A Bedtime Story for Valentine's Day
Saturday, February 14, 2026
When we
arrived to Vancouver from Mexico City in 1975, I believe I may have gone to
Wreck Beach where I photographed some sand ripples. I made a Valentine’s card
and gave it to Rosemary,
Today is
Valentine’s Day and Rosemary stares at me from her portrait on the wall
opposite of my bed. I just cannot help myself and I have to stare back.
Because I am
really an English speaking Latino I am a tad romantic. Rosemary and I did lots
of stuff together where we explored our romantic involvement with each other
and celebrated many a time with active shenanigans in bed.
One occasion
I remember well is that we commemorated one of our wedding anniversaries at the
Granville Island Hotel. We first saw the film An Officer and a Gentleman. I had
called the hotel to tell them to have an ice bucket with a bottle of good
champagne in our room. It is most difficult for me to forget that were unable
to turn off the ice making machine of our room refrigerator and we had a
sleepless night with next to no shenanigans.
In our home
all the plants (first in Kerrisdale) and now in Kitsilano are reminders of our gardening relationship. I must admit that
before Rosemary told me how to be a garden snob I would buy those silly
(without scent) red roses for Valentine’s Day. But I did buy her Belgian
chocolates (my faves they were).
Now with her
gone I often open my room closet and look at her shoes all in a row. From the
very beginning of our 52-year relationship I would tag along when she went to
buy shoes and she listened to me when I suggested a pair she should buy.
Another
romantic memory is of us going to The Bay to buy sheets, pillow cases and
towels. Every time I make my bed in the morning her voice in my ears says, “Alex
let’s make the bed neat for the cats.”
I believe
that our relationship was a good one as we pursued lots of stuff that we did
together. One of them was daily breakfast in bed. We did this for 25 years. I
was often very hungry for breakfast as Rosemary was more active in the morning
as we were about to wake up (you know what that entailed).
When I look
at my cats these days I cannot stop from asking them, “Do you remember
Rosemary?” They are a living connection for a woman that I loved.
Mary Arnold - Dancing with the Daffodils
Friday, February 13, 2026
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Mary Arnold |
For oft,
when on my couch I lie
In vacant or
in pensive mood,
They flash
upon that inward eye
Which is the
bliss of solitude;
And then my
heart with pleasure fills,
And dances
with the daffodils. William Worsdworth – I Wondered Lonely As a Cloud
Today I
found out that my long-time friend Mary Arnold died last Monday. We all called her Little Mary
as she was no taller than 5ft.
I first met
her around 1978 at the No 5 Orange Street club. This was what we used to either
call a stripper bar or an exotic dancer bar. We did not use that deprecative term
peeler. We did not know at the time that in the 19th century, the
first organized police organization had been started by Sir Robert Peel in
1829 in England. We (or at least this guy) did not connect the lovely painting at the
Cecil Hotel that featured London Bobbies. They were called peelers.
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| Mary Arnold, second from left |
In this 21st
century, the concept of pornography has hit social media and their often strict “community
standards” have all but disappeared. I am tired of seeing red carpet shows
where clothing is at a minimum and rear end twirling is a must. Nipples and
Brazilians have taken over.
The above is
but my explanation that the ecdysiast (a nice little known word that defines
peelers) boom that happened in the late 70s in Vancouver. It started when club owner Gary Taylor went to
the BC Supreme Court and won, so that his joint, The Castle Pub could serve men hamburgers and beer for
lunch, while they watched lovely women take off their clothes.
As an
amateur fan of modern dance and ballet I can attest that those Vancouver
dancers knew how to dance. They had some sort of inner energy that gave them
pride in what they did. The clubs they worked in were spotless. I drank lots of soda water.
These exotic
dancers, who were all my friends, were patient when this bumbling
photographer tried to take their photographs. In the end my reputation was such
that I was invited to take photographs in the previously verboten dressing
rooms. I can attest that I am a better photographer today thanks to these women.
With all
that preliminary info out of the way, I can now go to the task at hand, which is
to tell you what a lovely woman (girl, too!) Mary Arnold was. While their was
competition between dancers they all joined and agreed that Little Mary was gem.
What were her talents?
At 5ft she
had a perfectly proportioned body. Everything was just right. What nobody was
ever able to explain is that she could fill BC Place with her voice without a
sound system.
Little Mary
could drink anybody under the table. She had a fondness for Grand Marnier. Perhaps
it is that fondness, that through the years, we all thought she was doomed to die
soon. She did this at age 67 in her sleep.
Little Mary
pioneered the concept of wearing leg warmers when she began her act. In 1979, ahead of everybody else, she danced to music of Vancouver bands, especially the punk ones. I was completely
her audience slave when she would dance to my favourite Police song, Message in
a Bottle.
After she
stopped dancing, I did not know too much about her family life. She had two
brothers who were short, too, who were jockeys at Exhibition Park. I would visit
with her for lunch at her favourite restaurant, La Bodega on Main Street.
There was a
talent she had that few know she had. She was a formidable seamstress.
The paradox is that this small breasted woman designed outfits for the fantastic
modern dancer, Corey Caulfield who was plagued with large breasts. With Arnold’s
outfits everything stayed in their place. Not too long ago she came to my house
for a portrait (my Rosemary adored her) so that she could get a city license to
do her clothing business. It was not to be.
Health
problems took over her life and in the end we all knew that her end was
inevitable.
All I can
say is that I will never forget that little woman coming down the stairs to the
stage at the Number 5 Orange, with Frank Sinatra singing. The little woman had
big style.
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| My last photograph of Mary Arnold 8 years ago |
A pleasant postcript. Many years as part of the Outreach Program of Emily Carr I went to teach for a weekend at a place that was new to me called Kyuquot. When I arrived at my hotel the front desk clerk desk told me,"Sir a friend of yours has given me this number. You are to call her." The woman who answered was Mary Arnold. She told me that both of us were going to a Halloween Party (it was February). When she arrived to the hotel she had lots of makeup. I asked her what she was dressed as. Her answer wast total Little Mary, "I am a Ukrainian slut."
Andrew Wyeth & Yours Truly
Saturday, February 07, 2026
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| Rosemary Elizabeth Waterhouse-Hayward in Morelia, Mexico - late 60s |
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| Farm Road - Andrew Wyeth |
I have
always admired the paintings of NC Wyeth and Andrew Wyeth. I particularly like
the works of Andrew Wyeth because of the relationship he had with his favourite
subject and muse Helga Testorf.
Because I
believe that depending on what you look for in social media their algorithms
are quite smart. Both m Twitter/X and Facebook shower me with photographs of
photographers I admire and such painters as Joaquín Sorolla, Van Gogh and most
recently the Wyeths.
When I
spotted this painting called Farm Road which features Helga Testorf I
immediately connected to a photograph I took of Rosemary many years ago in Morelia,
Mexico. I have no memory of taking it as I have no memory of Rosemary ever
having a braid. I printed the photograph to fit a $4.25 London Drugs frame. The
beauty of being able to scan my negatives with my Epson scanner and then make
inkjets to size means that I can buy cheap frames or nice frames in antique
stores and print to fit them.
What you see
here is pseudo cyanotype. It is not a real one. I have Corel Paint Shop Pro XII
and it has one app button called cyanotype. My cyanotype expert friend, Ralph
Rinke is the only person that can look at my fakes and by how the image sits on
the paper he knows it’s fake.
Whichever
way you look at all this I always harp that what makes us human is our ability
to associate. Thus Wyeth and this amateur have something in common.
Ese Horizonte No Interrumpido de la Pampa Argentina
Friday, February 06, 2026
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| Linda Lorenzo - el tero |
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| El hornero |
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| Avestruz |
Sólo dos veces en mi vida tuve la maravillosa
experiencia de ver el horizonte en 360° sin interrupciones.
A los 9 años en 1951 en Buenos Aires, mis padres me mandaron en
un verano a una estancia en La Pampa. Allí ya andaba a caballo y me gustaba ir
a esa llanura tan argentina para corretear a las avestruces. De vez en cuando
un ombú aparecía y rompía la monotonía (¿qué iba yo a saber?).
La segunda vez ocurrió en el buque ELMA Ría Aguapey en
el cual yo era el único pasajero en camino a la casa de mi mamá en Veracruz,
México. Había cumplido mis dos años en la conscripción obligatoria en la Marina
de Guerra Argentina.
Al estar en alta mar, pude ver ese horizonte del cual
Borges escribió unas poesías y ensayos.
Aquí en mi Vancouver las montañas esconden el
horizonte y sólo en las provincias centrales puede uno ver ese horizonte
mágico. En un viaje al norte de la Provincia de Saskatchewan para enseñar no vi
ese horizonte por las abundantes poblaciones.
Al ir a esa estancia me acuerdo que en el colectivo
que nos llevaba tocaban tangos antiguos. Vi una vacas con las bocas coloradas
como si sangraban. Mi mamá me dijo después que los estancieros habían tenido
una muy buena cosecha de frutillas y querían que subiera el precio si había escasez.
Ahora con mis 83 años me doy cuenta, con algo de
tristeza que no tengo ninguna foto pare ilustrar esta bitácora.
En mi acoso de las avestruces
me topaba con esos lindos teros. De vez en cuando cruzaba alguna estancia y en
los postes podía ver los nidos de barro de los horneros.
Tengo que advertir que sólo viví en la Argentina desde
el 1942 al 1952 y después casi tres años durante mi conscripción. ¡Como soy
algo tonto, hace unos 20 me di cuenta que para tener nostalgia hay que estar en
un lugar que no es el lugar de la nostalgia!
Para vivir esa nostalgia hace unos 20 años una amiga
argentina, Linda Lorenzo, aquí en Vancouver, me posó varios meses para vivir con
la fotografía nuestra nostalgia mutua.
La fotografié come un tero y un hornero.
Y no como una avestruz pero…
