Here’s how this week’s arts and culture column begins: Located at 270 Arlington Drive in Pasadena and comprising two acres, the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden is a hidden LA treasure. The pond-style stroll garden was created in the 1930s by Japanese immigrant Kinzuchi Fuji for his patrons Charles and Ellamae Storrier Stearns. After their deaths, […]
OUR COMMON HOME
ST. ANDREW’S ABBEY
ST. ANDREW’S ABBEY IS A BENEDICTINE MONASTERY IN THE HIGH DESERT OUTSIDE OF LA. I HOPE TO BE BURIED THERE.
SUNDAYS LIVE AT ST. JAMES
Here’s how this week’s arts and culture piece begins: For years during the 1990s when I lived in Koreatown, I’d attend the Sunday afternoon Bing Theater classical music concerts at LACMA. After almost a quarter of a century, the concerts have now moved a couple of miles east, to St. James Episcopal Church on Wilshire […]
IN THIS PLACE CHRIST WANTS TO BE BORN
Here’s how this week’s arts and culture piece begins: “Now he comes to be born in the narrowness of our lives, to be incarnate in us, to give his love to the world through us, through our flesh and blood. That is one meaning of the Incarnation. The reason why we are where we are this Christmas, […]
LET EARTH RECEIVE HER KING
Oh the season of Advent has been deep. I find I’m spent. Not from buying presents, eating, or showing off/arguing/sniping on social media. Rather from the deep prayer of the last four weeks… “The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light.” And then the Gospel today, the beginning of John: “The true […]
A GLASS PANEL HOMAGE TO LOCAL FIREFIGHTERS
Here’s how this week’s arts and culture piece begins: Artist Anne-Elizabeth Sobieski’s family lost their Pasadena home to fire when she was 17. “I was frozen. I don’t know how much time went by. We just watched as the roof fell in, and one by one, every room burned.” Ever since, she’s had a special […]
PROJECTS AND PLOWSHARES
I haven’t much checked in as of late. This is in large part because I have many PROJECTS. One: I am making a will! That’s right: getting “my affairs” in order, a task upon which I’ve been procrastinating for probably five years. So the ball is rolling. That feels good. It’s a lot of work. […]
GORDON PARKS: THE FLÁVIO STORY AT THE GETTY
Here’s how this week’s arts and culture column begins: Through Nov. 10 at the Getty is a compelling exhibit based on the work of Gordon Parks, a Renaissance-man film director, writer, and photojournalist perhaps best known for his work for LIFE magazine. President John F. Kennedy’s “Alliance for Progress,” launched in 1961, was an initiative designed […]
THE ANCIENT BRISTLECONE PINE FOREST
Here’s how this week’s arts and culture column begins: I spent mid-August to mid-September at a writer’s residency offered by the good sisters at the Monastery of St. Gertrude in Cottonwood, Idaho, population 923. It was good to get away. But it also felt really, really good to be heading back to Southern California in […]
FEMINISM IS IN TROUBLE
It’s not in trouble here. I have hit the ground running upon returning from my month in Idaho and week-long road trip on either end, have fallen in love with LA all over again, and am obsessed with migrating (eventually) to a new website. The light in September! Every day I am torn, and from […]
ART IN THE LA METRO STATIONS
Here’s a perk of our glorious city: LA’s snazzy public transportation system offers free, docent-led art tours led in various Metro stations throughout the city. You can check out the possibilities at Metro.net/art. Union Station tours are held on the second Sunday of the month and run from 10:30 to approximately 12:30. Over the summer, […]
ON THE ROAD AGAIN
Per usual, life has been moving at a faster clip than I’m able to keep up with. I do know this: I’m in Carson City, Nevada. That’s right. Holed up in the Forest Room of the Bliss Bungalow: “a charming inn for the discerning traveler.” Well, the first part is right. Carson City, the Historic […]
COMPASSIONATE SOLIDARITY
“When we think about the people who have given us hope and have increased the strength of our soul, we might discover that they were not advice givers, warners, or moralists, but the few who were able to articulate in words and actions the human condition in which we participate and who encouraged us to […]