It’s not my earliest memory, but it best sums up who my father was. Among other things, he stood over 6 feet without shoes, and he laughed, often, his enjoyment of life so very apparent. He could build anything, and do anything, or so it seemed. Even in the kitchen, he conjured up a myriad of…
Tag: Apples
The Promise of Apple Blossoms
Spring, when she sashays in, always takes my breath away. Such vivid raiments cover her, so radiant that Joseph with his coat of many colors could only turn green with envy. The eye hardly knows where to light, much as a honey bee – turned loose in a field of daisies – darts from one…
The Heart of the Matter: A Pithy Gallery*
The heart of the matter is often not what we think. A heart can be obscure. Dark, even. Or perhaps too full or too empty. Sometimes it’s intricate, complicated, as “they” say. And maybe even split down the middle. In the end, the crux of the matter leads us to what’s important, to where the…
Apples in French Indochina: Chapa (Sa Pa) – The Phantom Hill Station in Vietnam
In looking at pictures of the former French colonial hill station of Sa Pa/Sapa (formerly called Chapa by French colonizers), Shangri-La comes to mind. But James Hilton’s 1933 novel of that name likely took place in the Nepalian Himalayas, not in the highlands of northern Vietnam. A little taste of paradise, that’s what Sa Pa…
The Apples of France: What’s the (Hi)Story?: Speculations about the Origins of Apples in France (Part II)
The frosty morning mists of early autumn roll through the hills, swirling like a white cotton-candy carpet at the base of the gnarly old trees. Branches creak and sway with the weight of the fist-sized apples, some blushing like tiny faces, or red-cheeked as it were from the chill of the windy gusts. So much…
