"mini phalaenopsis"

Budding, unfolding, full-blooming...at home in a branch of a schefflera tree.

"purple walking iris"

"purple walking iris"

"palms in rain"

"palms in rain"

"cascade"

The elegant hibiscus pours from its center like a gentle waterfall.

"washington street bougainvillea"

Just one of my favorite streets in Key West to wander with camera. 

Bougainvillea never fails to capture my attention.

"koi shade"

koi shade

water lily

pad and bloom

shadowed carp

at scorching noon

"zephyr lily"

"zephyr lily"

Also known as Zephyranthes. 

Zephyrus: god of the west wind. Anthos: flower.

"Who can open the door who does not reach for the latch?

Who can travel the miles who does not put one foot

in front of the other, all attentive to what presents itself continually?

Who will behold the inner chamber who has not observed

with admiration, even with rapture, the outer stone?

Well, there is time left --

fields everywhere invite you into them."

from Mary Oliver's West Wind

"night calls"

It was almost midnight. I received a phone call from a friend, "Get over here as soon as you can, the cereus is blooming!" I grabbed my camera and hurried to my friend's garden. The cactus was pregnant with buds and blooms. So delicate. So beautiful. Cycle of life exampled once again.

A few days later I had breakfast with another friend. We talked about my session with the night-bloomer. She was reminded of a poem by Thomas Merton.

Excerpt from Merton's Night-Flowering Cactus:

I neither show my truth nor conceal it

My innocence is described dimly

Only by divine gift

As a white cavern without explanation.

The last few lines told the story of that night:

Have you seen it? Then though my mirth has quickly ended

You live forever in its echo:

You will never be the same.

I saw. I will never be the same.



*post dedicated to Monica Dahl and Jane Worth.

*pieces of the giving tree*

Michele R. Strüb

All Rights Reserved

27 January 2014

[photographs taken in front of Shel Silverstein estate in Key West]

*seventeen years*

I bought a typewriter at a flea market for five bucks.
I took it to a repair shop to find ribbon replacement. The proprietor unwound the old ribbon, wound new on the stock spool, then cleaned the works beautifully. He only charged me thirty-five bucks. A bargain considering my relationship with the old typewriter produced a batch of poems and caused me to revisit previous work. As it had been some time, it would also be some time before I would write again.

As David Stevenson said in a post back in October:

"Writer's Block" is the ultimate first world problem.
But he also said, "Pffffff."

*Tool,1923*

portable Remington
pristine
charming little machine
with red seal declaring
"to save time is to
lengthen life" --
cuts in chronicle
well chosen words
for bloodletting

-- passionate
kind and cruel

Michele R. Strüb, 11/1996

*boccaccio, thanks*

Mikalogue, the Website

*moment of ex-hotel room seller in a tourist town

Two honeymooners 

riding down Catherine Street  -- 

"...we should come back for our first anniversary."

PR scenarios waft through thought. 

I rattle and roll my head and go back to editing photographs. 

*panic room, explained*

A Key West friend, Amy Culver, is project lead for an organization called *The Busara Project, created to provide access to its audience "the understanding of three of the the oldest tribes in Tanzania, East Africa", opening our eyes to the challenge of cultural and geographical preservation as these people fall prey to the modern world of landgrabbing greed. The website has some fascinating stories of the lives of the Datoga, Bushmen and Maasai tribes. 

In the meantime, having just recently returned from one of many visits to Africa, Amy posted this on Facebook!
 

"I just came back from the gym and bike ride. I turn on the tv and it is the show Million Dollar Listings. I am laughing so hard...explain in Swahili a panic room! Got to be kidding me...explain to an African a 'panic room'."

A short scenario I had in mind:
 

Oh shit! simba ni kuja kwa ajili yetu!"

Oh shit! A lion is coming for us!


Lazima kujificha kutoka simba!

We must hide from the lions!


Lazima kwenda kwenye chumba hofu! haraka!

We must go to the panic room! fast!


-- Ni nini hofu chumba?

What is a panic room?
 

Ni mahali ambapo hatujui hofu.

A place where we do not know fear.

 
-- Ah, mimi kuona! Sisi lazima haraka kwenda huko sasa!

Ah, I see! Then we must quickly go there now!


Nadhani ni kuchelewa mno. Sisi kuzungumza sana.
Imekuwa ni furaha yangu kwa kujua wewe, rafiki yangu!

I think it is too late. We talk too much.
It has been my pleasure to know you, my friend.








*If you would like to support the amazing work the Busara Project is so passionate about, you can link here for the donation page.

*this post is so 1960*

Post by Michele Strüb.

*cactus dancing up palm*

Michele R. Strüb

All Rights Reserved

19 August 2013

*hot breasts*

I remember, as a young girl, the day I was told I could no longer play outside [those hot summer days...] without a shirt on. It was the day my sense of equality was birthed, shattered and borne.

My eyes trailed after my little boy friends going off on their own, free bared backs catching the sun.

I turned and made my way home to cover what was not so different from theirs.

"It's not fair, Mommy..."

~ "I know honey, you'll have to get used to it."

I never did.

Michele R. Strüb

All Rights Reserved

11 August 2013

*thoughts and tech trauma*

I've called Network Solutions [one of my website/business email hosts] on too many occasions to report that I'm being overwhelmed with spam. One rep said, "Oh! You just need to change your password; then you won't get anymore spam!" I thought, "Bullshit, you don't know what you're talking about". So I said, "okay, thanks", and hung up...why waste my time when what I needed was a tech support guru? Several  phone calls later with no *real* assistance, no gurus, and emails piling up three deep [bartender reference], I started moving emails to the spam folder, but their program wouldn't let me move more than three at a time without crapping out and popping up messages that I'd timed out...

So, I had 200 SINGLE emails to move the crap folder...

After I labored over about a hundred of them, logging back in about as many times [it seemed], I was exhausted and pissed [angry, for my UK friends], and for a woman like me, with near infinite patience [I looked after my mother for 17 years], I thought, "Screw this! I'm changing the contact info on the website to my gmail account."

I scrubbed Network Solutions from my mind. 

That was a few weeks ago. 

Tonight I figured I'd go in and see if any improvements had been made...

*492* EMAILS, and ALL SPAM. 

Okay that's it, I thought, "I'm DONE with Network Solutions, they've given me none...

But I took another look at some of the subject fields to make sure there were no relevant messages, when one caught my eye:

"HealthNutritionNews...Do you POOP enough?"

... and I thought, "Well, yes, until now, and it's going to take a lot of effort to get rid of all the bullshit I've eaten, thanks to Network Solutions."

*beware the cat out of bag

A revolution is afoot. 

Spanning our world, the word is out; cat out of bag. People [and I confess, I am one of them] are uniting in fellowship, dutifully mourning the recent prediction: extinction of *our kind*.

Kinships are being formed and plans are being made for mass procreation. Oh, that I could have given my uterus for the cause, it would have been an honor!

Fucking Genocide.

Ruining the last couple of happy days for staunch Redheads everywhere.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*especially the ginger, s/he may scratch your eyes out.

Michele R. Strüb 

All Rights Reserved

5 August 2013

*clitoria ternatea*

Photograph by Michele R. Strüb 

All Rights Reserved 21 July 2013

-- info on this flower for making Butterfly Pea Tea

*reverie*

Michele R. Strüb 

All Rights Reserved

21 June 2013