Crambe maritima & Rosa 'Souvenir du Docteur Jamain' 21 July 2025

 

I stepped from plank to plank – Emily Dickinson

I stepped from plank to plank

  So slow and cautiously;

The stars about my head I felt,

  About my feet the sea.

I knew not but the next

  Would be my final inch,—

This gave me that precarious gait

  Some call experience.

My grandmother, María de los Dolores Reyes de Irureta Goyena often quoted from the 19^th Argentine prose poem – El Gaucho – Martín Fierro , “Mas sabe el diablo por viejo que por diablo.” That translates to “The devil knows more not because he is the devil but because he is an old man.”

And because I am an old man about to be 83 soon, I think of stuff that is obvious. The word routine (I have a pretty inflexible daily one) comes from the idea of taking the same route. Is that obvious? Jorge Luís Borges liked to write about obvious stuff. He once said that in order to remember you must first forget.

Part of that daily routine of mine that is one that I cannot avoid is to associate so much of what I see in my house and garden to my memory of Rosemary.

Most of my plant scans somehow I always connect to her. Today’s scan is of one of her fave of all grey plants (she loved grey plants) of Crambe maritima  which I combined with one of my re-blooming (the correct botanical term is remontant) red roses, Rosa ‘Souvenir du Docteur Jamain”. I did this combination as it is about her and about me. She did introduce me to be interested in roses. This scan is about our shared experience, one we had for 52 years.

Every moment of my daily routine is to remember what I have lost.

Art Bergmann & Steven Drake

 

My adventures with rock started at an American High School in Mexico City where I was teaching around 1973. My students asked me one day, “Mr. Hayward what do you think of Alice Cooper?” They laughed when I answered, “Who is she?”

It was in 1979 in Vancouver when I was set straight by two events. Vancouver Magazine sent me to the Smilin’Buddha to photograph a performance. I witnessed Art Bergman and his K-Tels. I put my camera bag in a corner and I pogoed with the rest of the audience.

In that year I took my first rock photograph of a group called Gary Cramer and the Works. I had no idea of what I was doing but somehow I lucked out and it is one of my favourite ever rock photographs. It was then when I met Stephen Drake and his brother Adam. In the early 70s when they were living in Los Angeles their parents would take them to a farm of a friend called Neil Young. It was then when the Drake brothers decided on their future careers.

Gary Cramer & the Works - 1979

 

The people who live in Vancouver in my opinion are quite reserved but when I go to concerts where either Drake or Bergmann play I am hit by their extreme passion. That they have persisted with it and are performing together 46 years later has been inspiration for me at my age of 82 to keep with my photography and writing.

The two will be playing their guitars and Bergmann will sing this Friday 25 of July at 7pm (performance will begin at 8) at Blue Light Studio, 1839 Franklin Street.

This amateur who did not know who Alice Cooper was believes that Drake is the best electric guitarist in Canada. Bergmann is a rare post punk performer who really now is a folk punk. His lyrics are about the terrible happenings of our world right now. He is an angry man who sometimes softens up but will not let go in protesting man’s inhumanity to man.

I would not miss this concert for anything. I have purchased my ticket.