{"id":472,"date":"2003-09-02T09:11:01","date_gmt":"2003-09-02T09:11:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/?p=472"},"modified":"2020-09-25T08:40:01","modified_gmt":"2020-09-25T07:40:01","slug":"low-tide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/low-tide\/","title":{"rendered":"Low Tide"},"content":{"rendered":"

Or Wandering Along the Edge of Things\u2026<\/h4>\n

It was raining last week in Vancouver – the plane always seems to come down through the rain when you land on the West Coast.<\/p>\n

There is something about the Pacific Northwest, though, besides constantly wiping your glasses free of rain. It\u2019s where I grew up, and though of course you can never go back, you can always go there again.<\/p>\n

At 5 a.m. there are not a lot of people down by the beach (one of the advantages of jet lag). Just ravens, gulls, otters and a flock of Canada geese on their way somehere. Sea lions making their habitual racket on the reef farther out. I like walking the tide line.\u00a0 Shorelines, like borders and frontiers, let you be a foreigner in peace.
\nThere may not be anyone to talk to, but there are loads of voices if you care to listen\u2026
\nAll right says the beach, I don\u2019t keep your footsteps on file anyway, I can get along without them, besides, the waves have just erased them.
\nFine say the clouds, we don\u2019t need you to see shapes in us, or to watch what we do with the light. (I\u2019m above all this childishness anyway adds the sun.)
\nOf course say the islands, we can have the mist to ourselves, and moreover, what\u2019s the promise of another dawn to you? You never ask our permission anyway grumble the rocks, draping themselves in their ragged liveries of weed and barnacles. Put me down says the shell, it\u2019s not the sea you hear anyway. Even the starfish just shrug.
\nWe were all here before you gave us names, they chorus, and we\u2019ll forget the names you\u2019ve given us in good time. In our own good time.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why landscape is sublime. You can erase yourself with it, brush yourself away like a sketch gone awry, and sharpen your pencils again.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why everywhere I go, I scratch my name on the water, it\u2019s so much more enduring than stone.<\/p>\n

GRUY\u00c8RES<\/p>\n

Opening night in the Castle of Gruy\u00e8res last Friday. As usual, I am entirely out of it. even under the most auspicious circumstances. This time I had almost literally just stepped off the plane, so I was even more oblivious than usual.
\nThanks to LaWise for the report. In her own over-modest words:
\nIn case anyone cares for horrifyingly miserable quality pictures, due to Kodak \u201cone-way\u201d cameras, you can go to the very small report I made: http:\/\/lawisewoman.com\/jhowereport.html<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Upper left: Canvas poster (4 metres by 7) on the main road through Bulle, on the way to Gruy\u00e8res. Nearly had an accident trying to stop along the road to take a picture\u2026
\nUpper middle: Approaching the castle itself.
\nUpper right: One of the two rooms that house the exhibition.
\nLower left: Very young spectator accompanied by her Mom. (photo: Dominique Javet)
\nLower middle: Chatting with a VERY distinguished visitor. (photo: Dominique Javet)
\nLower right: I even got to sign one of the catalogues for him, which was really an honour. (photo: LaWise)
\nGANDALF<\/p>\n

Gandalf has at last let first his beard and now his moustache grow. I admit the images of him with only the beard are rather disconcerting to say the least\u2026 Oscar is going to exercise another of his many talents – hairdresser – before attacking the notorious hat. (All photos by Oscar Nilsson)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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ON THE DRAWING BOARD:<\/p>\n

Theoden and the Witch King.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Talk about rough sketches, these practically have bark and splinters\u2026 now I will probably blithely ignore them and do something entirely different\u2026
\nAIRPORT READING<\/p>\n

Picked up a lovely book by Bill Bryson which I had been unable to find for some time: MOTHER TONGUE. While Bryson\u2019s travel writing is hugely hilarious, his philological forays are rather more serious in tone. MADE IN AMERICA, the history of English in the New World, is also an extremely good read, whether you\u2019re on a plane or not\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Or Wandering Along the Edge of Things\u2026 It was raining last week in Vancouver – the plane always seems to come down through the rain when you land on the West Coast. There is something about the Pacific Northwest, though, besides constantly wiping your glasses free of rain. It\u2019s where I grew up, and though […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[41,22,43,48,23],"class_list":["post-472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronicles","tag-exhibition","tag-gandalf","tag-gruyere","tag-illustration","tag-middle-earth"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1PY8Y-7C","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.john-howe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}