St. Louis: Art Museum: Half Moon Serene

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

A January Sunday. The end of winter soooooo far away. Days still short; nights still long. A good day to float through an art museum, enter rooms of others' imaginations.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

I hied to the St. Louis Art Museum.


My eyes fell on Ben Nicholson's Half Moon and they rested there.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Half Moon by Ben Nicholson, St. Louis Art Museum, Missouri. January 2018.

Missouri: Springfield: WOW Aquarium and Wildlife Museum, Part 2

WOW Wildlife Museum, Springfield, Missouri. December 2017.

December 2017


I covered the WOW Aquarium in Part 1 here.

Today it's about the Wildlife Museum.

It reminds me a bit of the Chicago Field Museum, which my mother and I visited some years ago during a burning-cold winter weekend, which you can read about here. The similarity of the two institutions is the catalog-like collection of living creatures, now dead, stuffed, and preserved for our observation. Not a bad thing, just a little disconcerting at times. Like being on a massive space ship, aimed for a new planetary home, taking with us a unique library of what was on Earth.

The WOW Wildlife Museum, like the Chicago Field Museum, also has exhibits depicting the clothing and arts of native peoples of North America. And paintings of historic America.

Chicago Field Museum, Chicago, Illinois. December 2009.

There are moments of awe in some of the WOW rooms, in which the awe is a consequence of an astonishing quantity of one thing. Like the room of mounted deer heads and the arch of antlers. Or the room of mountain sheep. 

There's a gasp-inducing exhibit of a world-record sized polar bear.

WOW Wildlife Museum, Springfield, Missouri. December 2017.

When I walked through the Wildlife Museum, I'd already spent so much of my mental and sensory energy on the Aquarium that I couldn't give the Wildlife Museum its due.

That was a shame.  

Word of the Year: Courage 1

Rio Grande Nature Center State Park, Albuquerque, New Mexico. April 2013.

From the movie, He Named Me Malala:

There is a moment when you have to choose whether to remain silent or to stand up. 

If my rights are violated and I keep silent, I should better die than live. 

Islam is our religion. They tarnished the beautiful face of Islam. Today, in a very peaceful manner, we record our protest. People used to respect each other's beliefs. Whoever ruins Islam's holy name, for the sake of politics, it is required to stand in their way, and not let them go. 

If I keep silent, then you lose the right to exist. 

The above quotes are from either Malala or her father.


I'm not one to do words of the year, annual vision boards, or the like. Nothing wrong with these things, they just aren't generally my bag.


However, this year is different. I need a word for this year, and that word is courage. A couple of definitions from Monsieur Google:

• Strength in the face of pain or grief.
• The ability to do something even when frightened. 

I don't know how this is going to roll out on my blog, but for now I'm looking at doing something on this word on the first day of each month.

The inspiration of Malala came to me first, because I figure if a 15 year-old can show the courage she has, then maybe I can, too.