Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Tall Tuesday: Dad


"Being 6'7", do you have tall parents?" you ask (as others have). Yes, I do. My dad was 6'5" and my mom is 5'10". So in this Tall Tuesday, I honor my dad.

I'll decipher some of the imagery for you. He worked in the accounting field but also had a creative side. He loved working in the yard and garden. Setting up flower beds, creating a fish pond and waterfall and sculpting bulky juniper bushes into shapely bonsai were just a few of his feats. When gardening he used to where some old college sweatshirt that was worn ragged and faded into some nondescript shade of mauve. A cup of iced tea was always handy in a green plastic cup. His old army boots had lost all their tread and were stained from years of treading wet grass. Behind him is a reproduction of Picasso's "Woman Dressing Her Hair" that he painted in high school and now hangs in my basement. He also had a large collection of jazz records from the 60's that were kept in pristine condition: Miles Davis, Cannonball Adderly, Dave Brubeck and many others.

Dad loved tracking the stock market. "The Wall Street Journal" and "U.S. News and World Report" were standard reading material. As a kid I used to love playing with his electronic calculator with it's futuristic blue lit text. He had a favorite watch that was worn at all times and made a very distinct sound when shaken. Last is a box of computer print outs he brought home that was my drawing paper for years and years growing up.

My sister reminded me of his love of sailing and windsurfing, but it was too late to fit into the composition.
I'll follow up about the art later. For now here are two detail views.


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