Category Posts

Stumped

JT Twissel 25 Comments

This tile mural was installed on the masonry wall of the Orinda Community Center. To get close enough for a photograph you have to climb the stairs leading to the adjacent library. Thus the slanted angle.

Care to guess what it is a “visual metaphor” for? Here are a few clues:

Above the bull are images of people many of whom are glued to their iPhones. Transposed in front of them is a figure all in white. Why is he running? Is he a cricket player? Do you recognize the climate activist hidden amongst the crowd? How about the political sign?

Below is a close up of the bull – note the palm trees blowing in the wind etched on his torso. Humm, palm trees blowing in the wind … a hurricane?

And then there’s the crumbled figure at the bull’s feet. He’s not dressed like a matador. He’s dressed like a farmer. What does he represent?

Surrounding the the bull (on the red tiles) are images of wild animals – an owl, a lion and a wolf and others. On the blue tiles (and admittedly harder to see) are images of cartoon animals. I think that’s Goofy on the upper left.

I was completely stumped. What on earth was the artist trying to say? A murderous bull with hurricane tattoos, people who only see the world through the lens of their social media, a cricket player trying to run away from the whole bizarre scene?

Here is the official explanation.

Apparently it’s either La Course Camarguise or the Death of James Merry (a Scottish farmer who wanted to be a matador and practiced his skills by wrestling with a young bull. All went well until the bull grew to his mature size and then well …)

I don’t know if there’s any difference between teasing a bull in the bullring or wrestling a bull in a muddy field. Granted, in the bullring you might have a better chance of surviving. What am I missing?

Stoned

JT Twissel 14 Comments

We had to put in a new retaining wall and fix a drainage problem which required a lot of dirt moving and unearthed tons of rocks. Literally. The entire project was supposed to take a week. It took over a month. I just wrote the final check.

I began noticing many smooth rocks were being unearthed. The kind of rocks that are gentle to bare feet. The Mexican guys who did most of the work must have thought I was nuts, stacking piles of silty stones along the new retaining wall, but I grew up in Nevada where rock collecting used to be a very popular hobby. Admittedly most people were looking for arrowheads.

All that remains of my childhood rock collection. Three rough cut garnets, two arrowheads and a bit of silica (I think)
This rock has bubbles which makes it difficult to get a good picture of.
A close up of the bubbles. Looks like a serpent’s head, I think. Maybe an alien life force?

Amazing what you can find in nature. An art gallery once the silt of ages is washed away.

Hearts

JT Twissel 15 Comments
Rock unearthed from the hill. Tumbled until smooth by nature.
Heart revealed by the rough hands of man.

Peter gave himself up for lost, and shed big tears;

but his sobs were overheard by some friendly sparrows,

who flew to him in great excitement and implored him to exert himself.

Lately I’ve found inspiration from an unlikely source. Care to guess who the Peter in the above quote is?

At the park, a not quite #WordlessWednesday

JT Twissel 16 Comments

A plaque thanking all the contributors to the park’s playground for …..humm, what age group could that be?

A mural I’ve never noticed before titled “Bear and Friends.” What’s that in the top right corner?

A house on the hill with an infinity pool and a roof top helicopter pad? Oh my, do you think that might be Bear’s home?

Meanwhile the Starlight Players are getting ready for another production. The last one of their season, LeFanu’s Carmilla.

Check out other #WordlessWednesday posts at Hugh’s place.

The psychiatrist who ran away and joined the circus

JT Twissel 17 Comments

I’ve never been a big fan of circuses. I always have visions of the tightrope walker slipping and falling head first into the path of an elephant who’d been whipped into obedience a wee too many times. Or the clown on meth who flips out and decides to randomly fire into the audience. Only with real bullets and not water balloons. And then there’s the evil ringmaster with his Snidley Whiplash mustache!


Luckily my parents much preferred torturing us on the ski slopes or on rocky, dusty trails into the back country. Bears versus demented clowns, hum, I don’t know. Which one would you prefer?


However, many years ago I visited a friend in Las Vegas who was the “queen of props” for Cirque du Soleil’s Mystere and she was able to wrangle us “very special seats” for the midnight show. Despite my fear of clowns, we just couldn’t pass up very special seats to a Vegas show even if it was a circus. I hadn’t seen Jo for many years and was surprised that my brilliant friend, a person so well read and so knowledgeable in so many fields, would find joy and fulfillment dealing with, as she called them, “childish Russian acrobats with garlic tinged breath.” But she did.

Just before midnight, we slipped through a guarded back door and then rode the freight elevator up, up, up to a room which was basically a glass bird cage suspended from the ceiling. There, a team of technicians monitoring the sound and light equipment greeted us with a list of instructions:

  • No talking!!!
  • no sneezing!!!
  • no coughing!!!
  • no photos!!!
  • no eating!!!
  • no drinking!!!
  • no recordings!!!
  • and, don’t dare move from your seats until the break!!!

Our “seats” were actually a bench that faced a wall of windows sloping dangerously forward. Far, far below we could see the stage and the audience as they trickled in to find their seats. To be in that box as the theater went dark and all you could see were the muted lights on the various instrumental panels was … well I couldn’t breathe. It became even more surreal when several acrobats on swings dropped down from the ceiling, their faces so close to the glass we could see them chewing gum!

Then the beating of the giant taiko drums announced the start of the show. The acrobats flipped over backwards and dropped headfirst down towards the audience as search lights highlighted the startled faces in the audience. The acrobats flew over the audience like the flying monkeys in The Wizard of Oz until this creature appeared.

Alice the Escargot who marks the passage of time

The story line is impossible to follow as act after act explodes upon the stage, each one more daring and mind-blogging than the one before. If you’ve never seen a Cirque du Soleil performance, it’s hard to believe the acrobats, dancers, contortionists and magicians are really human beings. We were bedazzled, shocked and almost dizzy with excitement as we left the magic lightbox and exited into the now quiet casinos of the Treasure Island Resort.

Jo was dying. I think she lasted another year and it was a rough year. But the cast of Cirque du Soleil all signed a giant Get Well card for their “Queen of Props” which she cherished until the end.

And that’s where I got the idea for Flipka, the psychiatrist who ran away and joined the circus.

Breakfast with the Beast #FriWFlip

JT Twissel 14 Comments

Every Friday I will be posting a snippet from the sequel to Flipka. If you’re interested in following along, welcome! All feedback, be it fair or foul, is welcome.

“Absolutely … Positively … NOT!”
Hyman shrugged and then continued digging into the one meal he allowed himself a day: Breakfast, which always consisted of (if he could be believed) a barely cooked Porterhouse steak, topped with three eggs sunny-side up and washed down with prune juice. We were in the Headliner Room on the top floor of the resort, hardly a cozy spot at seven in morning with the cleaning crew emptying ashtrays and vacuuming the debris from the night before.

“That proves it,” he said between bloody mouthfuls. ‘You’re crazy. I knew it. All shrinks are crazy.”

No wonder he likes to negotiate deals over a steak, I thought. Watching him tear into raw flesh would intimidate the hell out of anyone. “I won’t debate that point but the answer is still no.” I rose to my feet and took one last look around a room generally off-limits to mere mortals. It was smaller than I’d imagined with decadent, red leather booths and high mirrored ceilings. Perfect for intimate concerts. All of the greats played in the Headliner Room, generally to private audiences; audiences consisting of wealthy, powerful people … some had unfathomable fame while others stood in the shadows and quietly controlled Vegas. After a night of schmoozing, they’d left behind a fog of cigar smoke and costly French perfume.

“Sit Doc. You haven’t been excused. I tell you what. I’ll give you a hour to think on it.”

I slowly sat my bottom back into the chair as ordered. “How good of you but I have to catch a flight at three and I still have packages to ship…”
“I’ve already taken care of your packages. Hell, I even ordered you a limo for the airport.”
“I’ll take a cab, thanks. Last time I got into one of your limos I ended up with a new life and I kind of like the one I have now …”

He looked up from his plate. “ I overestimated you, Butters. I didn’t peg you for the kind of broad to go all Tammy Wynette on me. You know show business. Sex sells. That’s just the way it is.”
“Yeah, that’s me. Tammy Wynette. Listen Mr. Hyman, I don’t understand why you can’t produce this atrocity without me. Get another psychiatrist to act as ⏤ what was it? ⏤ technical advisor?”

“You know all that psychological mumbo-jumbo. Besides I wanna to get my hands dirty on this project.” He motioned to his lawyer who’d been sitting by the stage absorbed in a phone call. The man hung up the phone and walked over carrying a thick notebook. “Just sign the contract. You don’t have to read the damn script,” he said as the lawyer dumped the pile in front of me.


“Bullshit. You know if I put my name on some bogus script that it’ll shut me up forever. But, here’s the thing. I wasn’t planning to say anything, really … as long as the girls are okay who cares what really happened? The government sealed those mines and so their secret is … Wait a minute, you haven’t even told me how Meredith is doing.”
His hooded eyes flickered slightly. “She’s in Switzerland at that fancy psychiatric place. You ever been to that country? It’s boring as shit.”
“But is she okay?”

“Listen, you want more money? Because we can get the mother fuckers to up their offer.” He had no idea how his daughter was doing. Nor did he care. Over the past year I’d often wondered about Hyman. Why had he suddenly shown up in Ely on the day that the girls were “rescued?” And why had he footed the bill for all three girls when he hadn’t even tried to get his daughter’s drug conviction overturned? It just didn’t make sense.

He threw a pristine white napkin into the bloody mess he’d made on the table. ”Simmons!,” he bellowed at the lawyer who was standing a foot away. “Make sure you get the signed contract before she leaves the hotel!”

With that, he plowed out of the room.

Next Friday, August 23: What does Sergei know? Character Study: Sergei … at least what little is known about him.

The Album that Turned Granny On

JT Twissel 9 Comments

We probably have 500 vinyl record albums stored in a closet in the hall, maybe more. God help our beneficiaries, I don’t think any of them will ever be collector’s items. But you never know…

Okay – fess up. How many of you would give anything to own this rare and priceless record? I have nothing against Julie Andrews but … I’d rather be dipped in butterscotch than listen to her sing Joy to the World.

Now BIng Crosby, I do not like at all. His movies make me cringe. But who knows – perhaps this album is a classic (for Satan worshipers).

I wonder if my mother-in-law (or her husband) bought this album in the Adults Only section of their music store. Naughty, naughty. I’m sure the guy on the left with the huge box of chocolates tucked under his arm is hoping to have a “conversation” with the lady in red. It all depends on you. Yeah, I bet it does!

Oh my, if Perry Como dressed like your grandpa and leaning on an obviously fake fence doesn’t knock your socks off, than what’s wrong with you? I can almost smell the Old Spice. Can you?

On the other hand, these four lads from Liverpool wrote some of the most romantic songs ever recorded. But will my grandchildren be able to get beyond this cover? Doubtful! I can hear them now “Look at the album that turned Granny on! I told you she was strange.”

Dear me – we can’t say weird anymore, now can we?