A late-summer trip to Lake Tenkiller (in eastern Oklahoma) yielded lots of fun, and at least one decent picture. Hopefully the picture explains the odd title above (Wow – Big Thriller). Those are my nieces: Caitlin on the left (falling off); Grace on the right (screaming). Thanks to the Simon clan at Pine Cove Marina for loaning us the boat!
It’s hard to take pictures in Washington D.C. that don’t look just like the zillion images you’ve seen all your life. And you spend a disheartening amount of time waiting for a little gust of wind so the flags will look better flying in the breeze.
It’s a tough time to get excited about Washington D.C. Washington is nothing if it isn’t a big symbol – full of smaller big symbols – of the federal government. A very big federal government. I suspect D.C. tourism rises and falls a little with the approval ratings of the President and Congress – making this a fairly uninspiring time to visit the capital.
Even so, walking among the monuments and museums and memorials and government buildings, it’s hard not to be impressed. I remember my first trip to D.C. many years ago: what struck me was that it was full of American castles. I’d grown up thinking that the U.S. – unlike England or France or Germany – didn’t have castles, but there they were in D.C., one huge, lavish government “castle” after the next.
I went to a seminar in Washington a few days back. I got there a little early and stayed a little late so I could walk around the “mall” and take a few pictures. Several of the pictures you see are of the Capitol just at sunrise (thus the pretty light). There are a couple of shots – with the Washington Monument and reflecting pool – taken about 15 minutes apart, from the Lincoln Memorial. One of those was taken as a nasty storm blew in, trapping me (and about 400 others) inside the Memorial watching the downpour. A couple of shots (those from up high, and including the one of National Park Ranger Julia Clebsch) are from the clock tower of the Old Post Office.
That picture with the Capitol building in the distant, lower right and with the relief sculpture up close is at the Ulysses Grant Memorial, which is at a very prominent spot between the Capitol Building and the Washington Monument. It was striking to realize that it’s a tribute to General Grant (as opposed to “President” Grant). It’s a war momument: He’s on a horse, dressed as a Union general, and flanked on all sides by dramatic sculptures of Union soldiers on the attack. As a de facto Southerner, somehow that ongoing granite-and-bronze celebration is a little unsettling (To be clear, though: I’d never suggest it be removed. It’s real history.). It reminded me of my lifelong observation that many Americans have been much quicker to embrace our former foes from international wars and conflicts than their fellow citizens from opposite sides of the Mason-Dixon.
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In a small town like Vian, Oklahoma, no tradition is stronger. Nothing brings the community together – and nothing brings the community to life – like a high school football game.
I’ve never worn a pair of shoulder pads or a pair of cleats. Even so, Friday night football was a big focus of my high school experience long ago in Vian (just like Saturday football was a centerpiece of college life at OU). I got to see a Vian football game last Friday night. I was glad to see that very little had changed in the past 30 years.
I went to Friday’s game to watch #40 Rowdy Simon (Sr., FB/LB) and #5 Rylee Simon (Soph., LB/QB). Their dad, my cousin Joe Paul Simon, was a Vian football hero back in the 1980s (much like his dad had been in the 1960s). It’s no surprise that Rowdy and Rylee are following in those cleated footsteps.
As the pictures show, Senior fullback Rowdy had some big runs (one TD scored and a second TD called back). Sophomore Rylee is the backup quarterback. But both of them are also starting linebackers (Rylee in the middle; Rowdy outside): Imagine what a great experience it must be to stand out there shoulder-to-shoulder with your brother. Then try to imagine how excited their Dad gets.
The 2012 Vian Wolverines are (again) ranked in the top handful of teams in Oklahoma in 2A football. Friday night they made short work of Class 3A Spiro — scoring 55 points while holding Spiro scoreless until the last seconds of the game. Keep an eye on the Wolverines this season.
In high school in the 1980s, I took football pictures for the yearbook and newspaper — standing on the sidelines in my band uniform and trading the camera for a trumpet at halftime. But that was 30 years ago, so my football photography skills are now a little rusty. Friday night, I could barely get my camera to my eye before a young Wolverine would dash right past me on the way to the goal line. And I’d forgotten how to shoot with both eyes open, so I was nearly flattened more than once by players barreling across the sideline while I had my eye in the viewfinder (one diving Spiro tackler actually kicked me in the shin).
That mischievous-looking ballboy (below) in the black #1 jersey is River Simon — Rowdy and Rylee’s younger brother. Rest assured that River will be taking the field for Vian High in the years ahead.
One more thing: I researched it, and it turns out that Rowdy, Rylee, River and their little sister Rebel are not actually my “second cousins,” as I’d always thought. They’re my “first cousins once removed” because our connection is via my grandparents and they’re from a different generation. But in Sequoyah County, no one says “first cousin once removed,” so I’ll pretend they’re second cousins.
Quick: Where are the tallest Sand Dunes in North America? Hint: They’re not in a desert, or at a beach. The Answer: Southern Colorado — surrounded on all sides by the Rocky Mountains. Somehow a combination of prevailing winds, mountain winds, and the sandy remnants of an extinct high-altitude lake have formed a 30 square mile sand dune field just west of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains east of Alamosa, Colorado. The big dunes rise over 700 feet above the surrounding terrain — roughly the height of a 60-story building. (Notice the tiny little people way up on the top).
I was en route from Leadville to Houston recently, and detoured a few miles to see the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve. I didn’t expect much, but it was actually more interesting-looking than I’d imagined. Unfortunately, heavy cloud cover made the light flat and limited the photographic possibilities. Then some approaching lightning convinced me that I’d picked the wrong day to climb up on the high, isolated dunes.
The National Park Service’s descriptions say the former gigantic Lake Alamosa disappeared due to “climate change,” but the change to which it refers is not one caused by my Chevy Tahoe or the plastic bottles from which I drink Diet Coke. Apparently it happened a few hundred thousand years ago, so I have a pretty good alibi.
It’s a myth that big sunflowers like this turn to follow the sun all day. They just face east. Apparently when they’re tiny, they might turn (i.e., they’re “heliotropic”), but not when they’re mature. So if you want to photograph them “head-on” and you want something else in the picture, that “something else” needs to be lined up precisely due west of the flower patch. Thus, last week as I drove through a part of north-central Italy (near Siena) where they grow sunflowers, my goal was to spot some cool old building — a big church or something that made you think “Tuscany” — that looked good from the east, and that was situated exactly due west of a pretty sunflower field. Hmmmm.
Even after finding a spot, I had to avoid an ugly fence — and an ugly sunflower farmer 100 yards up the road near the signs that said “proprieta privata.” Thus I took all these pictures from a single spot in the middle of the road, with the Castillo del Cuatro Torres (“Castle of the Four Towers”) lined up on the hill due west of me.
These were the last shots I took before I packed the camera away for a while and headed toward the airport for my flight back to Houston.
