In the courtyard stood
The lonely cottonwood
Bare branches chattering in the wind
Except
For one small twig
Nestled beneath the eaves
Giving forth the first yellow green
leaves of spring
~Bobbie Wideman 1955-56
Good Shepherd Home, Mesilla Park New Mexico
The lonely cottonwood
Bare branches chattering in the wind
Except
For one small twig
Nestled beneath the eaves
Giving forth the first yellow green
leaves of spring
~Bobbie Wideman 1955-56
Good Shepherd Home, Mesilla Park New Mexico
17 comments:
(I'll keep my comments to a minimum about the back story I know to allow others to draw their own conclusions from your work.)
Such a little girl, in such an imposing place, but with an important yellow green hope for Spring.
Again, Mom, you've done wonders in your new found milieu.
Another lovely and fascinating dream image. The Home looks nice but a little forbidding and austere, in brown and white.
I can imagine that little girl looking out of the window at the green leaf of hope on the winter tree as a promise of something better. I don't really know you Bobbie, only virtually,(so sometimes it's difficult and we have to learn to tread carefully as we are all getting other people's innermost and precious thoughts and feelings in their art) but I think the implications are that you have made a huge success of your life after such an inauspicious start.
Bobbie, I have a new blog. I am keeping my old one too. This is just another creative outlet. xoxo Nita from red tin heart
I may be reading something into this, simply because it resonates with me - as my grandmother died when my aunt was 2 and she was put into an orphanage for some years. Somehow this reminds me of the little girl who was my aunt. Strange! I have no idea why. Maybe because she has straight brown hair?
Looks like an orphanage or hospital of some sort. I can't read what is written on the window, but for me, the young girl and the leaf are the future and life - I love this as a profound image, though it seems very lonely - I hope if it is you, that this isolation did not last long and the darkness was left behind.
What more needs to be said... Absolutely Fabulous!!! I love the colors in this.
the bursts of color of the little girl and the leaf are such a remarkable contrast to the house. is this a dream or an actual memory?
~sue
Hi Bobbie,
This is compelling! Have we seen this place before? I might be getting it mixed up ... one of our group had the dog that was hidden with the brother and mother ... it has a similar feel to me.
Perhaps the outside and spring and nature is the life blood for the girl.
~ Diane Clancy
www.dianeclancy.com/blog
How wonderfully done that is and how curious it makes me!
Love what you are doing in digitals. Don't you love the colors you can tweek on these programs? Amazing stuff!
This collage moves me a lot, there is fear, anticipation, danger and yet, hope, serenity, and a deep invitation to fly away, just like the golden yellow leaf. I really love what you are accomplishing!
P.S. Are you working with old photographs?
Hey, where did my comment go? or maybe I messed up with the code word - i get in a hurry and don't stick around to see if it got through - sorry
Another eerie vision... another mystery. A little girl lost, a big, big, big house, that looks like some fat old spinster with a pinched face. A sense of something left behind, a recent loss, and a turning point. Every time I look at this image, it grips my heart and I want to cry a little, I get anxious.
Esthetically, wow! I know how hard it is to come up with these colours, having tried and tried and tried and failed to find just the right combinations. Chapeau! the proportions also work very well in telling this story. the perspective, the background - it's a very rich image. I believe Debi when she says you were (and still are) a terrific photographer - it's obvious.
Thank you all for your outpouring of comments and encouragement. It means a lot to me. I am having the best time and I think I would call it photoshop mania :) It is also a very healing activity for me, as you saw in the case of the dreams where fears once portrayed have lessened their grip.
This IS a memory not a dream, and has a true basis. The little girl represents me, the big building represents the Good Shepherd Home, but is not it, the cottonwood tree is not a cottonwood but an elm I think. The leaf is a cottonwood leaf. So you see this image is sort of a digital historical novel.:)
Deconstruction: I used photoshop 5.5 to assemble the following images into a collage. The building was purchased from dreamstime.com as was the leaf (most small images are $1 per download). The little girl is a vintage image selected from a group of girls in a photograph from eBay. She is holding her embroidery work which also figures in the memory. The finished Photoshop image has 8 layers and one adjustment layer for the leaf. The girl's dress is "painted" with a blue (digital) paintbrush.
What is next? Well, I do have a couple of ideas :)
This was my first visit(of many I think) Your blog is beautiful. This piece is so different from the girl swimming and yet I loved them both.
Ok,late as usual! but I do love this. Beautiful words. I read them while the photo loaded and couldn't wait to see the illustration. Very touching with a sense of stillness and hope. Awesome :)
thinking of you... xoxo Nita
Bobbie, you seem to have tapped into a deep emotional stream, that is resonating with so many of us.
bobbie, this is magic, life, hope! fantastic shot!
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