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Foreign and Fashionable TalentBy The Fashion Fairy QuailBellMagazine.com Ah, yes, the fabled European boutique, where every piece merits admiring stares and wistful sighs. It's actually less of a fable than many Americans are willing to admit. I once knew a cobblestoned shopping district in a medium-sized French city with dozens of shops. Shopkeepers greeted you the moment they heard you walk through the door. Eager, smiling attendants waited on you until you had found what you wanted. And it seemed that everything they showed you was handsome in some regard, if not perfect. Think the BBC's Are You Being Served? without all the antics. I remember one lingerie shop in this maritime city that interpreted Marie Antoinette's taste for the modern gal: lots of lace, plenty of pearls, bow upon bow, but in racy cuts or in bold blacks and golds or tropical colors. The styles might have seemed un peu démodé to the most fashion-forward Parisians, but, as an American, I found them positively irresistible. At one shop, I discovered a tiered, calico prairie skirt in berry tones with a white tulle petticoat that poked out slightly from the bottom. At another, I stumbled upon a vaguely “African tribal” peasant top in uncharacteristically subdued colors. Was the tribal pattern perhaps an offensive cultural misappropriation especially given France's historical treatment of its African colonies? Maybe. Is it okay not to take yourself so seriously and just put on a top because you like it? Yes., at least in this case because the top was made in France, not Algeria. My whole shopping experience enchanted me. The unique clothes paired with the impeccable service was a combination too hard to find in most shops in the States. Bethesda's Celine de Paris is a welcome exception, self-described as “so reminiscent of a high-end Parisian boutique that you may forget that you are in the heart of Bethesda, Maryland.” But Celine de Paris doesn't only tout beautiful French designers; the shop offers pieces by foreign designers from elsewhere, too. Take Juan Pajuelo, a Peruvian designer, for instance. (If you're raising your eyebrows at the mention of a Peruvian designer, read one of the gazillion pieces about Lima's fashion uprise on the racks and online.) Here are a few of Pajuelo's lovely alpaca pieces: Model: Anastasia Marchenkova
Wardrobe: Juan Pajuelo Alpaca Couture Available at Celine de Paris boutique. CelinedeParis.com Photographed at Celine de Paris boutique, Bethesda, Maryland Photography by Alexander C. Kafka Copyright © 2013 by Alexander C. Kafka; all rights reserved. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Plane Tickets from SantaBy Fay Funk QuailBellMagazine.com Christmas is always pleasant but the actual events are always hazy. I open presents with my family, and we go and see a movie. The years all blend together.
The days before Christmas, however, come back to me easily. One of my fondest Christmas memories is from my freshman year of college. Finals were over and the dorms were closing down for the holidays. My roommates and I were preparing for our last night of the year in our room before we all headed home, to Oregon, Washington, and Colorado. We were hungry, but the dining halls were all closed. So we ordered delivery tacos. We chose tacos because we didn’t have any forks, so we had to get a food we could eat with our hands. It was cold and snowy in New York, and we gave the deliveryman about a 70 percent tip for coming out. Then we sat in a circle on the floor of our room, eating tacos and talking. The next day, we all left for home. I am fortunate to be close enough to my family to spend the holidays with them, but my friends are more far-flung. Some still live in New York, some in Washington D.C., and some live even further away, in countries like Tibet and El Salvador. There is no holiday set aside to go see your friends. Not that there should be necessarily, though it would make getting together easier. Coordinating among people in four different states and three different countries can get complicated. Over the summer my friends and I managed to coordinate a get-together in New York City that felt as important as any holiday. It can only happen about once a year, and we all take time off from our jobs and internships to just hang out. And it will always feel too short. I have never cared very much about getting presents, and for most of my life have never known what to ask for. But for the next few years I know what I want: a round-trip ticket to New York City at some point in the year, when it works for all of my friends and me to be there. I have a Christmas bonus and some funds of my own so I can help out “Santa” (aka my parents) when the time comes to buy the ticket. It seems like a good use of my Christmas resources. Tacos will always seem a bit like a Christmas food to me. It’s a little quirk that makes this time of year more memorable. Cheap delivery tacos are not a food you usually get with your family; it’s food you get with your friends. When the time comes for me to cash in my Christmas present and go back to New York City to see all my friends we will probably get tacos at midnight, and remember our first almost-Christmas together. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Families Mourn at Arlington During the Holidays One of our country's most treasured historic sites during the most poignant time of year.
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Through Sickness and HealthIt was winter, 1986, and I had just arrived as a freshman to UMass, Amherst. Being from Connecticut I was used to the cold, but it was somehow different being far away from my parents. Bundled up in my parka, hat and mittens, I headed to my 9 a.m. anthropology class. The snowflakes fell gently, occasionally landing on and tickling the tip of my nose. I could see my breath as I trekked through what seemed like 4 feet of snow. My toes and finger tips began to tingle quickly so I decided to stop off at the student center’s Blue Wall to grab a latte. The Blue Wall was a campus landmark for lattes. It was the 80’s version of Starbucks. “A small latté with one sugar," I yelled to the barista who had asked for my order. Thankfully the coffee line was not long, but the place was still loud. I guess the snow kept most students inside. I grabbed my latté, paid and hurried out the door. When I got outside of the Blue Wall, my eyes fell upon the most amazing thing—amongst the rows of vendor who typically displayed their art for sale in the student center, sat the most beautiful display of hand knit sweaters. In an array of colors, lengths and styles, I knew immediately which one would complement my collection of clothing back in my dorm room. The vendor caught me assessing her handiwork—the stitches, the pattern she had used, the softness of the yarn. I was in awe of an off-white, mid-length one. “$40”, said a gentle voice, “or your best offer." I smiled at her, reached inside my parka and pulled out my money. I counted $15. I couldn’t possibly offer her this, I thought. I responded, “I will have to come back later, ma'am, I don’t have enough money with me right now. I only have $15." “No problem. It’s yours, please. $15 is fine. I want you to have it." “It will last you years in this Amherst cold and it will always protect you from the elements." I graciously thanked her as I handed her the money. She gently wrapped up the sweater. “Many blessing to you, my dear, and happy holidays," she whispered as she handed the sweater to me. With my new sweater and one sugar latte in hand, I hurried off to class. No longer were my toes and fingers feeling tingly. Later that day when I got back to my dorm room, I unwrapped my sweater and held it up to myself and looked in the mirror. I was very proud of my purchase and excited to wear it. Needless to say, 27 years later I still have the sweater, and on cold wintery days I wear it. It was with me when I turned 21, graduated college, got my first job, and rocked my baby boys in their cribs. It has seen me go through two marriages, and two divorces. It helped me wipe away countless tears as my son graduated high school. It was with me on those days when I had to trek through the snow to get to my cancer treatments. The sweater carries the many memories of my college friends borrowing it, us drinking lattes while laughing and telling jokes at the Blue Wall. When I walked across the stage to receive my MBA, the sweater came with me. The vendor was right about those cold winter day in 1986; the sweater has protected me from the elements and has guided me for 30 years. I often wonder about that vendor and what happened to her. I looked for her when I returned to campus for a reunion, but I did not see her. Wherever she may be, I send her wishes for many blessings, like she had whispered to me in 1986. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
History for Railfans and Future Railfans alike! By Mo Karnage If you have ever taken 14th Street and crossed the Mayo Bridge, heading into Manchester on Richmond's Southside, surely you have noticed the building on your left, with the signs saying 'Richmond Railroad Museum CLOSED.' Well, the museum isn't shut down, although it seems that folks all around Richmond get that impression. In fact, the Richmond Railroad Museum is open on Saturdays from 11-4 and Sundays from 1-4. The brevity in open hours are because the museum is entirely volunteer-run. The museum has existed in the old Southern Railway Passenger Station since 2011, when the Old Dominion Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society moved and expanded into the space. The window of opportunity to visit is small, but the price is right. Admission is free, although donations are welcome, and it is a good idea to bring some money to spend on unique gifts and historical items in their gift shop. The Railroad Museum is a great place to take kids, older folks, history nerds, train nerds, and also, dates! Railfans are people who are railway enthusiasts, and they often go to great lengths to research and learn about a variety of trains. They collect photos and artifacts on trains. Some specialize in certain lines or regions or time periods. What they all share is a passion about trains. At the Richmond railroad Museum, Railfans share their passion and knowledge with anyone who comes in. Who knows, maybe you will catch train fever! One of the first displays that will catch your attention, as soon as you park in their lot, are the train cars set up outside. You can go inside several of the different cars. If you want a guide, one of the volunteers might be available to tell you about the functions of various aspects of the train cars. All the cars have been carefully restored by the ODC.
Inside the museum, there are multiple rooms with displayed artifacts. The largest room is the Freight room, and has artifacts from around 150 years of train history in Richmond. There are items from the six different train companies that used to operate in Richmond. There are old documents and maps as well, which are neat little windows into our past. The Stationmaster's Office is quite charming, set up like it would have been when the station was in use. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Baggin' Some Ho Ho HoOkay, maybe you're not one of Oogie Boogie's “little henchmen.” There are still plenty of other reasons why you might want to catch Santa Claus, such as these: 1. To take all his presents and give the poor kids the best ones; 2. He sketches you out and want to get him psychologically examined; 3. You just HAVE to ask him for fashion advice. Plus many more!
Regardless of your intentions, I'll share a few theories about how to bag yourself a Santy—not that I've ever attempted any of these myself. Here are seven ways: 1. Cover your living room floor in pine tar. Keep it hot and Santa will get stuck. If you're concerned about your hardwood, well, that's your problem. 2. Wait by the chimney with a baseball bat. Do I really have to tell you the next step? Just be sure to have something cold for the big lump on Santa's head. He'll thank you later. After all, it's not like he can beg you for mercy after you've already done the deed. 3. Put a chair on your rooftop and wait for that sucker to fly by. You better make that slingshot EXTRA big, and find some way to haul Santa off the street. 4. Surround your Christmas tree with dragons/gargoyles/other scary, vicious things. In case you were wondering, yes, Santa does faint and he is loud when he falls. Come up with a lie for the neighbors. 5. Hold Rudolph hostage. It's not like Santa has headlights. I'm telling you: Ol' red nose is one valuable Rangifer tarandus. You're not going to find him in the Wal-Mart clearance aisle post-Advent. 6. Lay out a humongous feast. Santa will gorge himself like a goldfish and conk out. Feel free to have your way with him during his food coma. 7. Go to the North Pole with a net, preferably the same kind of net used to catch whales. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
A Different Battle at HomeEleanor Roosevelt is quoted to have said, “Anyone who thinks must think of the next war as they would of suicide.” Think how a person might survive the emotional trauma of partaking in war without not also considering ending their own life. U.S. Navy Capt. Todd Kruder and his wife, Sharon, had a joyous 2012: The couple marked 25 years of marriage, their oldest son was married, and their second son was commissioned into the Marine Corps. But Kruder almost didn’t get the chance to celebrate that year with his family because on three different occasions, he attempted suicide.
"First time I tried, I thought about suicide, I chickened,” Kruder said. “The second time, my son interrupted. So I had to come up with a different way." The different way, he explained, was to over-exercise himself to death. "It was the perfect solution to the problem I had, which was I didn't want the stigma of suicide," Kruder said. Kruder’s over-exercising, together with his 17 hour-a-day job as an executive assistant to a three-star admiral, were taking its toll. It was all part of what Kruder, 47, called his "master plan." But what he didn't expect was his family and friends becoming concerned about his 60-pound weight loss as well as his personality changes. Then, one morning in 2011, Kruder hit rock bottom. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
'I Hate Christmas'Christmas instrumentals crackled from a desktop radio; shriveled poinsettias stood in pots pressed up against the wall. We were hunched over a table littered with print-outs, each gripping our editor's pen with the talons we had formed from day after day of marking run-on sentences, inserting commas, and dashing out les accents aigus and les accents graves. Earlier that morning, we had exchanged gifts—homemade toffee, gourmet gingerbread cookies, odds and ends scraped up from forgotten drawers—but our merriment was momentary. We had an issue to birth and you need multiple midwives to put out a magazine.
About an hour into the eye-bleeding process, one of the editors started tearing up and blurted, “I hate Christmas.” Flatly. Matter of fact. No exclamation. Now it was our responsibility to absorb the information, process it, and, perhaps, cast judgment. Scrooge. Bah, humbug! Who hates Christmas? Everyone loves Cary Grant, not the bishop because that bishop is a real baloney head, abandoning the spirit of Christmas and scheming for a cathedral instead. Meanwhile, Cary Grant waves his hands to add more tinsel to a Douglas fir than it can probably sustain. Think big! That's the Christmas mantra. Go all out! Max out your credit card if need be! You can always pay it off next year! Huzzah! Hot chocolate, candy canes, a fat bird in the oven—Christmas is delicious...if you can afford it and have no qualms about excess. A week prior to her outburst, that same editor had told me that Christmas bothers her because it only reminds her of people “who go without.” These are the people whose Advent is a far cry from the Hollywood interpretation. These folks don't get a Christmas roast because they're lucky if their EBT benefits will last them through the end of the month for a Christmas PB&J. They can't cozy up because they can't pay for heat. They wait outside for the bus in the rain and snow to get to their minimum wage job. That's the same job that probably requires them to work on Christmas Eve and/or Christmas day. Part of me feels the same way as my fellow editor. How can I prance around in my new dress if there are other young women my age who have nothing nice to wear? How can I snuggle up in my new blanket reading my new book and sipping tea from my new mug without even a hint of guilt? Shouldn't I be firing up the grill, agonizing over how I'm going to pay for baby formula as customers insult me? This weekend, I visited Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, a word-class arboretum and botanical garden established by Pierre S. du Pont. Yet as much as I enjoyed the dazzling lights and exotic plants, I also worried about the staff members. They probably wished they could wander the grounds with their families the same as all the tourists. Of course, fretting over strangers doesn't accomplish much, either, not unless you're actually helping them. And “help” is such a subjective word. What's kind? What's demeaning? Sometimes “helping” unintentionally turns into “enabling.” The words “charity” and “whore” both come from the Latin “carus,” which sometimes makes me wonder if we're whoring ourselves out by performing so-called good deeds. Not to be a Negative Nancy. Just some thoughts before you make merry this Christmas. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
This ebook could change a kid's life.Your purchase of The Children of Jackson Ward, a poetry and photography collection by Christine Stoddard and Kristen Rebelo, will go toward the Quail Bell Scholarship for Creative Promise. Learn more about the book and the scholarship here. Happy holidays!
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Saturnalia!December 21st is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year, and the day marking the beginning of Winter. That might be a little hard to believe this year, seeing as how Richmond will have a high temperature of 74 degrees on Saturday. Nonetheless, the 21st is also celebrated by many pagans as the Winter Solstice, and the holiday is called Yule or Saturnalia. Yule pre-dates the Christian celebration of Christmas. The pagan holiday was absorbed into the Christian one, an attempt at converting the pagans. Holiday traditions now associated with Christmas were originally parts of pagan Yule celebrations. The Yule log, mistletoe, cloves in apples and oranges, holly and decorating trees are all part of the Yule celebration.
Traditionally, the Yule log is an Ash log, either from one's own land or a gift from someone else- never bought. The log is ceremoniously decorated and then lit with a piece from the previous year's log. The log was left to burn overnight, and smolder for 12 days before being doused. Modern interpretations of the Yule log include logs that hold candles, and even cakes decorated to resemble logs! Yum! Yule is the shortest day of the year, but the optimists celebrate that the coming of Yule means the return of the sun, and that every proceeding day will be longer and longer! For Wiccans and other pagan sects, Yule is a celebration of the new solar year and the Horned God. Even if you aren't pagan, Yule is an appropriate time to plan for the future, and the year of sunlight to come! Many people over the ages have taken advantage of this longest night of the year to share warm beverages with friends and family around a fire. Happy Yule! The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
A Critique of Mainstream Conceptions of Stein Editor's Note: Claire LeDoyen is Quail Bell's editorial assistant, as well as a young writer from Suffolk, Virginia now studying at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. She recently wrote this paper as a final for one of her classes and, damn it, we're proud. Gertrude Stein’s identity is as hard to pin down as the meanings in her complex and wonderfully original literary works. Through reading biographies, correspondences between family members and friends and accounts of her from both herself and other people, one cannot create a distinctive mold in which to put Stein’s persona. She is depicted in fragments, labeled in one book as childish, in a letter, matronly; some sources say lively and others stoic; famed psychologist William James found her extremely intelligent while some critics feel that Stein was an unoriginal copycat, dawdling in the shadows of big brother Leo Stein. Making assumptions from a biographical lens to rebuild Stein’s personality is an impossible feat, especially since she and virtually anyone who would have met her have passed away. Generalizations about her poetry and prose are worthless, because her words hold such a variety of ingenuity, creativity and playfulness. Her literary work remains a treasure trove of unique and complex experiments in language and identity that gets lost in the constant barrage of criticism based on assumptions of her personality. Throughout sources on Gertrude’s life and work there are almost degrading (and sometimes surprisingly so) stances on her inferiority to the men she called brother and friend: mainly Leo and Pablo Picasso. This pervasive attitude allows for an easy dismissal of her revolutionary and incredibly complicated play with grammar, syntax and structure of literary forms. Perpetuators of Stein’s inferiority have long been swayed by the continual positioning of her under Leo, do not take into account her own conception of what it is to know a person, and forgo in their analysis and criticism Stein’s inclination toward self-mythologizing in her work. In Charmed Circle: Gertrude Stein and Company, James R. Mellow calls Gertrude a “satellite after a superior planet (27).” Susanna Pavloska tells us in Modern Primitives that Gertrude was often “lost” in the glory of Picasso, and is usually represented as an onlooker or stimulating patron1 in the world of Modernist art collection she found herself in the thick of at her and Leo’s Paris salon in their home at 27 rue de Fleures. Irene Gordon’s book about their lives as art collectors, Four Americans in Paris, is written in relation to Leo Stein, though it comes across that its focus on Leo’s primary role in his sister’s life is an attempt to discredit Gertrude. Biographies of Gertrude, the two’s older brother Michael and Michael’s wife Sarah are given in relation to Leo, whom the author calls Stein’s “guide and teacher (16).” The book posits Leo as the ringleader of the siblings’ art collections – “two of the most revolutionary collections of art ever assembled (13)”– through examples of “correspondence, diaries, photographs and papers (14).” However, accounts such as these are easily manipulated to present a prejudiced view of their subject. There is little discussion of what Gertrude had to say about herself in Four Americans. In fact the book raises pertinent questions about how anyone can know or even simply understand who and how an artist was only through texts written about her years ago as the author continually presents Gertrude Stein as what she “comes across as (17)” through letters and others’ accounts. The presentation of Gertrude Stein only on assumptions of how other people interpreted her is sharply one-sided and intrinsically inaccurate, and only further asserts her artificial inferiority.
It can even be proven that Leo’s interpretation of his little sister is not much worth paying attention to when trying to get at the truth of Gertrude Stein. It seems to be widely accepted in the study of Gertrude Stein that her brother Leo, although usually considered an important intellectual aesthete, was flighty in his interests. The subjects of which he had knowledge of were quite vast, but he only ever obtained a shallow understanding of topics of interest to him. He is described as “unteachable,2” yet his understanding of the Modernist movement is assumed to be top-notch. His shallow understanding seemingly applied to his little sister as well. Although famous for being one another’s closest and most constant childhood companion, Leo is quoted in his memoir that “…despite constant companionship throughout our childhood and early youth, in which we talked endlessly about books and people and things, [we] never said a word to each other about our inner life.3” In light of Leo’s shallow knowledge of even Gertrude- her emotions, passions and private life - the descriptions and opinions he held about his little sister lose validity. Thus it is made evident that others’ accounts of the revolutionary writer should not be given so much credit. Not only do these books invalidate Stein by emphasizing Leo’s dominance in texts written by friends and critics, the events that the authors choose to inform their readers of add sway to the impression they give of Gertrude. For example, a few sources tell us about Gertrude’s special study with famous psychologist William James at Radcliffe College and the paper she co-published about their experiments called “Normal Motor Automatism,” and an award she received in grade school for an outstanding essay. However, Janet Hobhouse chooses to illustrate a childhood scene in the lives of the Stein siblings that shows Leo’s intellectual dominance. The two write “masterful pastiches” of Elizabethan plays, but Hobhouse focuses on Leo’s finished pastiche of a Marlowe play and the Shakespearean history that the younger Gertrude left unfinished4. Ultimately, this event is totally arbitrary, and should not be considered any indicator of Gertrude’s inferiority, even though it is positioned as such. Hobhouse does not include analysis of the small but meaningful two-year age gap between Gertrude and Leo, nor does she think about the plays that each Stein kid took on. There is no mention of the accessibility and humor of Christopher Marlowe’s work especially in comparison to the Shakespearean verse and dense subject matter of any one of the Bard’s histories. This may seem a picky critique, but such subtle assertions of the superiority of the female artist’s male comrades are some of the most dangerous enemies in the accurate presentation of women artists. Probably the most interesting problem in the study of Gertrude Stein is her penchant for self-myth and the tricky way she talks about herself in her writing. The beginning pages of Selected Writings of Gertrude Stein demonstrate this right off the bat. In the preface A Message from Gertrude Stein, the very first words are “I always wanted to be historical, from almost a baby on, I felt that way about it…5” This personal admittance sets the right tone for the way analyses of Stein should be taken on. In Vechten’s General Introduction to the collection, the first topic he discusses is “Steinese,” “the peculiar literary idiom invented by Gertrude Stein around 1910 and made familiar to a large American public by her admirers and non-admirers alike.” In this compilation of Stein’s work, the reader vaguely curious enough to read the intriguing Message and General Introduction is immediately prepared to encounter a writer talented in the performance of self-identity. Just like Stein herself, her distinctive “repetitive, illogical” and “sparsely punctuated” style was and remains a “scandal and a delight. 6” The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Far-flung Fantasies on These Long Winter DaysBy Quail Bell Camera Eye QuailBellMagazine.com A sunny May day in Duck, North Carolina. Don't you wish you could travel back in time to this moment? (Sorry, Dr. Who fans—not possible.) Instead, you have to pile on the layers.
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The Jefferson Hotel Reveals Santa's Big Secret I know the big issue right now is Fox news vehemently claiming Santa is white. Shawn Everett Jones wrote about the 'black Santa debate' for his recent essay on Quail Bell. But no one is talking about another Santa scandal that has been ongoing: the merry man's cookie addiction. A visit to the Jefferson Hotel in Richmond, Virginia to check out their annual holiday decorations ended up revealing Santa's secret (or not-so-secret) addiction: As you may know, traditionally, American families leave a plate of cookies and a glass of milk out for Santa on Christmas Eve. It's always seemed like a nice gesture, nothing more.
Well, if you check out Santa's sleigh, which they have on display at the Jefferson Hotel, you will see why it is VITAL to keep Santa sated on plates of cookies. Santa's sleigh is made out of gingerbread cookies and candy! Specifically, 350 pounds of gingerbread cookies and 400 pounds of frosting. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Rub Your Palms Together and Drink that Cocoa Editor's Note: People have been heating with wood well before the inventions of electricity, nuclear power, the mining of coal, or extraction of oil and propane gases. There is something instinctively comforting about sitting around a wood fire, something primal about staring into the flame. And something more wholesome about the process of procuring wood than other heat sources which involve radioactive waste or fracking. While wood emissions are an area of concern, wood remains an accessible, affordable, local resource for people trying to save money and stay warm. There are efforts being made to bring ye olde wood burning stove/boiler into the modern age, making best of the old technology. WASHINGTON—Bill Traver has sold wood stoves to customers in Maryland, Pennsylvania and West Virginia from his small shop in Hedgesville, W. Va., for nearly three decades, but over the past few years, he’s seen an increase in sales. “It’s because people are finally getting away from gas and oil,” Traver said. “Because they can’t afford it.”
Traver’s store isn’t an exception. According to U.S. Census data, the use of wood heat in Maryland grew by 33 percent from 2000 to 2010. Much of that increase is due to the market - the recent economic downturn, combined with increased prices for oil and propane, has led to many customers switching to wood stoves and boilers for heat. But as wood heating has grown, concerns over its emissions have grown, as well - so much, in fact, that in October, Maryland and six other states, along with the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency, sued the Environmental Protection Agency over certain high-emission wood boilers. Wood-fired boilers are different from wood stoves, which heat wood inside the home. Boilers operate outside a home, using combustion to heat up water, which runs through pipes into the home to heat it. But the trouble with older boilers and wood stoves comes from the soot, smoke and small particles they emit. In 1988, the Environmental Protection Agency placed regulations on stationary wood-burning devices like new wood stoves. Currently, those rules require catalytic stoves, which use a device to start combustion at lower temperatures, to emit less than 4.1 grams of particulates. Non-catalytic stoves must emit less than 7.5 grams. Wood boilers, however, were exempted from the rules. That’s made it so even though cleaner boilers are available, the older, dirtier versions are still sold and used across the country. Jonathan Kays, a natural resource extension specialist with the University of Maryland, said that even with the concerns over boilers, wood heat can still be a clean, cheap option, especially if residents in rural areas use newer, cleaner wood stoves. “You know, renewable energy is focused on solar and wind and geothermal, but to take advantage of those, you have to have $20-or-$30,000,” Kays said. “But the average person could buy a wood stove for $2-or-$3,000 and could cut their heating bills in half or more. And that’s what’s happened. The wood is cheap.” The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Embraceable YouBy Christine Stoddard QuailBellMagazine.com Leah and David are long-time sweethearts who started dating Leah's senior year of high school in Newport News. For the past three years, they've made Richmond's Shockoe Bottom—the historic haven of edgy bars and restaurants we just can't talk about enough—their home. So it made sense to photograph the couple near their apartment and by some of their favorite haunts, including River City Diner and The Halligan Bar & Grill. For the shoot, Leah chose a stunning, timeless look with a scarlet dress, pearly baubles, black hose, and silver heels. David also opted for classic style and went with a handsome tailored suit and wine-colored tie. Leah and David will be wed at Shockoe's Main Street Station, a beautiful city landmark that originally opened in 1901, on January 4, 2014. See The Quail Bell Crew's fiancée shoot with Leah and the accompanying love poem here. The all-woman Quail Bell Crew styles and shoots engagement and wedding portraits for couples of all colors, sizes, religions, and orientations in Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. We seek to be respectful and inclusive as we work with couples to represent them however they believe best captures their love story. Please visit the Quail Bell Press & Productions website for more information and 'like' Quail Bell Weddings on Facebook.
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A Christmas Bummer I heard a snippet on the radio yesterday morning, something to the tune of this: A teacher said to a young black student, who was dressed up for a school holiday party, “Santa Claus isn't black." It hurt my heart. A kid can't even enjoy some holiday cheer in this world because of some ass turd parading as a teacher. I want to ask this teacher how tall Santa is. Ya know? Like exactly how tall is that motherfucker? If you know that he is white, then you must know how tall he is. I'm sure the teacher would not know, would be totallly stumped. Why? Because Santa is a fucking figment of the imagination. Santa is a mythological being. And as most mythological beings, Santa's form changes depending on many factors. These factors include race, nationality, country of origin, and so on. One such so on includes different artists renditions of Santa. I don't know, take your average mall Santa and compare him to say, the Santa in the animated Rudolph Christmas special. Well, they are both about as Santa as it gets. Yet they are completely different. One is like your uncle dressed up as Santa and one is a clay creation. Ok, not fair, let's take the Nightmare Before Christmas Santa then. Let's compare him to the Rudolf Santa. Again, they are similar and, at the same time, they are very different even though they are both animated clay figures. At the end of the day, though, they are both Santa as fuck.
Ok, ok. You know the Santa Claus hat at Spencer's. The black Santa hat. It is still a Santa hat. When anyone sees it, the immediate association is it's a Santa hat because it is a Santa hat. It doesn't matter the race of the hat. If a black man wears a black Santa hat, he is Santa. And so, I guess now I should say that I don't celebrate Christmas. I do respect anyone's way of celebrating any holiday that is sacred to them. I appreciate Christmas because most of the traditions of the holiday come from ancient pagan traditions. The lighted trees, the green wreaths, and Santa, all go way back in history. The trees and the wreaths have nothing to do with Christ. They were a symbol of green plant life to comfort us in the winter. At the Yule season, these plants were brought into homes to represent the promise of nature. The shortest day of the year, the Winter Solstice, is the beginning of the return of the sun and then the spring and then the summer. Santa comes from the wild shaman, St. Nick, who would roam in the snowy forrest tripping balls on mushrooms and hanging out with deer. What he has to do with the contemporary Christmas holiday is unfathomable. But alas, as with the renditions throughout time, the interpretations change. I mean, Santa is as realistic as white Jesus. Santa is as realistic as black Jesus. Sant is as realistic as pudgy Buddha. Santa is as realistic as skinny Buddha. It is all make-believe. The reality is scary. Always is. That some white ass know-it-all tries to claim it, wants to have Santa all to himself, wants everything cut and dried, easy-bake, ready-made, drive-thru, consumerism, Wal-Mart, gas-gussling, Black Friday, White Santa, fuck you and yours, love me and mine, haha, ho-ho, to the funny farm, where life is wonderful everyday. How about we as humans stop hiding behind religions and traditions and customs and really work to make life wonderful everyday for all? Guess that's just my Christmas wish. Let's hope I've been a good boy. And may the young Santa kid be merry and may Krampus take that crappy teacher away. Happy Holidays Anyways, Shawn The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Hanover County, Let Me Give You a Personal Tour I grew up in Hanover County, about 25 miles north of the City of Richmond. You can drive north on Route 301 from Richmond, and you will end up at the crossroads of Rt. 301 and Rt. 54. The intersection is less than a mile from the house I grew up in. There are other areas of Hanover County that are more built up, have shopping centers and subdivisions. But this little area, Hanover Courthouse, will always be the one I call home.
The Houndstooth Cafe is sitting right there, in it's simple white building. But it's everyone's favorite place to go for hushpuppies. My mom used to be a waitress there, and when I was a kid sometimes my dad would bring us in for dinner while she was working. The owner, Bob Cunningham, died working on one of the old cars he loves. But his wife Connie carries on the traditions of the Houndstooth. St. Paul's Episcopal Church also sits at that intersection. I went there for Sunday School, pancake and spaghetti suppers, and all kinds of social activities growing up. I remember one year I was serving spaghetti plates and I spilt one on someone's lap because the noodles just slid right off the styrofoam plate. And I remember the Halloween parties they held every year before the kids went trick or treating. I went as Wednesday Addams when I was 8 or 9 years old. One time, there was a haunted house in the church basement, and they had peeled grapes in a bowl to feel like eyeballs. Outside, where you'd always go with your lemonade and cookies after a service, were wooden playground my daddy built. I think those were replaced a few years back. The Church has a cemetery behind it, which faces the intersection. Mr. Wingfield always used to say that if they widened the road anymore, you'd start to see people's feet sticking out from the bank of the cemetery. At the flat T part of the intersection is a little green antique store called Two Frogs On a Bike. I learned about bartering there, when I negotiated to buy a little gold jewelry box that I still have. My dad bought an old pinball machine there once, which was a lot of fun, but the fuses kept blowing. Now it's gathering dust in his shed like a lot of other things. If you head north from there, towards the Fire Station where my dad used to volunteer when I was a kid, you'll pass Kelley's Country Store on your left. You better stop in. Billy Kelley was a sweet man, who loved his family, antiques, and funny animals like emus. He would always give out a whole full size candybar to trick or treaters on Halloween. And no matter how many piercings or tattoos I came back with, or how infrequently I came back, Mr. Kelley would always greet me politely, as Moriah. Mr. Kelley died a few years back, and his wife, Catherine, still runs the store. Go buy some old glass bottle sodas and dot candy. When you see the Fire Station, don't get confused. That's all new stuff. There is a little yellow building back behind the new white one. That's where my dad used to volunteer. He was buddies with the other firefighters. Every year, the Fire Company gets someone to dress up as Santa, and they drive down the streets of Hanover Courthouse in a firetruck, and Santa sits up top, and throws candy out to all the kids who run to the ends of their driveways. It was always a huge thrill, that night in December when you'd hear the sirens, and think there was a fire, then remember. Inevitably, running down the gravel in bare feet, not dressed warmly enough for the December chill, all to sweep up pieces of hard candy thrown down to you. I also remember, how one time, my dad was burning trash in a barrell, like we always do, but the bottom of the burn barrel was all rusted out, and the fire escaped and caught the tall grass on fire. The fire was headed towards our chicken coop and stable, and my little brother and mom and dad and I were trying to hit the fire with shovels to put it out. My mom called the fire department, but gave them the wrong address, and I had to jump up and down at the end of the driveway waving my arms to flag down the firetrucks. They figured it out eventually, but we had the fire out by then. I'm pretty sure my dad's buddies gave him shit for that one. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Feeling Overeducated and HelplessI work as a secretary for a small book publishing company. I love it. We publish children’s books focusing on the natural world. The artwork in our books is beautiful, and the stories are intelligent and interesting. I feel incredibly lucky to have a job in a creative industry, even if it is administrative. Yet it’s a far cry from what I was originally going to do. I was going to work in politics.
In college I majored in Political Science. While I never wanted to run for office, I did want to be involved in policy. I thought I could work as an aide, a pollster, a lobbyist, a lawyer, or something along those lines. But it turns out, that’s not the path for me. Unlike with my other interests, the more I learned about politics the less I interested I became. About three years into school, I knew it wasn’t for me. Because of my degree, I know how much I don’t know about politics. That’s the biggest lesson I have learned. And it’s not uncommon in any field. The more I learn about music or literature the more I realize how little I know about it, really. But that was far more frustrating in political science than anywhere else. The broken parts of our system are, theoretically, fixable. They are rules made by humans, and can be changed by humans. And yet, we don’t change them. At first, my political science classes were interesting. Still frustrating, but interesting. I learned, for example, that the United States has a winner-takes-all voting system for Congress. This system creates a difficult environment for third parties, which is why we favor a two party system. Countries with a viable multi-party system usually have proportional representation, where seats are awarded proportionally to the vote. Would it be possible to change the voting system in the United States to allow for more diverse representation and new political perspectives? Theoretically, yes, of course. But the gatekeepers on that type of change are the two parties, and they are not about to enact a change that does not benefit them. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
The Hottest Newsman in TownThere was a time when Walter Cronkite, the famous and influential CBS anchorman of the 1960s and 1970s, was touted as the “most trusted man in America.” His reports influenced everyone from the American public to presidents. Today, according to an opinion poll from Reader’s Digest, the most trusted man in America is Tom Hanks. The closest news anchor: Robin Roberts of “Good Morning America” at No. 12. The hottest anchor going is not even real. Ron Burgundy – Will Ferrell’s legendary newsman from the film “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” – and his trademark mustache are everywhere you look. He has made appearances on live television news and is being featured prominently in his own exhibit at the Newseum in Washington. Is the Anchorman museum exhibit confirmation that the halcyon days of the anchor are relics of the past, or is it a spark that could reignite interest in journalism? Do kids today dream of being the next Brian Williams or Megyn Kelly when they grow up? Jonathan Thompson, manager of media relations at the Newseum, said he sees children and teens every day get excited to step up in front of the green screen and read a newscast at one of the museum’s interactive exhibits. “Kids these days grew up in front of cameras,” Thompson said. “It’s on every cellphone that they own, so they seem to be naturally more comfortable with being in front of the lights. It’s something we see here all the time.” One of the Newseum’s younger patrons, seventh-grader Ben Smith of Mayfield Woods Middle School in Elkridge, said he either wants to be a cop or a newsperson when he grows up. “So I can be on TV. I want to be on TV,” Smith said. Even as a junior high school student, Smith understands the rush of a scoop and the thrill of breaking a news story. “I can tell people, like, if I only know about it and it’s not out yet,” Smith said. “If it’s a storm I can tell them about that and then everybody else would know about it.” Smith has a long way to go before choosing a college major, but Olive Reid, associate dean at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland, said that enrollment in journalism is still alive and well. “The numbers are smaller but it’s still competitive,” Reid said. “The intensity of interest is just as great if not greater than before. The interest is incredibly strong.” The 2012 Annual Survey of Journalism and Mass Communication Enrollments, published by the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communications, reported that enrollment in journalism programs has declined for the second year in a row, but only marginally. The 485 programs that participated in the survey reported 212,488 students enrolled in the fall of 2012 compared to the 218,751 students in 491 journalism and mass communications programs in 2011. However, this decline could be attributed to the smaller number of journalism programs participating in the survey. Tim Bajkiewicz, head of electronic media for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication and associate professor of broadcast journalism at Virginia Commonwealth University, said the spring semester journalism classes are bigger than they’ve ever been. “Broadcast news has done almost too good of a job making it look easy,” Bajkiewicz said. “To report news, to get interviews and then look together while talking about it on television takes a lot of skill and effort.” The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
Ancient Village in the Great LakesCahokia - Monk's Mound submitted by bat400 Ancient City in Madison and St. Clair Counties, Illinois--Time to drool over another place you'll definitely want to visit. A few miles west of Collinsville are the remains of a Mississippian city now called Cahokia. The site was inhabited between 700-1400 A.D., with its peak being around 1050-1200 A.D. The city is famous for its 120 plus mounds constructed and enlarged on several occasions during the city’s habitation. At its most populous Cahokia is believed to have had as many as 10000-20000 people living there and its central area covered six square miles. In addition to the mounds, a bastioned stockade around a central mound and plaza area, and the remains of rows of houses and other plazas have been found. The site has produced many finds, including copper items, fine pottery, and carved tablets of stone. Burials of individuals with funeral goods and human sacrifices support the concept of a society focused on individual leaders or hierarchical lineages. Some researchers (including Timothy Pauketat, Joeseph Galloy, Thomas Emerson, and John Kelly) believe that Cahokia, along with two other Mound Centers, the East Saint Louis" and Saint Louis Mound groups, were joined and served as a central ceremonial and administrative center to a much larger area of smaller settlements, farmsteads, and craft centers, In others words, they functioned as a city, producing an influx of peoples of multiple ethnic and language groups, spurring trade, and having a large influence on religious and technological culture up and down the Mississippi River and its regional watershed. Other researches (whom Galloy refers to as "minimalists') concede the size of each center, but doubt that the society was as complex as to be considered as as a city. What happened to Cahokia’s inhabitants is not completely understood, but archaeology seems to point in the direction of a decline in the population starting in the 1200s, leading to it being abandoned by 1400 A.D. The name ‘Cahokia’, comes from a tribe who inhabited the surrounding area some 200 years after the city was abandoned. Cahokia - Kunnemann Group submitted by durhamnature. Excavation of Kunnemann Mound, one of 6-11, from "Cahokia Mounds" via Archive.org See individual site listings for major structures within the Cahokia complex, including Monk's Mound and Woodhenge. For more, see the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site, and the National Park Service's World Heritage Sites. ***This post originally ran on The Megalithic Portal and appears here with permission.***
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Dormant Trees, Dead Bodies, Living SoulsBy Vault Photographer QuailBellMagazine.com A view of Arlington National Cemetery, c. November 2012 (if the Canon date is correct)
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My true love gave me a quail, not a partridgeBy The Quail Bell Crew QuailBellMagazine.com Illustration: Laura Bramble Dear fledglings,
Whatever you celebrate (or don't celebrate), we hope your holiday season is full of all the good stuff: true friends, loving family, nutritious food, proper clothes, a warm home, and a sense of purpose (and a sense of humor.) We also hope you have the chance to soak in some awesome art and history this time of year, whether it means popping into a gallery or making a Victorian-style wreath at a house museum as you down your favorite local cider. And don't forget about your neighbors! Sit down and exchange ghost stories. Help each other fix inventive meals or watch kids and pets—in costume, why not? Be kind and be merry! Feathery hugs, The Quail Bell Crew The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
A Herstory Told in 'ZinesAt the recent Montreal Anarchist Bookfair, where another (better) world of incredibly inspiring, provocative and boundary-pushing art and media is on display each year, I stumbled upon Eloisa Aquino and her wares—a series of zines on awesome butch dykes, appropriately called The Life and Times of Butch Dykes. The teeny books are what every great zine should be, for me: oozing with the love and devotion the creator, as well as political, punchy, fun, informative, and accessible. It’s a fantastic series—eight and counting—that brings to life the lives of important butch dykes from herstory. Soon after the Bookfair I had a chance to ask Aquino a few questions about her fantastically miniature and worldly project. (Interview and free zine sample after the jump.) Art Threat: How/why did you come up with this idea to (a) focus on butch dykes and (b) use the format of art and text in fanzines? Eloisa Aquino: Zines are easy and fast to make, and they are very satisfying for scratching a creative itch. When you’re done, you’re left with multiple art objects that you can distribute yourself for cheap. I always made zines, on and off, mostly collaborative zines of fiction and poetry. But I wanted to explore the idea of a non-fiction zine, and biographies seemed like a good challenge: how to tell someone’s life history in eight panels and eight pages of short text? This idea of synthesis was very appealing to me. I thought of butch dykes because at the time I was very much into identity politics, and few identities are as challenged in so many fronts as the identity of the butch dyke. The booklets are really beautiful, informative and intriguing. My only wish is that they were longer. Do you plan on doing longer ones or maybe a longer format book combining multiple herstories? Thanks! I actually would love to write a couple more and having someone else publishing all of them together as a small book. And in French, too! I am also planning on starting a graphic novel now that will be longer, but it’ll be fictional. The combination of capitalism and patriarchy with a good dose of heteronormativity keep these kinds of amazing figures from reaching the public sphere in a meaningful way. Can you talk about the role of art (and the artist) in correcting this ongoing problem? That’s the million-dollar question, innit. Can you make art that changes people’s minds? I honestly doubt it. People will continue making political art, though, not so much to change minds but to nurture other people who already think like themselves, and that is sufficient and necessary. I grew up in a dictatorship (Brazil in the 1970's and 80's) and the huge amount of political art being made at the time kept the flame of hope alive for many people – especially the political songs. But can you get marginalized figures better known publishing a zine with a run of 100 copies? Of course not. Most people who read/buy my zines already know many of these women. So in terms of correcting any problem, particularly a political problem, I tend to think that art is very inefficient. But it is efficient in maintaining or fuelling a sentiment that’s already there, in reducing the feelings of apathy or isolation, and in inspiring more art to happen. The Breadcrumbs widget will appear here on the published site.
East of the Virginia Capitol BuildingBy Quail Bell Camera Eye QuailBellMagazine.com Saunter through Shockoe Bottom and you're likely to twist your ankle on some cobblestone—but that's also what we love about it. #exploreRVA
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Celebrate Xmas with TJBy Starling Root QuailBellMagazine.com You're just a few minutes shy of witnessing the first of two traditional candle making demonstrations at Thomas Jefferson's holiday home and private retreat, Poplar Forest, in Forest, Virginia. The second one starts at 2 p.m. and the last tour of the day at 4 p.m. What's the deal? The historic joint's Holiday Open House takes place today. Admission's free today as long as you bring a donation of a non-perishable food item for Lynchburg's Daily Bread or Bedford Humane Society. So what are you waiting for? Grab a can and hop into the car! It's time to geek out and get some Christmas cheer!
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