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Show WedflriursFrl, July 31 -August 2, 2002 A-14 SUNDAY IN THE PARK By Teri Orr The Park Record Discover Classifieds! Do something different this summer Ibr kids under 12 years old. Buy Sell . Trade With Classified Advertising. Take out a four line ad for 4 issues for free! Fill out this form and cither mail it to The Park Record, P.O. Bat 3688 Park City, UT 84060. Or you may bring it into the Park Record Office, located at 1670 Bonanza Drive. I I Address '' ' . . . . . ,. .. . - ' . .... ... "W-ia.-..i..l-.;' " 0 It member Kids; 2o Words Maximumi Just for a moment... My skills as an amateur ornithologist are flawed. All I knew is that suddenly I had two, maybe three dozen new, small birds gorging at the front yard feeders. Tiny birds, speckled birds, not caring car-ing about me getting close to them. Late to flee the ledge when I came up to do, what has become recently, recent-ly, my daily refill of each feeder. They avoided the long, skinny, thistle feeder under the pine tree so I was fairly certain these were not the familiar finches. It wasn't until this weekend I learned from a friend, who is approaching 80, that the tiny birds I could not name were, in fact, simply baby robins. So this weekend, when my baby granddaughter came for a visit, I had a great time walking her around to the feeders where the birds, just her size, stayed put and fluttered a bit for her entertainment. Izabcl chatted right back in her stream of "Da-da mama ma-ma chortle snort ooooooh that I interpreted inter-preted to mean "thank you for showing me these exciting creatures up close, I appreciate your desire even at this very young age, to educate me to the nuances of nature." Her dad -- my son -- said it was time to get in the car if we were coins to hike at all before it was time to feed Izzie again. So we drove up to the trailhead at the base of the mountain, behind the condos at Thaynes to be more locally exact, and we hit the trail. Randy had loaded Izzie up in a very fancy baby backpack, slathered her in sunscreen and threw on a funky baby camp hat. And we were off. Mom Liz led the way, Randy followed fol-lowed and I brought up the rear. This allowed me to walk along side Izzie and watch her amazement at, well, everything. It was a busy day on the Spiro trail. Other kids and dogs and bikers and joggers were up and down in a steady stream. And then there were moments when there wasnt another human sound. The crickets chirped, the birds tweeted and the aspens whispered to each other. And then CRASH, SNAP, WHIRL. Right through the trees flew a baby deer we had disturbed somehow with our chatter. It moved so fast we weren't able to explain the significance signifi-cance of the noise to Izzie. She cooed just the same. There were wildflowers in red and yellow and purple. And butterflies that would flutter by and make her smile. Our hike down the trail took half as long as the walk up. We were all covered with red dust and hungry hun-gry so we headed over to the best thing to happen to eating, indoors or out, in Park City in years Windy Ridge. We have come in the past nine months to judge restaurants not solely by their award-winning, innovative cuisine but also by their level of being baby friendly. At Windy Ridge, the waiters understood the side order of just pickles. They brought a tiny bowl overflowing over-flowing with sliced long, skinny dills. Just right to grab and wave and occasionally suck on. For the baby, mind you. On their way past our corner table, the waiters would stop and bend down to her height and make eye contact and chatter with her. I was It's more than humbling to try... to see the 'world through those infant eyes. Where every day, you are so busy learning and testing and being rewarded for being curious that you just can't wait to wake up and get started all over again. " Teri Orr rather taken aback. These are young waiters, college-age college-age guys who appeared genuinely smitten by the baby. She is beautiful and engaging and stylishly attired in a lime green short set that featured a froggy frog-gy appliqued to the front of her shirt. All in all, pretty pret-ty hard to resist. After lunch we paid a surprise visit to Izzie s great-godmother great-godmother -- if there is such a term. Izzie charmed her with her ability to roll across the room all the while gurgling and snorting little sounds that we all find endearing. She has reached the pull-herself-up-on-the-table stage, always a crowd pleaser and being resourceful we discovered that drink coasters proved just as fascinating a toy to her as they had been to her father, lo those 30 years ago. When her great-godmother scooped her up on her lap and began whistling at her, Izzie became perplexed. Her tiny face was fixed and intent. She wasn't about to cry but she wasnt about to laugh either. We think she was studying just how to form her own lips and blow to make that breezy sound on her own. When it came time for Izzie and her parents to leave she was drooping her head with a thumb stuck firmly into her mouth. I kissed her forehead and whispered a secret grandma message so she doesn't forget me during the next week. Every day her world is filled with new sounds, sights, tastes and people. While she is busy on her discovery-filled days it would be easy to forget a person she sees infrequently. So a little whispered reminder seemed better than a tearful goodbye. OK, I admit she only lives in Salt Lake City and I am blessed that we all like each other well enough to see each other most weekends. There are plenty of my friends who have grandchildren in states far away and rarely have visits. But the change at this age from week to week is enormous and yes, I need to reintroduce reintro-duce myself at this stage and be tested again to see if I am recognized and if that merits a smile or a frown. And it's more than humbling to try for only a moment to see the world through those infant eyes. Where every day, you are so busy learning and testing test-ing and being rewarded for being curious that you just can't wait to wake up and get started all over again. That your body is surprising you in its strength and flexibility and how most anything you do makes those around you smile. At the feeder tonight all the baby robins were a-chatter. a-chatter. Catching up, no doubt on their adventures of the day. They were dining al fresco again and testing their wings while fluttering from branch to branch. Up on the peak of the roof of my house a red-breasted robin sat tall, watching us. Singing a little song that sounded a bit melancholy or did I imagine that? Babies are only babies for so short a time. All living creatures seem to understand that. At least the robin and I did this Sunday in the Park... Teri Orr is a former editor oThe Park Record and director of the Park City Performing Arts Center. - CORE SAMPLES Articulated art The Park City Art Festival was a little less artsy and a lot more festival back in the day. Oftentimes, the jury that decided which artists would be allowed to enter their works was the one that held forth at the Coalville Courthouse rather than the one at the Kimball Art Center. And I don't bring this up solely because "O.D. McGee's Key Klips" were always big sellers. We were all fugitives of some fashion back then the waning days of the Nixon and Ford administrations being what they were, and all. The arts, and the humanities in general, were viewed by the prevailing mind-set as second-degree felonies. Ah, the more things change. Why, up on the high end of Main Street it wasnt unheard of for a self-decreed artiste to set out a sack-full sack-full of Newfoundland droppings for the collective appraisal. It was the cusp of Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art. Those were the days when "the eye of the beholder", was brought to the table. You never left home without it. "Recycling" had taken up full residency in the vernacular of the then- current hipness, and the inorganic key clips --fashioned --fashioned from clothes hangers and the organic droppings mostly processed Alpo residue - were but two examples of its use in art. A bit further down the street, a trained eye could spot a blown-up-and-framed photo of said "Newf" amid other hhhimmmimbmm artsy images of Park City and its environs. And a trained ear could spend a few moments with the photographer as he expounded acoustic Dylan and such with his guitar and mouth harp. Multi-tasking is nothing new. What crowd there was never really got in the way. "Mosey" was the transportation mode of choice and, in fact, if memory serves, they actually gave mosey lessons at the Alamo, or was it the Elks Lodge, back then. It was more popular than the two-step. Since you knew just about every art vendor on the street, you would often end up booth sitting while your friend went off for a bit of refreshment or something. There were times when they would forget for-get their way back, or so it seemed. It wasnt unheard of, as a form of punishment for habitual tardiness, to cut other friends super deals on the artwork. If, upon their return, the artists had any questions, .fyoa would just play dumb. That was an art form in itself What are you talking about? You mean that that handwritten number is a "9" and not a "1?" As the hours passed I guess my eyes just got tired. Imagine my embarrassment." I dont know that there was ever an event in town during the past 30 years or so that didnt feature some involvement by the Park City Rugby Football Club. That is, an event that was worthy of my con- By Jay Meehan ft K tinued attention. Historically, the Muckers were the glue one sniffed in order to truly experience the essence of the community. And Mucker involvement with the Arts Festival took place most prominently, in the form of a beer garden. They would jump through the festival vendor hoop and the City Council alcohol sales hoop and, generally, great art would come out on the other end. Not having much of an arts budget, my involvement usually came in the form of a couple of quaffs and a Mucker T-shirt. My house has always been cluttered with such art. In those days, most every saloon was a locals' haunt, so when the constant mosey became overwhelming, over-whelming, one could always discuss art while kicking back for a spell with the peer group. If your plan of attack was to descend Main Street on the one side and ascend it on the other, then the bar at the Utah Coal and Lumber was the perfect halfway stop. Red-Eyes-Bleeding-in-the-Rain and Handlebar Phil were the barkeeps and they were always more than happy to use whatever artwork you naa purcnasea as an ashtray or to wipe up spilled beer. Most of the Art Festival spirit they had acquired over the years they served, surreptitiously, in shot glasses. Later on, a few of us Heber types would show up early and erect the KPCW MiMMn fundraiser and information infor-mation booth. This was well before there was an actual station to listen to or anything, but we were a spirited lot. The booth was more of a mountain man shelter with a pine bough roof and a few assorted antlers strung about. It was, well, art. They always gave us a great location, usually adjacent adja-cent to the "Keg Toss" site. The Keg Toss would usually usu-ally be the finale to the festival and take place early Sunday evening. This ahead-of-the-curve X-Game rewarded the tossing of an empty beer keg further than your equally inebriated buddy. The fundraising aspect was minimal at best and consisted of little more than the bounty of your, small-scale bake sale. Some rough-hewn paraphernalia parapher-nalia might also have been on the auction block but, suffice to say, KPCW didnt have much overhead at the time. That was the era of cheap Scotch. So here we are again. Art Festival weekend in the mountains. It's a much different slice of pottery, these days. The Mucker beer garden, I believe, is a thing of the past, as are the Key Klips, the Coal and Lumber, and the Keg Toss. How is an art aficionado supposed to have a good time around here anyway? We just need to stay the course, to stay focused. I'm sure it is there for the taking. Since you knew just about every art vendor on the street, you would often end up booth sitting while your friend went off for a bit of refreshment or something. some-thing. There were times when they would forget their way back, or so it seemed. " Jay Meehan POOR |
