David Masumoto, Stanford White, Picasso – Recipe for Dilemma

Minneola Tangelos Saturday at Dean and Deluca at Prince and Broadway

 courtesy La Toscana

Who’s that girl?

List of non-negotiables:  sunlit kitchen, access to nature – as in dirt, LONG growing season, access to art, books, architecture, places to walk which constantly inspire ,work

Some days life makes sense – some days, not so much, right?  Some days when you step outside your door you know exactly which direction you’d like to go in, some not.  I’m not talking about any critical life or death issues here, just some sensibilities/practical-type things……….  I’m caught in what could be called “The Picasso Dilemma” – where multiple delights collide making the location of one’s life seemingly irretrievably conflicted.

Friday continued a triangle of loves all around as I traipsed all around the West Village in the drizzle.  Saturday, it was more of the same savoring my relaxed and cozy downtown haunts, feasting on the early Spring vibe as we joined the hordes of people in Washington Square Park coexisting and listening to music.  I have, in essence created a picture of myself which is real, yet broken into distinct pieces – sort of like a lot of those abstract Picasso paintings, which I have always had a hard time figuring out.  I have seen some of his work in person, but because I am more literal than abstract in my approach to things, I have had to appreciate them from a distance, often saying to myself, things like, “well, these are interesting, and I think I can appreciate his talent, but what WAS he thinking about when he painted them?”  I am sort of limited in my intellect in this regard (and a lot of others) and find abstract art approachable but sometimes very puzzling.  Today, perhaps, I sort of “got it”, maybe just a little.

A selection of the works, courtesy Pablo Picasso:

            

I know that we are all fascinating, complicated and multi-faceted creations of DNA, yet somehow one’s own self-image tends to be dominated by a couple of fundamental characteristics, which hopefully form a thread as we go from early age, through the stages of “development” and somehow, arrive at the point which I consider to be something akin to “middle age”.  I guess, while I spend time trying to figure out where I am going in this lifetime aprés raising kids (not that you are ever done), literally, as in “where do you want to LIVE, Marianne?”, I am a collage of these paintings above.   I guess I would  have hoped to jell into someone who, at the core, makes sense to myself.   Some days, at least on the surface, this would seem to not really be the case.  As I rush around trying to absorb all that I mindlessly “ran past” in my youth and suck it in like a thirsty sponge, I wonder who the person in the mirror, or more poignantly, with her hands in the mixing bowl, is.  If I can’t decide something as fundamental as where I want to live, well then, yikes, what?…. Hmmmm

First of all, I have realized the degree to which I have a great coalescence of thinking, physical focus and obsession around the beauty of fruits and vegetables.  Obviously, I am not the first one to feel this way.  Great artists have had as their muses,  fruits and vegetables for centuries.   I find the greatest delight in seeing produce piled high in markets outdoors and in.   I reach for my camera.  And, farmers, more so family farmers, do fall in love with their crops and their land.  I wonder what this means sometimes, through the psychological lens….  I am so drawn to them – in nature, in the markets, in the kitchen, just as I am to many farm animals – goats, sheep, chickens, cows and pigs mostly.

And, as I was reading the wonderful article in the March issue of Saveur about the Masumoto family farm, I found myself thinking about their own multi-generational obsession with their farm their peaches and their other crops – along with their wisdom and the importance of passing this land to the next generation. This is exactly the kind of story that I can attach myself to and can so identify with – these people, their craft, their caring and their nurturing of their land and its output.  To me, there are few other vocations more worthy of lifelong, and multi-generational devotion.  If you feel akin to any of these feelings, you must read David Masumoto’s books.

• “On our farm, we remain part of a working class, engaging in livelihoods where we are judged by our deeds, not our   bank accounts.”  David Masumoto

And, as I stepped out of the shower yesterday morning and was thinking about the Masumotos and all of the pictures I have seen of the dawning of Spring on the west coast of the US and in Italy, I had a momentary tantrum – as in “this is so totally unfair!”  I realize this is quite the irrational and juvenile impulse, but with all the blessings I have in my life, I consider these people to be proportionally more lucky and want to plant myself with them.   But, at the same time as I feel this,  I also so enjoy every single trip I make into New York, rain, shine, cold, hot……….  I guess I am just a person filled with a certain degree of irrational thinking and conflict between two lifestyles………  sort of half City Mouse, half Country Mouse.  At this stage in my life I guess I have decided I am going to go with my impulses – wherever they take me, and enjoy the ride – with all the beauty I see through these two eyes of mine, regardless of where they take me……  Irrational sometimes, yes, but oh well, I’ll take whatever fun I can find and I can feel the hand of someone upstairs leading me along……  how utterly wonderful.

Without people like the Masumotos, though I do not know them personally, yet, I feel the world would be all the more at a great loss.  And, while I do not live near them, I FEEL near to them, their values and their lifestyle.  In them I see the pull my Father felt to till his little garden every Spring, to soak his seeds and to watch for the budding, the weeds and signs of other pestilence.  It is in these thoughts and deeds I feel my innermost soul.  And while I run to cities to fill myself up during the colder months (and to some in Summer too)  and see all the greatness that has coalesced there, like Stanford White’s Arch in Washington Square Park, for instance,  I am at heart a working girl – a cook, baker, hoverer, teacher, worrier, seeker, grower, tender, pruner, gatherer, arranger, taster, dreamer.

In March we are going out to California to do some more exploring.   I hope to get to do some wandering among the farms I have come to know around the Central Valley and then northward.  Right now, their year is beginning in earnest – the pruning, the planning, the prayers for rain.  But, then I will come back and run right back into New York for a helping of that great degree of invigoration welling up from the radiationally-heated monolith there.  I guess it will be my job to feed all facets of the painting – to be like the mother bird who brings the food to the nest and it becomes the satiation of the young ones who grab it and demand it the most assertively.

At the same time that these sentiments permeate my bones, on Saturday, I felt a  heartfelt thank you well up –  to Stanford White – and these two serendipitous views of the two spires – downtown – the Freedom Tower  and uptown, the Empire State building as seen through his arch at Washington Square Park.   I confess, I had never noticed this before.

  the Freedom Tower as seen looking downtown at around 3pm

  the Empire State Building as seen looking uptown at around 6:10 pm

And so, as I pad into the kitchen in awhile, to begin preparations for this day, I am not any farther down the road on this dilemma, maybe more stuck than ever as I schedule in my mind a visit to the almond blossom festivals of Sicily, the San Marzano tomato harvest and the shaking of the olive trees…….  And so, I come to a peace with Picasso and his paintings.   It’s a wonderful life and I can take being fractured, for the time being, maybe I’ll just celebrate the wide range of attractions, after all.

Coincidentally, yesterday, I watched Mike Colameco’s show on the West Village from 2012 –  featuring the following in my very favorite neighborhood:

Crispo’s 240 W 14th St

Joe’s Dairy 156 Sullivan St – so sadly, closed on 1/22/14

Pino Prime Meats 149 Sullivan St

Rafetto’s 144 W Houston

Faico’s 260 Bleecker

Florence 5 Jones St

Yes, I am one of those who returns to this neighborhood over and over again – seeking the warmth and individuality of these old-time family businesses