Busy Sidewalk, No. 3

Count the helmets in the bucket--one pink and white, one purple, one blue, one black. I also see a cloth cap that is white with a gray lining and a something turquoise that is knitted or crocheted. On the box there is a sticker that reads, "She flies with her own wings," one for Session Lager, one for I Heart Oregon, another of the flies with her own wings, a tiny smiley face, a tiny red apple, a couple of butterflies, two of white dogs in silhouette--maybe a Rottweiler and a Lab, one black and white one of a fox drinking from a steaming cup, another one with the same fox seated at a table with a chicken maybe having coffee together, and several that I cannot make out. Inside the box, the word Bakfiets is engraved at the end closest to the handlebars, and along the outer lower corner near the front wheel I read clevercycles.com. A quick Google tells me this is a WorkCycle--I guess so, peddling along with your children in the box would be work, for sure. There's a bell on the left handlebar and a large chain locking the bike to the bike rack bar. It is parked outside The Children's Gym, a busy place it seems to me because I often see parents and children there after work when I go walking by across the street and on Saturdays like this, too, when I'm heading for the nearby Circuit NE Bouldering Gym to say hello to my two sons who may be there doing their thing. According to the gym's Web site, gymnastics is their main thing, but they also have dance and music classes, plus after-school care and the occasional Parents Night Out. I took this photo on Saturday, March 15, at 12:24 p.m. I suppose the peddling parent went inside to watch his/her children's gym session.



Here's a wide shot of the sidewalk so that you can get an idea of it and the gym and the cars parked along the sidewalk, plus one pedestrian ahead of me.

Sunny Saturday! Been to a lecture and walked around taking photos. About to go out again into the sunshine, just as soon as I get this posted!

Walking from The Circuit Bouldering gym just of NE Sandy at NE 18th, on my way home today at 12:46 p.m. I had stopped for a few minutes to visit with Lamont and Leland who were in there bouldering. Lucky for me, they had a few minutes to stop climbing and visit with their little ol' Mom! Lucky for me also to get this photo of the two buses that I ride home from work--the 12 and the 19. That's my usual stop that the 19 is at--it's named NE Sandy and NE Flanders. The 12 is at the traffic signal at NE Sandy and NE 20th. The multi-browns brick building is the triangular one that houses Halo Salon, on the tip, and right behind it, The Blue Diamond PDX, my practically-perfect-in-every-way neighborhood bar. Depending on whim or weather, I can walk either direction at the tip of that triangle to get to my building--there's a side door if I go right, and there's a front door on the street parallel with NE 20th. Often I go to the front door so that I can get in a few more steps.

Nature's beauty, No. 7

Tensile tenacity. Definitions from Merriam Webster Online: Tensile, relating to the amount that something (such as a wire) can stretch or be stretched without breaking. I amend. Such as a spiderweb. Such as a dew drop. Tenacity, the quality or state of being tenacious. Tenacious, not easily pulled apart--and--tending to adhere or cling to another substance. We all know that we humans have the capacity to shamelessly destroy all that I have photographed. I celebrate those who instead assertively cultivate the opposite, who celebrate nature's beauty so that all who see may hold fast the nurturing of our souls by said beauty.

Thank you to the gardeners at the Albertina Kerr Center in Northeast Portland.

Seen in the neighborhood, rotating sign #2

Click here for a trip to City Daily Photo, transporting you around the world every day.



Gotta love this sign, even if there is no Dairy Ease Lactose Free Milk represented which is the type of milk I am thankful exists. This rotating sign is also within walking distance of where I live. And I can testify that I don't smell milk when I walk by, a good thing in my mind.

Wish I could fix it so that you could smell these roses.

I walked by on my way home and, when I realized just how good these roses smelled, I walked around on the other side of the bushes, got out my camera, and took this photo. Just one of the perks to many Portland neighborhoods--enjoying someone else's roses.

April 11 movement--a pedestrian in my NE Portland neighborhood

Click here for a trip to City Daily Photo, transporting you around the world every day.



April 2 I stopped after I had passed this young woman so that I could take a photo of her as she crossed NE Sandy at NE 20th. Can you guess what first brought her to my attention? Was it the heavy shopping bags? Her jacket that says Devil Woman on back? Her hat? Nope, it was those platform shoes. I used to wear platform shoes, open-toe sling-backs. Never platform boots. Oh, did you notice the home of Oregon Children's Theatre in the background? Or the yellow Mini Cooper?
 

Here's the original photo, for comparison.