Backwards in time

It should be no kind of secret to anyone who knows me, reads this blog, or follows me on Facebook that I love many things, but I especially love history. Living as I do in central Virginia, I'm pretty much in the cradle of the beginnings of this country. From the Jamestown colony, to Colonial Williamsburg, to the American Revolution, the writing of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the White House, the Civil War, and many, many more of the most significant locations, houses, battlefields, and events of American history exist within a day's or less drive of my house. I've been to many of these places, but a significant amount of time that has passed since I have had a chance to visit many of them again.

It's spring break week here, and with three kids, I like to plan at least one structured activity or day trip for the week. We tend not to travel much, so day trips are perfect. The original plan was to go to Washington, DC, about two hours away, and visit a couple of the Smithsonian museums, a place very dear to my heart. Alas, the fickle spring weather in Virginia wasn't conducive to a fun trip. Instead, we opted for a trip closer to home, to Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson.

TJ's place is situated on over 2,000 acres on the top of a small mountain just outside of Charlottesville, Virginia. We opted for the guided tour of the house, but toured the grounds and gardens ourselves, maps in hand. Noah was especially enamored of the map and took great care to make sure he knew where we were, and compared it to the illustrations on the map, at each stop we made. He loved it!

The view is stunning, even on a cloudy, cool, and otherwise dreary day. Our guide told us Jefferson had no outbuildings built at Monticello so he would have a completely unobstructed view from the house.

All the dependencies are built into the terraces under the house -- the kitchen. smokehouse, stables and carriage house, house slaves' quarters, and storage rooms are underneath wings of the house. The vegetable garden is immense and beautiful, as well as the vineyard and berry patch. Behind the house, the west lawn is expansive and bordered with tons of flowers -- tulips, daffodils, and hyacinths now in the early spring. The kids were all over the place, loving the peek into the kitchens and other dependencies, especially those with artifacts like dishes and bottles and sewing tools.

Inside the house, no photography (as with most house museums), so I can't share the wonderful things inside the house. Jefferson truly was a genius, in the layout and decoration of his home. Floor to ceiling windows, alcove beds, and huge skylights in octagonal rooms were my favorite. The details are simple and amazing, even down to the molded friezes over the doorways. His dining room is Mars yellow, a shockingly bright color that makes the room just glow,`and the tea room off to the side, surrounded by windows, is where I would spend all day, if I could. Our excellent guide told us that 60% of the furniture and artifacts in the house actually belonged to Jefferson, including some of his books. Oh! The books! Two shelves of his own personal books, plus hundreds of others that were of the era. Shelves and shelves of books in his library. And all I could think as I walked through the house was, Thomas Jefferson actually lived here, walked here, held these books, slept on this bed, wore these riding boots, sat in this chair....

And his books and papers, things he actually touched, silhouettes of family members that are hanging still on the walls in the South Square Room, it makes me want to see everything they have in the collection. I know because I work in a museum that there is so much more not on view to the public that is held by the Monticello Foundation and in the Thomas Jefferson library. Can you imagine? Ledgers for the farm and plantation, recipes, correspondence, sketches...I could sift through the papers and artifacts for days without getting bored. Our tour guide was really good, and I soaked in all the information he was telling us, and his enthusiasm for the place and the stories, and I just felt so happy. One of my favorite things about working at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is getting to tell people who come on my tours all about the history and the stories behind the works of art. I would love to teach in a house museum, too. I think I love material culture and archival 'stuff' -- papers, photos, other ephemera -- as much or more than I love the artworks. It's the stories about people and how they lived and who they were that fascinate me.

Some days I know I really missed my calling. I should have gone to library school, or gotten the history degree I had planned on. I would love nothing more than for my second career to really be about my passion for preservation and history and the stories of the people who came before us.

I hope I at least pass on some of my interest in history to my kids.

Soul-Filling Work

Doesn't everyone wish for a job that fills their soul? I mean, really, if you HAVE TO work, don't you want it to be something that not only makes you happy, but makes you feel dedicated to it, and to life?

I know I do.

I always wanted to be the person who loved their work so much, they couldn't wait to get there in the morning, and didn't want to leave in the evening. Maybe the fact that that never happened to me, even when I was working in a clinic or school, should have been an indication all those years ago, but I missed the signals. Even after undergrad, and looking through a university catalog (no internet back then), perusing the course offerings in such programs as Interior Design and History, I didn't take my side interests as being representative of something I should *actually* pursue.

But now I'm older and much wiser (one would hope). I have grown into a woman of many talents (ha!), and people ask me all the time how I have the time to do everything. Little do they know, (until I say it) that I don't have time for everything. I don't DO all the things I am good at, or love to do, all in one day or one week, or even one month. It's been a couple weeks since I lit my glass torch, and I haven't done as much sewing as I like to, but I managed a little bit of painting, and some needlefelting. It's been too damn cold to work metal in the freezing garage, or do any enameling.

But that's okay, because I have been riding weekly, and working at my day job a lot (to pay for the riding, natch!). I've also been seriously in love with my work at the museum, and THAT is where my soul is filled. Providing tours and information and stories about the wonderful art and artists who are part of the permanent collection at the VMFA. It's a job I never thought I'd do, and one that surprises me with just how much I love it. I love to teach, and while I know I would make a terrible high school teacher, I'm a really good storyteller and tour guide. Last night, we had a training session on making the  artworks accessible to those with low vision and blindness. It was incredibly fascinating, and the fact that the presenter talked about some linguistic theory in discussing congenitally blind people and their cognitive-linguistic concepts for things they have never seen, was amazing. Really wonderful stuff, and now I am all excited about doing tours for "special populations", including those folks with Alzheimer's and other dementia-related conditions.

I've got several really fun and interesting tours coming up, too -- a tour focusing on writing skills this Thursday (fourth graders), and one next week focusing on Greek art and The Odyssey (I need to re-read that), and then one in April on symbolism in Medieval/Renaissance/Baroque art (graduate students in art therapy). I know my creative urges are being really satisfied with the museum work, and that is making me more productive in other ways and places.

Riding has also been a kind of work, too, in that I am learning this horse, and how to make him go the way he needs to for the job he has. Right now, that's 'school horse and lower-level event horse'. Every time I go out to the barn to ride, something else happens that makes the path I am on with this guy unfold a little bit more in front of me. Today we had some small breakthroughs in dressage, and I could feel myself getting more secure in the saddle. The canter transitions weren't fabulous, but the canter, once we got it, was smooth and beautiful and we made perfect 20-meter circles in the ring. The connection from my hands to his mouth and back, and my seat and legs to his legs and back was solid. There's nothing like riding like that.

 He halted perfectly square at least twice, and at least once, I was able to correct a not-square halt TO square with tiny rein movements. I gave him lots of grooming time before our ride, brushing his thick mane out all shiny and smooth, talking to him, brushing him with the least-annoying body brush I could find. And he loves it when I talk to him. He's such a sensitive guy, but I swear, I *swear* he put his head down for me to put on his bridle. Awesome.

I wish I could have stayed longer at the barn. It was chilly, but I loved listening to the sound of the rain on the metal roof, and the horses in their stalls, munching hay. I need to clean tack and get things organized, and honestly, I miss the daily barn chores.

I guess I'd better get working on the tour I am doing on Thursday, and start making my packing and equipment lists for the horse trials. I think it's going to be great.

Worse to (Much) Better

It's funny how sometimes the worst day is followed by one of the best.

This morning, I was scheduled to give two tours at the museum on ancient Greece, Rome, and Mali to two classes of third-grade students from a local elementary school. I didn't do an excessive amount of preparation, because I have given this particular tour a zillion times already this school year, but I got to the museum about 45 minutes before opening so I could run through the possibilities with the other docents scheduled at the same time. We all agreed on our routes, and then, when the kids arrived, we split up our groups and off we went.

I don't think I've given a better set of tours this year. It was fantastic! I was in full-on storytelling mode, asking good questions, engaging these kids in the myths of the Greeks, the technology of the Romans, and the culture of Mali. My students were great listeners, extremely well-behaved, interested in what I had to say, and asked really insightful questions. It was wonderful, and I felt terrific. I really, really love this work. What a great morning!

After the sushi lunch I didn't get to have yesterday, I went to work for a little while. Well, THAT was as it has been recently: frustrating. I did get a few things done, and I did get my new printer hooked up in my cube, so that's something, at least. Yay for not having to walk across the office to the printer in the kitchen!

Later in the afternoon, it was time to go out to the barn for Wren and Kira's lessons. We brought my Dad along, who is visiting this week, because with the weather shifting tomorrow, we aren't sure if Sunday's show will be held, and I wanted him to be able to see the girls ride.

Wren was excited to ride her old friend, Keepsake, who was the very first pony she rode, and who is retired now, but was feeling well enough for a confidence-building ride today. She was nervous and anxious about grooming Keep, who barely moves a muscle while standing in the cross-ties. She was nervous after she got into the ring, and she didn't want to trot at all, but she managed to stay on and keep herself together for the length of her lesson. Afterward, it was like nothing had happened; Wren was grooming her pony independently, picking the hooves, brushing and hugging her, and it was really great to see her more confident.

Kira did a fantastic job riding Beau, and she really looked like she was having a great time, all smiles and confidence, as she trotted around the ring on the big Belgian.

Travis took both of the above pictures with a Canon Rebel T2 that he borrowed from a friend for his photography class. After seeing the pictures he took with only a few minutes' fooling around with the instructions, I have decided we definitely need a DSLR. And I need him to come to one of my lessons so he can shoot pictures of me jumping Champ. I really want to know what that looks like, even if it's ugly as hell.

On the subject of jumping Champ.....a friend of mine had some really good insight and inspiration for me on the subject of my favorite school horse. She said, "It seems that if it makes you that miserable that this isn't meant to be, it might just be a timing thing. Maybe he needs you. Remember that horses are a mirror to our soul, and they will show us everything about ourselves....When I had those [bad] days it always hit me, [my horse] wasn't just put into my life for nothing."

Champ had kind of a nutty owner before he came to be our trainer's school horse this past fall, someone who moved barns every year, and who apparently yelled at him a lot, and kept him blanketed and covered up in boots and sheets and all kinds of equipment. Maybe he's scared, or just not confident. Maybe he doesn't understand his job, or what I am asking him to do, and maybe he wants to do his job, but we aren't communicating well. Honestly, I think sometimes when he's being a total putz and not moving forward, he's telling me he needs a longer time to warm up before we really start working. Or maybe he only feels warmed up after we jump a few fences, and THEN he's ready to do some forward-moving dressage practice. Or maybe, like me, he just wants to get out of this %$#@#@! riding ring and go for a trail ride!

Maybe I just need to relax and listen to him a little while longer.

I mentioned to my trainer that maybe I wasn't ready for that horse trials next month, and she scoffed. "You don't have to look pretty, you have to stay on and finish. And you stay on."

I don't know. It's a lot of equipment (mostly show clothes) I still need, and a lot more practice. I guess I can give it another week's lesson and see what happens. Yesterday was the first time I had jumped a near-complete course of stadium fences in....sixteen years. Holy.....has it really been that long?

Probably I should cut myself some slack.