The Art of Halloween

Me as a football player and Norman as the cheerleader.
Makeup thanks to me, costume credit goes to the Erasmus Hall High School football team

I am not a fan of clowns. Katie isn't either. One fall day, we were driving near a pop-up Halloween shop, one of those seasonal stores delighting in scaring people. A clown was standing at the curb, flagging people into the store. He poked his painted head and bright orange hair into our car window. We didn't see him coming and we screamed as loud as Jamie Lee Curtis. Katie and I never liked clowns. Now we really don't care for them at all.

Q: Why are skunks afraid of clowns?
A: They smell funny.

Zach as Big Bird

Halloween seems to creep up on you unawares, just like that clown in the window. We are happy enough to embrace the cooler weather, pumpkin-flavored lattes and Oreos, a hot bowl of soup and a warm, cuddly sweater. But Halloween means planning ahead. That is not something I do well. Back in the day, Norman and I made a big deal out of dressing up for our friend Ellen's Halloween party. Now I am lucky if I remember to buy candy for the neighborhood tricksters.

Zach and Sam as Batman and Robin

Katie as a chef (not just a costume)

Most parents, including me, will get into the spirit for their kids. My kids were all manner of things from Big Bird to Batman to Hulk Hogan. But I am not the kind to dress up my house or my dog. I even grumbled coming up with a costume for school every year. Thank goodness Bridget organized a group costume every year. Thank goodness I retired.

Q: What do you get when you cross a snowman with a vampire?
A: Frostbite

We all dressed as crayons last year at school. An art teacher as a crayon? That was fun.

I do love the season and I do enjoy chocolate, but I just don't like getting scared. Tomorrow is the Zombie walk in Asbury Park, with strange people strolling the boardwalk in bloody clothes and oozing cuts painted on their faces. I dressed up like that a few weeks ago when I fell and created a bloody mess of my face for real. No thank you.

This year, we won't be home to open the front door with a big bag of candy from Costco. I won't have to grumble over my lack of spirit. We have plans to scare the altacockers in Florida instead.

I know, I can be a ghost... now that's the spirit!

An American Dream

Norman with a flea market find. We still have that lamp!

Not everything we buy comes with a receipt. We love to walk around a flea market and a lot of what we find requires just a few dollars and no written invoice. It's not that we collect a specific time period or style of furniture, we just like older things, things that were meant to last. Things that were used and loved. Our house is full of vintage radios, beautiful wooden coffee grinders, and hand-cranked victrolas. One day we bought a bedroom set from an estate sale and Zach asked if we ever went to a store to buy new. My son was very astute, even at such a young age.

Then Ikea came to New Jersey, and buying new became fun (and a puzzle to build). Our house became an eclectic mix of old stuff and new Scandinavian cool stuff. It is definitely not a decorator's dream home, but we like it. It's our home. And it's our American dream.

My friend, Joyce, knows a bargain better than anyone. She spends her Sunday mornings perusing the aisles in the Englishtown Flea Market and spends very little for something great. We have a lot in common when it comes to second-hand shopping, thrifting, and crafting. I thought she might enjoy a night at the Monmouth Museum to meet an artist who made a name for himself by recycling paper into art.

Dong Kyu Kim, a New Jersey emerging artist at the Monmouth Museum

Dong Kyu Kim, born and raised in South Korea shared his journey with us through clear, although slightly hesitant English. His struggles to prove he made it in the United States were preserved in the receipts (a word he pronounced recess) that he collected from his purchases. The fancier the store, the prouder he was of his receipt. He preferred highlighting his trips to Whole Foods instead of a Korean market and a designer clothing store instead of the Gap. (Hmmm... the Gap is a designer store for me!)

A traditional Korean wedding dress the artist created out of receipts

A trip to New York became a work of art

His consumer habits proved he made it in America. He found his American dream. His day job is in fashion design, a status he was quite proud of and repeated to us often. His hobby, though, was manually stitching receipts with embroidery floss to a backing made out of Swiffer sheets. He turned the most mundane of materials into a thing of beauty. He knows his receipts will eventually fade and the paper will wear thin, but his art is not about longevity, nor is it for sale. The beautiful panels and traditional Korean garments have become his memoir; a story of an immigrant's struggle to find his worth through the American dollars he spent.

If we spent little for a great lamp and received no receipt for it, what proof do we have of our dream? After 35 years, our lamp still shines brightly on a family that enjoys gathering together in a lovely, old living room. Our memories are as tangible as the frail papers of a dreaming artist.

I dream of art, as Norman does of tennis. But we also dream of a future filled with many more years together and a wonderful life for our children. What is your American Dream?

Picasso and the art of the older mind

A sculpture of a guitar by one of my 5th grade students

Imagine this...
You take a walk around an antique chair and you look carefully at all of the wooden bits, the curve of the back, the spindles radiating upward, the polished armrests, the intricate designs of the turned legs, and the full seat molded to hold your tush comfortably, at least as long as it takes you to partake in a meal.

Now imagine this...
Have a seat in that chair or plop down in another one out of view of the studied chair and draw what you remember.

I used to do that exercise with my students at school.

If you observed a chair from one perspective, you would be creating an illusion of a three-dimensional object on flat paper. Pablo Picasso would object to that. There is nothing jutting out from the paper, like an arm or a leg. The paper is flat! Why create such an illusion?

A more appropriate interpretation of a life on a flat surface would be to draw the bits and pieces of that trip you took around the chair in random places on the paper because that is how your mind remembers seeing it.

That is Cubism and the inventive mind of a very famous artist.

Pablo Picasso became so famous that people often use his name as a synonym for an artist. "Aren't you just a regular Picasso?" a parent might say to a budding artist in their family. Kind of like asking for a Kleenex when any soft, generic tissue would do.

"Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not." - Picasso

Last week, I went to my first lecture in the public library as a retiree. It was on Picasso. I listened to an author tell us about the women in Picasso's life. His timeline of events in the artist's portfolio mirrored the rise and fall of his love life. For example, when Picasso broke up with a lover, he entered his "blue period." It was an interesting philosophy and one that filled a book the author was selling at the end of the lecture.

Then just this week, I read an article asking us to consider if the next Picasso could be a robot.

Well, if a robot can do an observational drawing or even a cubist interpretation of life, perhaps we could call it an artist. But if the robot feels upset over the loss of his cuter female counterpart, will he impart those emotions in his work? I think not.

Realistic drawing of a face by Picasso

Also by Picasso

Picasso was a genius. He could draw a realistic portrait like nobody's business. But his fame rose out of his experiments with Cubism. Unfortunately, many art programs teach Picasso's theories as early as Kindergarten, with no benefit to the child or to their growing appreciation of art history. A five-year-old is way too young to understand how Picasso changed the world's perception of art. It has taken me a lifetime to appreciate all that he and many others have gifted us with their brilliance. And I am still learning.

Today I will attend another lecture, this one on sewing as an art form. Can a robot sew? Sure there are factories filled with them. But this living and breathing artist sews random objects together like torn notes and receipts. I am excited to see what his hand stitched creations look like.

Lectures like these are often attended by the over-55 communities who play pickleball in the morning and come to hear a free discussion in the afternoon, keeping their minds young and hopefully their bellies full with some free refreshments. I don't mind joining them. I might nod off in the middle of a long and dreary lecture, just like the older guy with his walker sitting next to me. But I also hope to live my life with the curiosity of a child, just like Picasso.

Fitbit my day

Holmdel Park in the Fall

Exercise is something I should be doing every day. I have no excuse for not putting on sneakers and taking a walk. I can't complain that it is too hot to breathe as it always is in the summer, and it is not the freezing-your-toes-off kind of temperatures of January. Fall is my favorite season and I have no excuse. Bugs have gone into hibernation and leaves are covering my path as if someone laid out a colorful carpet for me to commune with nature.

Even my Fitbit is thanking me for using it lately.

I make no claims to be an athlete. Norman is an athlete. He can walk a trail, run a race, swim in the ocean, throw a basketball, play a mean game of tennis, and embrace the new pickleball wave. And he will still stay up late to play poker. He loves to be active and he enjoys his games. Norman's Fitbit numbers are scary high on a lazy day. I'm amazed the black band on his wrist does not explode from the stress of his ridiculously high numbers.

My slimmer Fitbit model rarely reaches its default goal of 10,000. Last night, I dipped my tea bag in my mug and my Fitbit vibrated. After all that I did that day? It applauded me for making a cup of tea? I spent the morning panting up the hills in Holmdel Park. I built a bed frame for Sam's room, marching up and down the stairs with tools and trash. I even walked Murray a couple of extra times down the block for good measure. But dunking my tea bag brought me my applause. I wonder if shuffling the cards in poker last night gave Norman some extra claps of approval.

Sam and a creative sculpture on the High Line

This weekend, my son and I walked the High Line in Manhattan. We walked from Port Authority to the elevated walkway, a preserved railroad line transformed into a thing of beauty. Free for all to enjoy, the lovely landscaped footpath offers a touch of culture and architectural benches, perfect for napping or appreciating art. It overlooks a crowded and gray city, this path of heavenly respite for city dwellers and visitors.

We continued down the High Line to 14th street (and that was from Port Authority), over to Sixth Avenue, down the subway to lower Manhattan and then got lost trying to follow the Google map directions to the museum. My Fitbit vibrated and gave me a round of applause at some point during the day, but I should have checked it again because I am sure I deserved quite a standing ovation.

Waiting on line at Port Authority at the end of our night, I get a text from Norman boasting over 33,000 steps on his Fitbit. I quickly checked mine, sure that I finally beat my husband at something athletic. But it was after midnight when I looked at the slim black band on my arm. According to the Fitbit authority, it was a new day and all the city blocks we traveled did not count. My feet were sore, we were exhausted, and Fitbit said we walked a meager 307 steps. I groaned. I would have to dunk quite a few tea bags to make up the difference.

If you leave your Fitbit at home and you take a walk, does the walk still count?

Fiddler in Yiddish... Art on a Stage

The very first Broadway musical I ever went to see was Fiddler on the Roof. There were very few days my grandmother left the house or took a trip with us, but Baboo came with us that day. The story of Fiddler was a performance of her life on a stage. I am not sure she would have recalled her childhood as moments set to music, but I bet there were enough of the traditions in Anatevka to bring back memories of her shtetl. I only wish I could recall the conversations in the car on our way home that afternoon. She must have had much to say about the authenticity of it all.

My daughter would have also enjoyed that car ride home. She would have held Baboo's hand and listened with empathetic patience, as that is what she does best. There is just so much Katie can learn from her trips to Ancestry.com and the DNA test revealing she is 100% Eastern European. (No surprise there.) The key to her roots lies in the memories of her great-grandparents, many of which were recalled on the stage of a Broadway show.

The soundtrack to Fiddler on the Roof filled our car radio for many years. We all love the music and sang along in voices Sam would cringe at today. At Camp Kinder Ring, my son played a powerful Tevye with a voice as deep and glorious as Zero Mostel. I suppose he has the right to comment on his mother's lack of musical ability.

I can't dance either, but I did sway to Sunrise Sunset with my dad at my own wedding, giving my mom a good reason for her tears.

There was something so special, so right, about experiencing Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish. Sam and I had seats to a Saturday night performance at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Lower Manhattan. We both loved this show on so many levels. Sam knew a few of the actors on stage and he could truly recognize and applaud the talents of his friends.

I was told I would not appreciate seeing this show in another language. I was told by my stepmom that only those closest to her generation would grasp the true meaning of the story and the impact of the Yiddish translation.

But the thing is, I know the story well. I did not need the translations offered on the sides of the stage. This was my first and my favorite show. I watched my kids and my husband perform their roles on the stage in camp and I must have painted flats with the village of Anatevka for camp and school at least three times. I could recite the words of many of the scenes.

I know this show well, this story about my grandmother's childhood.

Baboo and me

It seems I also knew enough Yiddish to follow along. It is amazing how a language spoken in my childhood stayed with me all these years. I listened to the actors, glanced at the subtitles on the side of the stage and the essence and flavor of their voices brought it all home. It is the language of my family. Indeed, there was something so right about experiencing it in Yiddish.

This is the story of Baboo and many others, this story of Tevye and his family struggling to keep their traditions alive in a changing world. And it was presented in a language that is dying along with the generation of people who can still remember those days.

Fiddler on Roof in Yiddish has been extended through December. Go experience it.