Beth Kephart's Blog, page 239

The Wells Fargo Wagon, Tattoos, and a Brief Snip of an Olympic Horse

Thursday night is the big night at the Devon Horse Show, and so, after negotiating a tres crowded dance floor to learn a new waltz with Jean, I rushed back home and ran down the street to meet my husband, who was taking real photographs (with a tripod and all) among the crowds. Here the Wells Fargo Wagon is getting things started as I stand among the crowds.



In the final image box here I share a brief video snippet from the show itself. These are Olympic horses and riders on an Olympic-caliber course. I'm standing on an overturned bucket and can only capture but part of the course with my little hand-held Sony. But what is really so spectacular is the voice of the Devon Horse Show, to which I've been listening many, many years—it booms at me all day long these two weeks of the year and late into the night.



Photos only ever tell part of the story. This micro-video tells some of the rest. You have to buy a funnel cake, a lemon stick lemon, and a melting ice cream cone to get even closer to the truth. Then you have to take a carousel ride.

I spent the afternoon out here

reading about regenerative medicine (for a client), London (thanks to my son's glorious updates), and Stetson's Hat Company (out of blatant curiosity).



It was the prettiest day of the year.

Peaceable Kingdom

Today a breeze makes its way in through my window as I work, and so do the sounds of the horse show, two blocks away. My son sends daily reports of his adventure in London. I have a new book brewing.



That's peaceable in my kingdom.

Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River, an excerpt

Listen:

If someone were to ask her what she wanted most she would say, Give me a long ride on the river.  Give me a canal song to sing and a captain to sing it with. Give me the romance of moonlight. 

She pictures herself floating in from Schuylkill Haven, watching the trees and the fish and the towns slide by.  She imagines learning the canals well enough to name the mules, to care for coal, to tell canalling stories of her own.  There was once a hook-armed bowsman, she'd begin.  There was once a woman they called Ham and Eggs who jig-danced for every quart of whiskey.  There was once a boy who hid himself among chickens in the cabin.

She is keen to the hidden craving in all things:  the yearning tucked inside the songs of birds, the unconfessed regrets of men, the permanent rage of an unfinished fire.  My craving the loudest of all, for I do not wish to be diverted from myself, to be sucked down pipes and into homes, to be severed into locks and keys, to be dammed and forebayed and waterwheeled toward a reservoir, and out again, through bored wooden pipes, and into the calamity of homes.

—from Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River (Beth Kephart, Temple University Press)

worth celebrating

It's been hot in this house (a mild understatement) and I haven't been sleeping long hours (ditto). But I've had horses and children to keep me company by day and this brand new book project to keep me curious and calm in the middle of the night. I had a notion. I pushed it. I am digging in deep with the historic record. A nugget grows.



I'm not writing a book yet (or, I should say, I've written but 3,000 words).  I'm letting that book linger. Making calls to historians, checking the records on Library of Congress databases, reading old newspapers online, thanks to my friends at Radnor Memorial Library (thanks, Pam Sedor). Festering isn't always a good thing, but in this case I think it is. I have moved away from the land of vague ennui and unnerving uncertainty to be fully engaged once more.



Every time I learn this lesson, it feels brand new: I can't live fully without being inside a project. It just doesn't work for me.

The heat of the days: a photo essay

My new screensaver

and my thanks to those of you who have so kindly commented on the photographs these past few days. I am a peaceful person, when I have a camera in hand, when my only responsibility is to see. To wait for the horse to find me, to wait for the child to laugh, to wait for the sun to fall to just the right place. Photography slows me down. It forces patience. And I love having an outlet for it here, on the blog.[image error]

Rumblers and Waltzers and Heartfelt Thanks

Many exquisite things trundle and waltz by my home on Memorial Day weekend. There is, for example, the annual carriage parade. There are the dogs of the famous dog cotillion. And then there are my fabulous, witty, smart, and loving neighbors—so entirely and brilliantly in love.



Exquisite things waltz into my world as well, and this morning I would like to send my heartfelt thank you to Florinda, for this especially moving post about our time together at BEA. Caribousmom, I thank you, too, for including You Are My Only in your Book Buzz: Fall Reads; you've assembled an immaculate list of titles, and I'm so grateful to have my book included on that list.

A few things that are making me happy

I am stealing a meme from dear, so-talented, and missed Eating a Tangerine with this up-to-the-moment report on what is making me happy.



First, the cherished memories of my trip to the BEA this past week. Thank you, so many of you, for being such an integral part of my adventure, thank you Armchair BEA for the love, and thank you Florinda for the conversation.



Second, the news that Dangerous Neighbors has been chosen as the summer read by a lovely local private school. I have so wanted that for this book of mine, and I am grateful.



Third, the happy reality that, after allowing myself to stall for a few days (as I imagine most authors waiting to hear about circulating manuscripts do), I have found my way back to my prequel-in-progress to Dangerous Neighbors. Research proved to be the key. I have lucked onto something astonishing and juicy—a little known fact that will give my story heft, suspense, momentum, and (I'll toss the word in there) thrills. I have myself a riveting something. Now I just have to write it.



Fourth, spending time at the Devon Horse Show, taking photographs of horses, children, riders, and the big jumpers. Today I'll be photographing the carriages that are rolling down my street (two just did, so I interrupted this blog to catch them) as well as the famous puppy contest.



Fifth, spending an hour with Kim, my former student, at the show yesterday.  There she is, petting a three-month-old mini. Both are, I think, beyond words.



Finally, receiving and reading the richest imaginable e-mails from my son, now in his fourth day in London. The Brits are treating that great guy of mine exquisitely well, and he is turning most every hour into something worthy of a story. In exactly two weeks I'll be there, in London, too. Laughing, I'm certain. And listening.

The horses, jumping