Granny, they said, could talk to crows. She was very, very old when I knew her, years ago in the '50s. Now five decades later, I want to write some of my memories before they slip away into the oblivion of my own old age. She was born nearly 130 years ago.

She always wore a dress. Pants on girls were a new thing in the 1950s and not tolerated by most older persons. My fourth grade teacher sent home a note that I had to wear dungarees on Thursdays, when we played outside for gym class. My mother was shocked but went along with it. Granny surprised us by not objecting at all. She was a more forward-thinking woman, probably, than my mother.

We went to live with her when I was seven and my brother nine; our father had suffered financial reverses and we were very hard up. My mother said many years later that having to live with her mother probably contributed to his early death.

I remember seeing her garden with its neat brick edging and little brick stepping places for walking into the beds for nearly the first time when we showed up in our old black car.

Granny spent a lot of time in the garden on her knees. Some might have said she was praying, but you might as well have said she was chatting up the worms in the garden soil or communing with the catnip that grew in tall drifts on the right side. More likely she was coaxing weeds away from the flowers.

Her house was near the river, and she would often walk there in her mid-calf-length dress and her walking shoes. My aunt, who was ten years older than my mother and never married, would walk with her. Aunt wore a dress also, usually a little short-sleeved cotton number she had run up on the sewing machine herself, of the sort they used to call a "house dress.". In the sixties, Aunt took to wearing white cotton knee socks and tennis shoes with her dresses instead of stockings and regular shoes. She still went to church in her tan cotton stockings, held just above the knee with elastic garters -- she never wore a girdle as other modern ladies did, and my friends and I thought it strange.

Granny wore a black coat in the winter that nearly covered her dresses, though not quite. I recall one time her trying on a dress and asking my mother if she was standing up straight or seemed round-shouldered. My mother assured her that her back was straight; but said she bent a bit at the hips. I wasn't listening to the beginning of the conversation, but suspect they were discussing why the dress seemed longer in front than in back, and perhaps whether her slip showed in back (it did, but that was not unusual and I thought nothing of it).

When Granny was very old and grew sick, they took her out in the garden one day and set her on a chair in the warm sun. She had a blanket over her lap and some slices of bread in her hand. She sat there, slowly and carefully breaking bread into small pieces and throwing it -- no, throw is too strong, literally -- letting it fall to the ground around her. Some black crows flew in from the little island in the middle of the river and walked about on the grass near her chair. They peered at her curiously and pecked at the bread.

As we watched from the kitchen window, Granny's arm relaxed and the last bit of bread dropped to the grass, her arm outstretched over the arm of the chair. She slid down slightly.

One of the crows gave a lusty series of caws, and about a dozen more crows flew in and walked around and around her, cawing. A couple of mourning doves stood respectfully a little distance away. The crows stood, still and silent, for about five minutes and finally flew away.

We called the doctor to pronounce her dead and the mortuary to take her.

I saw a picture of Yo Yo Ma in the NY Times today that entranced me.

Using the theme of the ancient Silk Road, the intercultural internet of ancient times, he has a travelling concert featuring artists from all over Asia.

I'd like to see/hear this. As described by the Times, this work (or works) carries themes that relate to musical puns on the different meanings of "Ma" in Mandarin, depending on pronounciation. Thus, with a rising tone it means earth; with rising and falling it mean horse.

It was not clear to me whether this was Mr. Ma's intention or the Times author's fancy. What is clear though is that Mr. Ma intends an extravaganza of intercultural exposition on a variety of stages.

I saw at two satiric drawings sites this morning. One was an exhibit of Soviet posters from the '60s through the '80s. They generally depict a crushing burequcracy.
The other is a cartoon series by New Yorker David Rees, 29, called get your war on.. These depict office workers (looks like clip art from the category "office workers") who might get behind the war effort, but try as they might, contradictions keep slapping them upside the head. Profane but hilarious.

I read about work being done with 'autistic savants' in Discover Magazine (February 2002). An autistic child, who did not speak and seemed uninterested in his parents or other people, suddenly at age 3 began drawing beautifully detailed horses. Other autistic children can do amazing feats of mathematics or have a fascination with technology.
Exploration of the unusual abilities autistic children and adults often display in combination with an inability to recognize faces has suggested that the left side of the brain, which deals with pattern and concept may not be functioning correctly, and the right side, which deals with detail and memory is freely functioning. In many people, the concept side of the brain -- the side we are trained and encouraged to use -- overrides the abilities of the right side. Writers refer to the creative side and the editor side. I expect highl6y reative people have leanred to go back and forth at will, drawing on the strengths of each side as needed.
Dr. Allen Snyder of Australia (see the above Discover article) thinks our unused abilities can be brought out through temporary electronic muting of the left side of the brain. I'd rather go the personal training route, myself. :-)
Betty Edwards' 1979 book "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" deals with similar concepts, though not from the aspect of abnormality. A friend lent me that book a few years ago, and it opened up my understanding of many topics.
One thing I thought about was police training. Police are trained to ask 'What's wrong with this picture?' as they make their rounds. In other words, they see in stereotypes; is it any wonder they do racial profiling then? I believe if police cadets were trained to draw in the Betty Edwards manner, they would be able to better see individual people instead of stereotypes. I think it would broaden and deepen their judgment and make them better police.

For an article on the features of each side of the brain, see Left and Right Sides.

this is a test post

I have nothing to write this morning... caught up in the technical side of things