there, 8 days of silence, monster snow storms, and then an early spring, much tasty food including the annual strudelfest, a trip to Cleveland, a few glass cuts on my fingers (well several), and it ended at midnight with some great friends who had fed us with home made Thai food earlier in the evening. and everything else...

and then there were none...we knew a day like this was coming

There was a time period before the five shows in five weeks. And back in those days Mosaic Woman had it be known to her that a medical test was needed. The doctor was booked through October. In the midst of the craft shows didn't sound so great. So the Monday when there were no more shows, I took a day off from work. As I showered, I wondered if I could seek joy, on a day like this...

The iPod shuffles along as we drive on wet roads just above freezing as the sun breaks the sky open in amazing shades of pink and orange. Is that a sitar? Not really in the mood for the tribute to Miles Davis featuring musicians from India. Wait up ... did Miles write White Christmas. What the heck is this? A moment later I tell Mosaic Woman that studies have shown that post-op recovery goes much better to those that listen to the amazing banjo playing Bela Fleck playing holiday jazz on the way to surgery. The sample size was small, but the study showed definite benefits, on days like this...

I am waiting with others as ABC plays out.. this morning, local news, Rachel Ray, Regis and somebody though Regis isn't there, and two volunteers bound through the room wearing antlers, they are saying it's the Holidays. I turn to the man next to me and say... That excuse won't last forever, just on days like this...

In my lap is a book on animal intelligence. But I draw a design first. It is all about JOY. I have taken my huge JOY off the market. It is staying in our kitchen. The new one is small, simple. It will be affordable to folk who need a reminder that Joy happens, on days like this...

Then I am reading about the anatomy and behavior of the octopus. Humans argue whether or not they are intelligent, but one thing can be said... no invertebrate has a brain to match, and 60% of their neurons aren't even in their brain. Their tentacles are loaded and some believe they all operate on their own until one finds something interesting. As Mosaic Woman emerges back into this world, I tell her about the octopus, on a day like this...

Before that I am saved by the ranting on The View about Tiger Woods and President Obama, when a doctor calls out her name, and I respond as if it is my own, on a day like this...

After the doctor says all went expected, results in a week, then tells me she will be out for another hour. So I walk the streets of Norristown, eating a Mounds bar and my brain, for the first time in a long time, thinks in terms of a blog post. It happened on a day like this...

and later after I buy her pancakes and get her home, I am running around mailing a package to New York, finding videos from the library, replacing the old oil in the car... and a song by Van Morrison pops into my head, yes... There will be Days Like This