Writing

What’s that Tiny Bright Light in the Sky?

/ Pam Goode / Leave a comment

I’m guessing you’re all atwitter about hearing my Eclipse story, right?

It’s actually one of the truly bizarre incidents of my life, and I have absolutely no idea how it happened. Granted, the little quarter moon in my area was lovely, if lacking a bit of actual excitement. More than the excitement of a slow afternoon, and a whole lot less than the excitement of actually seeing the full eclipse. But lovely it was, and it put a great big smile on my face and that lasted the rest of the day.

My son, of course, went waaaaaaay more than the whole nine yards, and I admire him for it bigtime, especially with a 10 year old. Both, I have to say, were high-spirited for the many, many miles of driving, waiting, driving, waiting, driving AND more waiting. But they got the whole deal and it was amazing. And oh yes, they’re already made plans for Australia and New Zealand in 2028.

But back to THE STORY. Due to regularly unscheduled issues with my car, I fuss about it a good bit. The days running up to the show were no different, but hey, at least I had that beautiful eclipse experience to lighten my many sighs. And then work is over, the eclipse has cleansed me, and I climb happily (enough) into my car.

And guess what! MUSIC streams out of the car with a lovely tune …. not MY music of course, but music, and I think my troubles are over because the eclipse wiped all those hiccups away just for me, or maybe for everyone, but I can’t really speak for that many. And though I have no idea where the sudden mystical music came from, it sang for me heartily the rest of the way home. And of course I’m thinking the eclipse, indeed, has super powers.

When I woke up the next morning, the music was nowhere to be found. Haven’t heard a peep from it since. Clearly, the Eclipse has left the room.

Pamela Goode Mosaics, Set 2

/ Pam Goode / 7 Comments

Artwork Top to Bottom and Left to Right:

The Wishing Tree: SOLD, 8″ x 8″, Glass, Millefiori on Wedi Board.
Colorado Dawn: AVAILABLE, 7″H and 13″ W, Mexican Smalti, Mexican Smalti Tortillas, Chopped and Divoted.
Mirrored Wall: NOT AVAILABLE, 33″H x 15″W, Hand-Cut Mirror and Colored Mirror; Outdoor Installation for Ciel Gallery (now demolished).
Wasteland: SOLD, 18″ x 18″; Agate, Mirror, Stained Glass, Unglazed Porcelain, Aquarium Gravel, Pewter; This mosaic began with a dream. Because the image is so void-like, I included lines from T.S. Eliot’s Wasteland and The Hollow Men using small pewter beads that crash into the deep. The mirror-backed “void” reflects the viewer. From the center, spirals of poetry and blank human faces form a rough heart shape, balancing the sense of desolation with a touch of hope. From the central abyss, the tesserae become less defined and increasingly chaotic, until in some spots there are no tesserae at all, but only a gouged space remaining.
He Said, She Said: NOT AVAILABLE; 12″ x 7″ Drawing on Paper (created for a future project that didn’t happen).
Sunbather: NFS, 10″H x 10″W by 5″ Deep; Crystal, Beads, Agate, Glass, Shell, Copper on Stone.
Wild Hearts: SOLD, Unglazed Porcelain, Clay, Beads.
Sunflower Table: SOLD, 46″ rectangular mosaic partially shown, Glass.
The Boy with a Moon and Star: SOLD, Glass on Wedi Board.
Late Bloomer: AVAILABLE, 10″H x 36″L x 18″W; Selected by and displayed at the Society of American Mosaics 2010; Glass, Metal, Mineral, Shell, Beads, Carborundum, Wire, Hand-Carved Styrofoam base by me; Through art, I hope to capture and momentarily magnify archetypal awakenings that resonate with the human spirit. I’m drawn to create with mixed materials because I want, above all, to create as full an image as I can manage. Late Bloomer pulls from the miscellanea of life — sometimes messy, sometimes arbitrary, always fascinating, always more cluttered than we had imagined. The pruning and fitting together of disparate materials becomes a way to order my own thoughts, emotions, and priorities, allowing the finished piece to serve as a kind of talisman.

A Day in Provence

/ Pam Goode / 14 Comments

It’s a bit dreary today (not to mention several other days across the last few weeks), so how about a handful of Sunny Provence?!

I took these photos during a glorious week in Menerbes. Now, I’m one of those girls who LOVES traveling countrysides, frankly they just flat out amaze me. Have a look, and let me know what you think!

And no, I did not visit with Peter Mayle, but I did pass his delightfully charming house!

P.S. During our walk along the gorgeously ancient cobblestones, we passed an enticing church that was closed. Not to be deterred, I snapped a bit of the interior through the keyhole.

When *S*****T* Happens

/ Pam Goode / 11 Comments


Well then.

Sometimes it feels like the world is caving in a bit, and maybe it is; or maybe it isn’t and it’s all just coming from me.

For the second time, I’ve had my credit card stolen at a place that I frequent regularly — a place filled with kind, quiet, people who spend a couple of hours working on their computers in a pleasant environment. The first time it happened, I felt like it must have somehow been my fault. Of course it wasn’t.

Now that it’s happened a second time, I’m livid and … something else that I haven’t yet identified. The difference is that this time I told everyone nearby immediately and then pretty much everyone I know when I got home. Why? Because I don’t want it to happen to anyone else. Yes, I’m savvy enough to know that these things happen all around us far too often, but loving enough to believe that I won’t be robbed because I’m a good and kind person. Yes, well … I guess that’s naive to a “T” isn’t it?

And it leaves me wondering about life in so many ways.

One of the problems for me is that I really, really don’t want to have to beware every time I leave the house. I really, really don’t want to believe that any passerby and his mother is out to steal from me and who knows who else. And I really, really don’t want to spend the rest of my life watching my back. I’d like to say that I refuse to live that way, but the truth is that I won’t be able to let it go — I’ll be watching my back pretty much forever now. I suppose you could say that’s a good thing, but it doesn’t feel good to me.

Yes, it’s a huge wake-up call that hopefully melds okay-ish with my life, but there will always be a part of me that hates it.

Uncommon

/ Pam Goode / 2 Comments

There was a moment 
that I raised my head 
to yours,
an uncommon
instant
for shy girls.

It was a meeting
of hearts —
one strong.
one reticent.
But your smile was a steadying hand
that reached across divides
of country, persuasion, tomorrows, or names,
and steadied me.

One heart steadying another.
Fleetingly —
and ever present.

© Pamela Pardue Goode

Pamela Goode Mosaics, Set 1

/ Pam Goode / 21 Comments


Hello Lovelies!

Today I’m posting a few of the mosaics I’ve created over the past gazillion years. What a joy it’s been! I’ve taken a break lately due to wrist issues, but I’m slowly making my way back in and loving it. The new pieces will be smaller (grumble), but they’ll still be a joy. They range in size from 8 x 8 inches to about 14 x 20.

Who has a favorite?

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

/ Pam Goode / 10 Comments

Life is strange. Or maybe it’s me. Does it matter which?

I started making art when I was about 6, which comes so naturally to kids. And then of course I stopped. I stopped, in fact, for 47 years. I was busy doing wonderful things of course, and as a creative type, that never stopped. But mosaic art was to be my future, and I made my first piece at the ripe old age of 30, which, perhaps surprisingly, seems to be the usual path. And suddenly I fell hard. I loved the art form, and it loved me back. This in itself isn’t unusual — it was who I was and, I believed, who I was destined to be.

And then one day some years later, I stopped cold turkey and without a thought to the contrary. I don’t remember if this made me sad or happy. I don’t remember loss. The only change I remember was that I was working on some large pieces for a mosaic flower garden, and it was a kick ass project. I loved it. No matter that I had to drive five and a half hours to make the work/play dates — and then make the drive back home three days later. No matter that the roads were filled with big ass trucks barreling south down the interstate. No matter anything, I was in my fifties, in my prime, and it was pure bliss.

And then it happened like this: I was working at home on a piece, and the large center space was filled with beautiful, ethereal circles that pulled you into a distant paradise. My circles were perfect, and I loved them.

They loved me less. My glass grinder began emitting coughing noises. I added more water and solvent and kept working to make every curve perfection. I bought a new head. I spoke to it sweetly.

But the fingers . . . the fingers that had worked with me so well over so many happy decades …. I simply couldn’t control the budding arthritis in my happily toiling hands, and in a short series of hours, they just stopped working in the flawless way they had always worked. I got it done, delivered the piece and then another, but when I finished, I just walked away. I don’t think I’ve ever walked away before. It’s not who I am, and it didn’t feel right.

A few weeks later, I made it back to Virginia to help with the installation, and spent the weekend laughing and working. It was the best of times, but I knew my mosaic days were numbered, and I didn’t like that one little bit. But what do you do? Give up? Push on? Wait for healing? I chose the latter.

Last week I was teaching a class to a great group, and they were doing so well on their own that I walked over, sat down, … and picked up my tools. I picked up my tools for the first time in years. I looked at them with joy for the first time in years.

And then I started using them. No real pain, no backing off, no icky feelings — I just worked without worry or expectations.

And then I worked the next day.

I worked by myself in the studio. And … I had fun. Some very long-lost fun, and though concessions had certainly been made, it felt good. It felt really, really, REALLY good.

And you know, change isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Some times it’s just what we need. And sometimes it opens whole new worlds just when you needed them.

P.S. These pieces were created to fit together with those of other artists in a community project.

Artwork by Pam Goode

Fah Who Rah-Moose 2

/ Pam Goode / 6 Comments
from shloshspot.com


‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house

Every Who down in Whoville was doped up and soused.

They hated the New Year; they grumbled and whined,

“We don’t want a NEW year; this suits us just fine.”

But the clock wouldn’t listen, it groaned and it wheezed,

And it paused not a whit on the cusp of the breeze

That would blow that foul second hand forward and then

Slap the faces of Whos with a pointy-mouthed grin.

Auntie Em hugged her teacup; Vern gripped hard his bottle

Cindi Loo sucked her nipple of mead on full throttle.

While Muffy poured scotch and Big Joe warmed the wassail,

I saw Gramps downing Nyquil to plump up his fossil.

Homer was huffing and Jane rode a bender

While Grams poured tequila and rum in the blender.

They binged and they cringed and they cowered in fear

“We must stop it from coming! We’ll stop it this year!”

But no matter the moonshine, no matter the crack,

Father Time gave the gift that he wouldn’t take back.

He granted them change and a hope for the new,

Whilst snickering snickers, ice cold as a shrew.

It’s a New Year, My Lovelies, You Hortons and Whos,

And you’ll take it and thank me; you don’t get to choose.

So get on with your hopes and your dreams and your wishes,

Cause I’ve got the clock, and you dogs is my bitches.

c. 2011 by Pamela Pardue Goode,
with apologies to Clement C. Moore and eternal gratitude to Dr. Seuss  🙂

On the Wind

/ Pam Goode / 6 Comments

A mother is passing me on the wind,
with the shaping, re-shaping 
of life, of this life, of my life,
of our life, 
in this most fragile fabric of life.

And her whispers hold fast as my worlds careen,
shifting wildly at 20, now 30, now 40 and 
more there than here, and then there, and then here — 
as I age and I wait and I watch for your song, 
as I wait and I watch for you there,
as I age and I wait and I age and I watch, as I age, and still you do not.

And the time that I opened my soul to the waiting,
with winds washing through me,
around me, into me,
with voices and songs of full ten thousand souls 
all rushing to soothe and to shape and to soothe
for this fast-coming onslaught
of loss, always loss,

as I’m filling my mind with the stories and songs 
of love and of life and of change, 
— too much change —
and I knew, of course,

it was here.

A mother is passing me on the wind as she reaches once more for my hand, 
and I know ….
and I know, and I know, and I don’t want to know,
not so soon, not this soon, not this soon,
but I know.

And the ashes fly slowly through peace and through tears 
as she takes to the sea that she loves — 
on the wind, with the wind, kiss the wind as she swirls, 
as she flies her way out to the sea, to the sea,
as she clings to the sea, to the sand, to the the sky, 
and all of heaven between — 
as she sings her hello and goodbye and hello, 

and then one day, hello and hello.

Costa Rica: A Teaser

/ Pam Goode / 14 Comments

When I first made this trip 20+ years ago, we traveled across the Pan Am Highway, her roads broken into car-sized holes that slowed the journey considerably. It didn’t bother me an ounce, because travel teaches us truth. And during every visit since, I’ve watched Costa Rica blossom in so very many beautiful directions. I pray it will always be so.

And now, once again, we’re here! First, we’ll enjoy a beautiful three-hour journey through the countryside. Along the way, we’ll pass small houses with colorful laundry hanging, stalls selling creches and life-size deer figures, and vast fields of sugar cane. The backlit fronds of the cane will compete for our attention with their feathery tufts.

The roads are hilly and winding, with lushly planted homegrown guardrails of Dracena protecting against the steepest drops. Fortunately, traffic is mild. A small white dog trots up the road; a hilltop palm missing most of its fronds arcs leeward in the mist. I spy a rounded tree literally covered with white birds — at least 50 of them — and again, I wonder.

Halfway through the drive, we stop for coffee and the skies open wide for the twenty minute afternoon rain. When we pile back into the van, mist has settled onto the hairpin turns taking us down the mountain, but not enough to obscure the drive of banana, coffee, bougainvillea, citrus trees, dracena, palms, unfamiliar tropical fauna with giant leaves in every shape, blooming brush, and one surprising stand of three-needled pines.

Bridges become more frequent as we cross rocky streams and rivers, each path only one-laned, making a gentle dance of transport vans and the occasional bus or truck. Most of the locals walk, wisely against the traffic but still along the road with neither sidewalk nor shoulder for safety. Small signs advertise local businesses: “Many Meaty Dishes. All Meatless. All Tasty.” The rafters of a porch along the roadside support 20 bunches of bananas hanging by ropes. We pass through several small towns, and as the 5:00 sunset moves in, the people double in number — there is so much walking through the nightfall, and I hope hard that each arrives home safely.

We reach Finca Luna Nueva at what seems like 10 or 11 PM, though it is actually closer to 6:00, and we ascend the gravel just as moonstain moves in, spreading her welcome across the sky.

The lovely ladies of the lodge feed us well — offering chicken with saffron rice, soup, organic spinach, juices and salad from the farm, and I’m fast asleep before 9:00, tucked away in my little cabin with Costa Rican breezes blowing through.

I pray it will always be so.

P.S. Twenty years of visiting Costa Rica regularly, and I’ve never, ever tired of it. Bring it on in January 2024!