Dayton Lanphear, bear sculptor

Meet Dayton Lanphear, an artist with huge vision. His basic tool is a chainsaw and he has begun to carve a majestic grizzly bear out of a 15-foot, 4-ton trunk of a redwood tree.
Before you scoff at the
idea of using such a valuable tree consider how the massive trunk landed in central Oregon where ponderosas and junipers rule the landscape.

On the west side of the Cascades land was being parceled for a housing development and the tree was in the way. The trunk was offered to Dayton who snapped it up along with a second tree. The trees were put on a truck and driven to Dayton's studio at a considerable expense. Months were spent designing and building a support structure around the trunk, now inverted, so Dayton could access the whole log during the carving process. A forklift will lower the platform to any level.


Finally, on April 27th, Dayton fired up the chainsaw and made the first cut into the log. The shavings flew everywhere, the noise, of course, was loud. Dayton has a plan only in his head. No drawings, detailed sketches. There are a couple of photographs of a ceramic bear he owns sitting off to the side next to the cans of oil and gasoline.

The bear will be revealed over time. He envisions a bear with an oversized head because the viewer will be looking at it from the ground and so the scale needs to be adjusted.
As this project continues I will be updating on this blog. You can also follow Dayton's website to see his past works.

Strength and Grace

Diane and I drove to Sacramento on Tuesday, the 22nd, my 62nd birthday. I did not care that it was still snowing and blowing all the way into Califiornia's central valley. We were going to see Allison, my daughter, have a nice dinner to celebrate her 18th birthday as well.

I'm also on a photographic mission. Ron Cunningham has been the artistic director for 20 years and there is a special gala
performance Friday evening with a party afterwards. The following night is another event, the annual Modern Masters series. So, this week is intensive for Ron and the dancers with two dress rehearsals and seven upcoming performances. The gala rehearsal was last night and once again I was amazed by the athleticism and artistic beauty of the dancers.

However, the story does not end here. Behind the fluid movements on stage, the dancers are dealing constantly with injuries and pain. They do not let it show, they endure and go on. Their strength and grace comes from years of commitment to their art. Jack Hansen has plantar fasciitis and Ilana Goldman has dealt with many injuries over the course of her career. The list of injuries dancers incur rival those of athletes in any professional sport.

Earlier in the day I spent awhile with my friend Geno Masuda. His strength and grace since the sudden death of his wife, Patti, April 4th, towers above anything else imaginable. With his closest friends he has let the pain show and now he has begun his recovery and deciding what life will be for him. "It's relationships and memories," he says. "Things don't matter."

I had not thought about how dancers and Geno were similar until I was out on a bike ride this morning. The when and where is relevant here. Eight days after Patti's death Geno had a wonderful epiphany after his first ride. He realized he was going to be all right. Geno and the dancers and many others in this world who are faced with major obstacles persevere, work through pain and stay committed to a way of life based on relationships and memories. Some ride into the future, some dance. The journey for us all goes on, every day lived to the fullest, and there will be no whining.

A Schizophrenic Spring

I do not usually dwell on weather. It's what happens every day. "The weather is here, wish you were beautiful" is a favorite saying. My years in daily newspaper photography were filled with redundant assignments to make a photograph of the weather. Now, I am conflicted.
It is mid-April and it is snowing in Sisters. In fact it has snowed four times today. Unseasonable squalls make it over the Cascades and drop a layer of gloom. Earlier in the day the sun was out and blasting through the skylights. The cats, heat-seeking mammals, found their spots and reveled in the warmth of a geometric space. I spent the day in the
garage/workshop wearing gloves, cap and two layers of fleece. It was all I could do to divert my attention to the task of finally getting the space suitable for efficient work. Racks for lumber, storage bins for hundreds of screws, nails, and a unique assortment of "things I
might need someday." Outside the weird day continues. Snow, sleet, sun, snow and sun, plenty of wind. I skipped town for an hour, went to Home Depot in Bend, got stuff to finish the organization project and then made my first trip to the new Trader Joe's which opened two weeks ago for a bottle of "Two-buck Chuck." What's there to complain about?

Déja vu all over again

The news is not good on the world's food supply, especially in impoverished countries, where prices for rice and other basic food supplies have risen so high that families are spending 80% or more of their income just to survive. "This is the world's big story," said Jeffrey Sachs, director of Columbia University's Earth Institute.

As far as I can remember, this issue has always been the world's big story. A photojournalist knows there are many themes and recurring stories. Poverty, homelessness, hunger, disease, war, health, the disparity between the haves and the have nots. It appears all the photos and stories have not made any damn difference, at least on a global scale.

I began photographing in my college years and then as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Malaysia in 1969 and the image of the sleeping boy with the empty rice bowl was one of those photographs that gave me a push and also opened my mind to the problem of hunger, a topic I revisited many times in my career. In 1986 I spent the better part of a year photographing people for a major project "Hunger in California." From soup kitchens to homeless camps and transient hotels in San Francisco, the story was the same. Not enough to eat, no jobs, no place to call home, bureaucracy to battle.

Perhaps all the stories and photos have some redeeming value. Awareness was raised, some action or assistance became available. Maybe a few people had life improve just a bit. On a global level though, the pictures don't feed people, money from major countries might. The world economic picture is not pretty either. I am no expert on world economics or hunger or the intricate political issues that prevent solutions to complex problems. I do wonder though how the United States might have been more of a problem solver without the financial burden of a protracted war in Iraq.

An hour on the Metolius

The Metolius River, just 20 minutes away, is one of the most peaceful places I know. A half-mile downstream from confluence of Canyon Creek and the Metolius water flows out of the hillside from an underground source.

I sit there and watch and listen; the water becomes eloquent white noise and allows my mind to slow down, reflect.

The last two days thoughts were about loss. I know I'm particularly sensitive to this and is the one emotion that is the closest to the surface of my being.

Injustice is a close second.

A walk along the river is calming. The Metolius flows from an underground aquifer, continuous and predictable in flow and

temperature. As such it becomes my physical metaphor for reassurance that there is constancy. Then I remember that the only constant is change which, in the past two days has been unpredictable. The song in my head:

" 'til the rivers all run dry,

  'til the sun falls from the sky,

  'til life on Earth is through

  I'll be needing you."

    -Don Williams.

With life comes loss

     The last twenty-four hours have reminded me of how fragile life is. Two people lost their spouses, one in Willamsport, Pennsylvania, the other in Sacramento, California. In each instance, the death was totally unexpected making their loss immeasurably tragic and hard to understand. No one has words sufficient for comfort or resolution. The burden of grief has no time limit and the loss is eternal. For me it is that reminder, repeated often, that the present is all that matters. Say "I love you" today to any and all I care about. Tomorrow may not come.

     I understand more keenly as I get older how my mother felt when my father died on the operating table during surgery for kidney stones in August 1984. She never got the chance to say good-bye. Sixteen months later she was no longer able to stay in the house they had lived in since 1948 and as she finished packing for a move to a senior citizen home I photographed her final moments in their small north Denver house. They were married 55 years. She lived another twelve years and was buried beside my dad, reunited, as she hoped.

     

     I wrangle, cajole, tease, laugh and cry with Diane. We are more entwined every day and do try to say the important things to each other. Words are wonderful, doing loving things are better. In the end it's both that matter and I have to believe both spouses had that.

     

     What will you and I do to take love, caring, respect, compassion a little deeper?  There may be an opportunity tomorrow but how may tomorrows are there?

Bill Clinton stumps in Bend

I was included in the "tight pool" of photojournalists covering President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore during an environmental summit at Lake Tahoe in July, 1997. Since then I have been trying to get this particular image signed by Clinton.

I nearly was successful several years ago when he came to a symposium at the University of California/Davis. He was given two prints to sign but the instructions on who to sign them for were misinterpreted and neither of them was signed to me. I also thought about sending a print to his office in Harlem but I never got around to doing that. Then, last weekend an announcement was made that he was coming to Bend to stump for Hillary. I got a plan in my head and had an 11x14 print made at Costco.

My best chance to get the print to Clinton was to get to the event very early at Bend High School, find one of his advance team members and ask them to have him sign it, rather than hoping for an opportunity in the crush of people after the speech. I drove into the school parking lot just as students were leaving at 3pm. With print and one camera in hand and my old Sacramento Bee press identification card in my pocket I headed to the gym where people were already lining up.

A TV reporter told me where the media check-in was and after securing a spot in the line I walked around to the back of the school where all the TV satellite trucks were lined up. Inside the building was the press table and one advance team woman, Cindy O'Leary, was instructing a few volunteers on the media sign-in procedure. I started talking to her about my quest, showed her the old Bee I.D. and she agreed to take the print with no guarantees. The situation was looking good I thought. I returned to my spot in the crowd and began to wait.

In my years of covering political events waiting for hours is not uncommon. As a working photographer, however, I was able to be inside the venue, warm and sitting. Today I was just another Joe Citizen standing in the line. The number of people that came to event far exceeded the capacity of the school gymnasium. The two-hour wait was difficult, the weather was cold and brisk. One woman said that winter in central Oregon is nature's way of reminding us why there are no cockroaches. Another woman, Cris Woodard wore her patriotic denim jacket with a red/white/blue scarf and brought postcards of Bill and Hillary she hoped to get signed.
Inside the gym I got a seat where I could see the podium and most of the crowd. The people around me were many of the teachers at the school. A woman next to me was an English teacher, a graduate of Del Oro High School in the Sacramento area. Small world. Her comment about the wait to get in was "think of it as waiting in line for a Disneyland ride."
The Bend event was Clinton's fourth of the day so it was not surprising that he was nearly an hour late. When he began his speech the cell phone and point-and-shoot cameras were aimed at the stage. He spoke for over an hour, eloquently and passionately about Hillary's candidacy. The speech, to me, was a down-home "state of the world" address that could only come from a man who has seen the issues from the rare perspective of having had the most important public service job in the world.
Flanked by three Secret Service agents Clinton worked his way slowly and deliberately through the crowd at the edge of the podium. I was able to get as close as I wanted to photograph. Since I wasn't "media" my access was better than most any other situation I'd been in as a working journalist. I also got to do something I would never have done before: I called out to him, shook his hand and asked if he would be sure to sign my print. He looked straight at me and said," I already have." I made a few more frames of him in the crowd then got out of the crush. It took nearly another hour for the gym to clear and the Clinton motorcade to leave for the Redmond airport. I found the woman who had my large envelope and print. I pulled out the photograph and sure enough the signature was there. "For Jay Mather. Thanks. Bill Clinton."

I left the parking lot after a five hour episode of waiting, laughing with folks, meeting teachers and a most helpful advance team member, Cindy O'Leary, and 15 seconds with President Clinton. I call that a great day.

Spring?

I've kept myself buried in my "photo cave" since returning from my quick trip to Sacramento last week. After a couple of successful book projects, one for Diane from her retirement odyssey last spring and another for Jesse and Carmen's wedding in July I launched into a third book from my trip last May with the Sacramento Ballet to China, a much broader endeavor. There is a purpose to my hermitic behavior which needs to remain undisclosed for awhile. Suffice to say, the editing of photos, layout, type, copy editing and overall proofing of the product was difficult yet amazingly efficient even though I've been at it for a week. Think about that: taking a collection of photos from a two-week, non-stop experience and converting it all into a ready-to-publish book in seven days on a Mac. The production details almost made me forget what was happening outside, a wild spring snowstorm that has dumped about 6" here at the foot of the Cascades. Snow in the Willamette Valley? Much more in the higher elevations. I've conceded defeat and just can't bring myself to shovel the driveway at the end of March. A trip to the mailbox adds insult: spring and summer catalogues from L.L. Bean and R.E.I. with glorious covers of lazy days I think will not be seen here anytime soon. After the book was uploaded and out of my computer I grabbed a camera and got out of the house to see what my mushy brain and eye would concoct. The fence was perfect in it's graphic symbolism of getting over a barrier and back into the real world. Hellloo!

Once Upon A Time

I just returned from a couple of days on the road to see friends from my days in Sacramento. Kirsten Bloom, the prima ballerina with the Sacramento Ballet, was performing the lead role in "Sleeping Beauty," a full-length production that challenged the entire company in it's complexity. Suffice to say, the performance was exquisite. Kirsten and I have know each other for the past 12 years. I've photographed her in many different dancing roles, in rehearsals, the studio and recently during the tour to China. She is the only dancer who has been in the company throughout my tenure. I never tire of watching her dance. Paul Kitagaki and Renée Byer are two of my former co-workers at the Sacramento Bee. It's a bit strange returning to a city where one lived for 20+ years. Everything is familiar yet I see the city through a much different perspective. The comforting part staying with Paul and Renée. The common link between Kirsten and them is the "once upon a time" factor. Kirsten dances to fairy tales, Paul and Renée are photographic artists. They pursue their careers with passion and total commitment and I think about my years doing the same thing alongside them. I enjoy the occasional trip to Sacramento as a reminder of my crazy life as a photojournalist. I'm reinforced in my decision to retire and carry on a smaller version of photojournalism, yet there is a reverie for my Sacramento days that are still so close and real yet far, far away in another time and place.

The Circle of LIfe

With Spring approaching the high desert in central Oregon the circle of life is in full swing. For Gayle Baker and her herd of cattle, the "girls," as she calls them calving season is a busy time of year. She watches carefully as each cow proceeds through the birthing process and for the most part, all has gone well. One calf was born with very low birth weight and was not feeding with her momma so Gayle used a substitute milk formula to get the calf through the first few days of life.

I have been out on the bike a couple of times when the weather was temperate enough for comfortable riding. I do still attend two spin classes a week which are 60 minutes of near-threshold work. With the surgery date now three months away I am more intent on getting as strong as possible. I think a lot about the pace of my life in a time-space continuum manner. Space being a three dimensional concept is understandable; time, the forth dimension is more difficult to comprehend in relation to space until I'm on the bike traveling through time and space as an ordinary activity. This is probably not what physicists would affirm. Life does move that way for me in most instances and probably for Gayle and her girls as well. Castenada's observation didn't mention the time it takes to understand the space one occupies at any given time. That one's on me.

Space

Diane and I went to a concert in town last Friday night. Tracy Grammer, a great folk singer, played her Martin D-28 and sang two hours plus of soulful and personal songs. During her performance she referred to her former singing partner Dave Carter a lot. They were becoming the new faces of modern folk music when Dave died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 49 in 2002. He died in her arms in a Massachusetts hotel following a run. She is still coming to terms with the space of time and loss since his death. The concept of "space" is so vague until it affects your daily life. Instantly Carlos Castenada's philosophical perceptions of space between tree leaves become much more intimate. Space, for Tracy Grammer, is the perpetual absence of closeness of someone gone, so dear and important in her life. That void is immeasurable. My issue of space is on a quieter and less traumatic level. For several days now I have been in a vacuum between recent and upcoming activities. In short, not much to do. That space used to be nerve wracking. One of my fears of retirement is that I'd be bored and at a loss without work. I have not felt that way (yet) and have accepted stillness and temporary inactivity as one of the ebbs and flows of life in my post-career life. It took me two days to realize that and the reason I hadn't written on this blog was I was in that "space," the invisible elephant in the middle of the room. The part of "space" that drives me a little nuts is that I don't have to do anything about it. Restlessness is a way of telling me to get comfortable with being uncomfortable and if I don't like it, then do something about it...when I'm ready. In the meantime I think about the things that are in my space (having nothing to do with the mega-internet site): Allison's high school graduation and my knee surgery in June, daylight savings time beginning this weekend, a trip to Sacramento in a couple of weeks and cycling in warmer weather, a home remodeling project. These are easy days and my superficial discontent is not in the same league as life changing events that I know will come. That is the space I will not understand until the day it happens. My favorite quote comes to mind: "The years teach what the days can never know."

Moving On, Looking Back

It's hard to believe that it has been one year since I left the Sacramento Bee. The purpose of this blog has been, for the most part, a way to look ahead, to savor my moments as much as I enjoyed photographing other's. However, today I am remembering the good times and the kind words and gestures from my friends and co-workers during my last days as a worker Bee.

The Chinook come home

Welcome back and greetings to new readers of this blog. This installment is a bonus "two-fer." I had planned on a single blog about the release of Chinook into a small stream near my home on Monday. Plans changed when my friend Brent McGregor asked me this afternoon to go ride with him on his "new and improved" snowmobile up to MacKenzie Pass, 8 miles beyond the end of the plowed road, to see of there might be the possibility of a winter sunset. Oh, and there was. So, today's entry is the result of two exceptional photographic days. If you have an aversion to mountain sunset photographs, now's the time to hit your back button.



Since 2004 major stream restoration in the Deschutes River watershed has been in progress to allow the re-introduction of Chinook salmon and steelhead that haven't swum freely in some of these waters for 40 years. Relicensing the dams on the Deschutes, Portland General Electric and tribes had to improve fish habitat, a project begun since 2004. The Deschutes Basin Land Trust has been working to ensure that there will be habitat for the fish for this day and days in the future. Monday, about 10,000 Chinook fry were released in Lake Creek, a tributary to the Metolius and the Deschutes. It was a great and unheralded moment. No media, no fanfare. Several groups led by Oregon Fish and Wildlife trekked through the snow to the streams, measured water temperature, acclimated the fish and then were scooped out of a plastic Ace Hardware bucket and placed gently into quiet sections along the stream bank.










Mt. Jefferson
























North and South Sister

A night for howling

There are times in life when you just need to let out a hoot. Tonight I got to do that watching a lunar eclipse over the central Oregon high desert. All day clouds rolled over the Cascades with the opportunity to see the celestial event in question until late in the day when the sky began to clear. By 6pm the only clouds were on the eastern horizon acting like a curtain for the upcoming show. When the moon reached the full eclipse it was well above the horizon and glowed like a copper penny for nearly an hour. I hope wherever you were tonight that the sky was clear and you got to see the moon. I viewed the eclipse with my photographer buddy Brent McGregor and as we stood with our tripods and cameras we were amazed not only by the moon but also the amazing starlit night, the Milky Way directly overhead. We wondered how many other photographers were photographing the scene and how many others went home frustrated by bad weather conditions. We felt truly lucky.

The Camp Sherman Quilt Show

The beauty of central Oregon is not limited to the natural landscape. The communities of Sisters and Camp Sherman have numerous artists. Painters and photographers are well represented, however, this area is equally known for the quilting work being done. Twice each year the Pine Needlers, a group of about 200 women hold a show in the Camp Sherman Community Hall where quilts are hung from the rafters of the building. Each quilt is unique and often has a long family history or a personal story of it's creation. This is museum quality on a down-home level. The quilts aren't for sale so a modest entrance fee, small quilted potholders, and snacks, sold by the "Pine Nuts" (husbands of the quilters) give the Pine Needlers a little profit which funds a scholarship fund for local students. The other show is held in conjunction with the Sisters Quilt Show in July when the streets in town are closed to traffic and thousands come to see the magnificent creations that cloth, thread and artistic vision create.

Moving On...the CD

A recent Google user inititiated a web search using the words "moving on songs" and was directed to this blog. It's not surprising to me that others are seeking the therapeutic power and soul of music to sustain themselves in a period of life where door and windows open and close in philosophical frames. I dug into my music library and compiled a playlist of songs that have assisted me in my transition during the past year. The "Moving On" CD has 19 tracks, basically acoustic music from contemporary artists, John Denver, Dan Fogelberg, Rosanne Cash, Richard Thompson, Richard Shindell, John Gorka, James Taylor, Alison Krauss, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Lucky Kaplansky, Carrie Newcomer, Jackie Greene, Bela Fleck and Jerry Douglas and several others. If the music interests you let me know and I'll make it possible for you to get the disk.

Valentine haiku

Sliding clouds love's kiss
Constant change yet much remains
For a life lived full.

Tracks

There are silent visitors to my world and I’m curious about the tracks they leave as they pass by. A little research determines the identity of the four-legged creature that walks across my snowy driveway. It’s a raccoon. There are also rabbit and deer tracks. I enjoy their company. The raccoon and the rabbit take shelter under the back deck; the deer are migrating through their winter range seeking anything edible not buried in snow. There are also the visitors to this blog. The number at the bottom of the page indicates how many have visited the site, a miniscule number considering some sites get thousands or millions of hits each day. I’m grateful that anyone reads the blog in the first place. I use a website that shows me the “tracks” blog viewers leave. This is where it gets interesting. The stats of a viewer are broken down into many categories: IP address, city, state, country, the URL that got you to my blog, keywords on a search engine, and the length of time spent on the site. I recognize a few visitors as easily as recognizing a rabbit track. The rest, however, are obscure and ephemeral and that tweaks my curiosity. There have been readers from the U.S.A., the U.K., Australia and the Netherlands. I began this blogging effort as a way to describe my efforts to lay down new tracks in Oregon after years of familiar ones in California. I’m beginning to realize that writing and photographing for this journey will be basically a one-sided conversation. Although there is a way to leave comments most visitors to "Moving On" do not. That’s o.k. I look at a lot of other blogs and don’t often write comments either. It’s easier to remain anonymous. I respect that and whatever viewer information I glean will never be disclosed, period. If you’d care to drop a note or a comment, thanks in advance. I’ll throw a virtual party for the 1000th viewer. You can track that one yourself.

The spirit lives on, doesn't it?

Even on a "down" day there is some redeeming element; that was a photograph I made a couple of days ago and thought I'd hold for future use. Today, as it turns out, is a fine time to use it since it's been a fairly lousy day for me. I canceled a trip to Sacramento (a weather-related precaution) so I attended my regular cycling spin class. Never in many weeks have my knees screamed so defiantly. I tapered off and finished a 60-minute session in pain. That set the tone to match the gray-brown, slushy world outside. Back home, the lid on the mayonaise jar was not on tight and the jar dropped to the floor spewing the contents on the refrigerator door. Now I'm seriously bummed. My sour mood continued the rest of the day until I figured out that the blog will come to the rescue. Write it down, it will get better. When I remembered the photo of the holiday tree still lit out in Camp Sherman I got a visual smack upside the head. Get over it and be content. It's still a beautiful place out there, perhaps not so much here today and that will change. Like my mood.

...and it's only February

This is a day to hunker down and wait out another blast of winter conditions in central Oregon. It has snowed all day and forecasts predict snow through tomorrow, a slight break on Monday and another punch on Tuesday. The meteorological wizards who predicted a big wet La Niña winter have been accurate. Damn. Wherever you are today and tomorrow, may your spirits be high in spite of things one cannot change.