Prospect: A Year in the Park

No wild beasts or angels

It had been more than a week since I'd taken a real walk in the park, and Ash Wednesday seemed as good a day as any to get back. Today marks the beginning of Lent, based on Christ's 40 days in the desert, where he was "among wild beasts, and the angels ministered to him" (Mark 1:12). No desert for me, just the Long Meadow, where I quickly realized I'd forgotten my usual second layer of thermal woolies. Forget about 40 days; I didn't last 40 minutes.

The dogs were streaming in for their morning romp, insulated by joy against the cold. Which is the angel and which the wild beast in this meet-up? 







 


It was a quiet morning, the brutal winds of recent days having died down; I heard crows, doves, and of course starlings, which were cackling and wolf-whistling as they ate up the grass seeds on the Long Meadow. Even without the wind it was bitterly cold, but these eager daffodil buds inside the fence gave hope.





Nearby, this accidental signage made me smile, since the berm along Prospect Park Southwest has been the site of spectacular rat sightings in the past. No rats were observed today; they were either keeping cozy or avoiding the headlines.

Refresh view, part 2

Last entry, I introduced you to a blogpal, Michael D. Robinson, the best bird photographer you probably never heard of. Today, beyond birds, some of his other glimpses of Prospect Park.

The Boathouse, serene in summer...

...and magical in winter.

Having tried to capture the elusive shifting moods of some of the same subjects within the park, I am delighted to tip my Salieri hat when I find a Mozart. 

One more great shot: the Long Meadow in autumn, full of shifting light and energy.

Photographers, artists, videographers, et al: If you have work that uses the park as background or inspiration that you'd like to share, let me know (brenda at tenthleper-dot-us); it would be fun to make AYITP a more collaborative effort!

All photos above, Michael D. Robinson, all rights reserved

Refresh view

The heart of the blogging enterprise is about two things, as I see it: being passionate about something, and wanting to share that passion. When it works, it really works. Through AYITP, I've met so many gifted artists, writers and photographers who are also inspired by Prospect Park. I'd like to brighten this dull mid-week day by featuring one of them: Michael D. Robinson, probably the best photographer you've never heard of.

A retired financial professional, Michael claims not to be a professional photographer, but if he is an amateur, it is in the Chariots of Fire sense, done for the love of it. Just his body of work with the park's swan population is so beautiful and tender. These wee cygnets remind me of three little first-graders heading off to their first day of school, all focus and bravado. He is not blogging (yet--I'm working on him), but his Picasa photostream can be viewed here.

It takes more than an impressive Nikon with monster zoom to capture the ruthless eyes and tensile grip of this hawk. (Although it doesn't hurt, as I remind myself when my point-and-shoot captures its umpteenth Blurry Bird of the Day.)












Check out the delicacy of this snowy egret. What all these photos share, I think, is an emotional intimacy with their subject, and when the subject is feathered and bird-brained, that is pretty impressive.

Luscious color study, a feast of textures, and at the heart of it, this brave raggedy cardinal.

Coming soon, a few more gems from Mr. Robinson (he does magical parkscapes, too). Meanwhile, since I'm not getting to the park quite as often this year 2 of AYITP, I'd love to make it a more collaborative effort. If you have any park or park-inspired shots or visual art (or, for that matter, embed-able video of performance art) that you'd like to showcase here, drop me a line. No pay, full credit, modest flurry of hits and a bit more Google-traction await you!

All photographs: Michael D. Robinson. Used with permission, all rights reserved.

Cold comfort

 Love-sick—or simply sick of love—on Valentine's Day? At the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket, you could say "Comfort me with apples," like Solomon in his song (verse 2, chapter 5), or Ruth Reichl. In the King James Bible, the singer also implores, "Stay me with flagons," (you could do that at the market today too, there were tastings from Paumonok Winery, although the flagons were plastic spit-cups). However, in the New American Standard Bible, this verse is inexplicably translated, "Sustain me with raisin cakes," as if the bard of Scripture had suddenly developed a craving for a granola bar.  This lovely loaf from Bread Alone was not a raisin cake, but it would have warmed my heart.

I love the seasonal perspective here: We are still in the time of root vegetables, but look far enough ahead, and the flowers are beckoning.

I'm not a huge primrose fan, but they were a heart-cheering sight on a cold grey day.

GREENMARKET DOG OF THE DAY

Yes, it's been too long! Meet Comet, a well-insulated pug out for his constitutional. Comet is a four-year-old guy who (surprise, surprise) loves people food and treats. His face-furrows are superb, actually forming a little arrow pointing down to his wet black nose. He didn't mind that I mushed them all together, rotated his ears, and otherwise did all that irresistible pug-snorgling stuff.

Got your back, Abe

The Great Emancipator gazed out yesterday from Prospect Park's Concert Grove as he has for 113 years (although he has only had this curious view of the Wollman Rink skaters since the hapless rink was plunked there in the Sixties).

In honor of his birthday, here is some info on this amazingly old statue from the Parks Department's latest newsletter:

Across the East River, Henry Kirke Brown was also commissioned by local citizens in a campaign organized by the War Fund Committee of Brooklyn, to design a sculpture of Lincoln for the elliptical plaza off Prospect Park, later named Grand Army Plaza. Brooklyn at the time was a separate city. Dedicated on October 21, 1869, the statue is quite similar to his work in Union Square. Though posed in a classical stance, Lincoln is depicted as a real man, even holding a copy of the Emancipation Proclamation, on which are inscribed the words, “Shall be forever free.” The sculpture was moved in 1896 to the lower concert ground area of Prospect Park. In 1989 the monument was conserved through the Municipal Art Society’s Adopt-A-Monument Program, with funding from the Lincoln Savings Bank, and plans are presently under consideration to more appropriately situate the sculpture in conjunction with park lakeside improvements.

In other words, Abe is probably going to get moved again.

Here's a look at his noble visage, taken a little over a year ago.

A brown study

Just because it was in the 60s, I was foolish enough to look for sproutage of my illicitly planted daffodil bulbs alongside the lake. Naturally, nothing green was apparent except a rogue tuft of onion grass amid the fallen leaves.


 





However, as I poked about, I found some really cool tree fungus. The one on the right, below, looks like a bunch of moths with folded wings. (What do you call a group of moths: a muddle of moths?)

  

Gum-tree balls looked like an abacus in a drain near Lullwater Bridge.






 

Peeling bark (birch, I presume) revealed a palette of earth tones that Benjamin Moore would envy.

Heading home, resigned to enjoying brown as much as humanly possible, look what I stumbled upon!

Long-lead trailer: Spring!

Just up, at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (part of Greater Parkopolis): the very first snowdrops!














And smelling sweet in the 55-degree sunshine, the bloomin' witch hazel.














Not a heck of a lot else in bloom, at least outside, but Daughter and I just loved walking around with our coats off, eating lunch in the cafe, and getting our fix of lush foliage in the conservatories.

There was a shocker in the BBG parking lot: Serious work is underway on the new visitors' center. How perfectly fitting that the slope near the old Herb Garden now looks like a glacier, since this entire swath of land (including our house, judging from the rocks in our soil) was part of the terminal moraine in the last Ice Age. (The BBG's Rock Garden has boulders labeled as to their original provenance, before they were ground forward in a forced march by the mighty glacier that stopped in what is now Prospect Park.)

I know this is the most logical place for a welcome center, but it hurt to see the Elizabethan knot garden ravaged to a heap of mud. And I wonder if they moved those ginkgo trees elsewhere, or ditched them because they were male and made stinky fruits?

A touch of red

I know I won't get to the park today, so here are a few shots from yesterday on the theme of "Cherries in the Snow." (That's a legendary Revlon lipstick color, by the way, although not one I'd ever wear, unless I wanted to look like Baby Jane.)

These berries are right behind the Boathouse; talk about "winter interest"! ID, anyone?

One little cardinal, big old world.

 

Ahoy up there, foolishly named woodpecker. Now if you would only shimmy up the tree trunk on your back, tummy skyward, we could see your alleged other red spot, the one you're misleadingly named after. (Yes, this really bugs me.)

Bag man and the bird blast

On a 14-degree morning, the lake was very, very frozen here at the Lullwater Bridge.

One patch of open water held a cluster of unlucky ducks and a chilly swan.

As I crunched along to the lake, I was alone except for an older guy in a shabby parka, who was toting a scruffy shopping bag. He registered on my Possible Pest Meter (bag, scruffy, alone) but not on my Danger Meter (older, slow-moving); we passed one another wordlessly in opposite directions before the Boat House.

Then as I rounded the Boat House corner, I saw what he'd been doing with the contents of the bag: The ground was laden with a feast for birds, and not your dumb chunks of old bread, either. This looked like quality chow, and the hunger-crazed birds were oblivious to my presence, cavorting outside this urban Audubon Center like starlets at an Oscar after-party. I offered many mental apologies to the Bird Bag Man, who catered this...

BLURRY BIRD EXTRAVAGANZA!

Okay, keep in mind, these guys were all within the same 2 square yards in the same 5 minutes this morning, so close that even I could snap them with my trusty crap zoom lens.

Are you a Song Sparrow? Well, are ya, punk? [No, according to two helpful commenters, he's a White-Throated Sparrow.]

Yikes! Is that actually a visible red(dish) belly patch (down near the legs) on the preposterously-named Red-Bellied Woodpecker? (Yes, there is also a Red-Headed Woodpecker, but how about naming this species something more intuitive, like Red-Capped Woodpecker, or maybe Other Kind of Red-Headed Woodpecker?)

It's a sin to kill a Mockingbird because their dying words would be, "Kiss my ass!" (sung in 20 languages). 

 

Blue Jay casts a beady eye on the competition.

A dove couple got in on the action.

I love his (her?) expression, it's, like, "OMG! Yummies!"

And of course, we can't have sparkling snow without these guys. Sparrow looks dubious. Just 'cause they're red and crested, they walk in like they own the joint!

Hands frozen and brain totally bird-buzzed, I headed back under the Cleft Ridge Span. That bundled-up human turned out to be a charming English lady, and I warmed my hands petting her English Bull Terrier (a "Spuds Mckenzie" dog) and doe-eyed Rottweiler mix. Altogether, not bad for a morning when I'd wished to stay warm in bed.

Staggeringly beautiful

This afternoon's wet snow clung, at least for awhile, to everything, creating just about the most gorgeous "winter wonderland" thing I've ever seen in the city. Walking around near the park's West Drive, I was stunned to realize that everything was exactly as beautiful as everything else. You didn't have to look for a "great angle," or avert your eyes from anything, to be overwhelmed with loveliness. I actually longed to find a dead rat, because it would have been so elegant, peaceful and snow-cloaked, each whisker outlined in white, and then I could have really proven my point.

The path was a mystical white tunnel.

 

Cyclists seemed magical. So did fence posts.

 

Dead leaves were like jewels.

So were living ones.

Tree bark, also gorgeous.

      

Back out on the sidewalk, who knew it was wife-beater T-shirt weather?