Awake! New York is Waiting with the Tulips on the Streets

A glimpse of the colorful tulips on the streets of New York City after two months of lockdown was a sensation. It seemed like all the hidden magic of the grim and chilly spring melted into the perfect flowers and became part of them.

At once arresting and colorful this series of my photographs is not only a reflection of my walk from York to Fifth Avenues along 72nd Street, but also a record of the great city on the brink of Wake Up.

From the history of tulips in New York. Tulips are native to Central Asia and arrived in the 1570s in Holland, through the efforts of passionate botanist Charles de L’Escluse. The tulips found their way  to New York around the same time as Henry Hudson. Henry Hudson, mariner, explorer, departed from Holland on the ship Halve Maen (Half Moon) in April 1609, and on this journey, which was supported by the Dutch, that he discovered the large New York bay and sailed up the Hudson River, which was later named after him.

The Spring Was Vanished With the Fear in New York

The morning sun of vanished spring is streaming through my window. I am in New York, having spent the past two months in the tiny apartment I keep in Lenox Hill, Manhattan. This is an odd and disturbing state of things in New York and worldwide. But what makes it odder is that I have worried and dreamed much, but done very little.

With the feeling that the country, city and I must go on, and that I must enjoy a reality of so belated for me spring, I went yesterday for a walk in the Central Park. As soon as I crossed the Fifth Avenue and entered the park area, I could believe that I have stepped into paradise. Not a soul was visible for a moment. I looked up. The trees around me seemed to ascend and diminish till they joined the sky. Reflection that the farther and higher I got the more I could see led me to stop on a hill near the park end and regard slowly the incredible beauty of the park. The feeling of spring in the air was real and the park was still there for me to enjoy. The air with no traffic on the streets increased in transparency till the strange 59th Street Skyline points showed themselves flying shamelessly into the sky. I gazed on and on till the windows, varied outlines of the buildings and construction nonsense lost their shine with the sun being covered by heavy clouds. The city became veiled in light mist. It was time to go back to my little shelter-in-place.

A bit of history. New York Central Park was the first landscaped public park in the United States. Supporters of creating park admired the public grounds of London and Paris and insisted that New York needed a similar facility. After years of discussions over location and cost, the park’s construction finally began in 1857, based on the “Greensward Plan” of Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. The designers sought to create a pastoral landscape in the English romantic tradition. Some twenty thousand workers - Yankee engineers, Irish laborers, German gardeners, and native-born stonecutters - reshaped the grounds between Fifth and Eighth Avenues and 59th and 106th streets to create the pastoral landscape. The Park’s first areas were opened to the public in late 1858.

New York Wears Pink

In the sharp June light New York forgets the rules and order of old times and wears pink on the streets as a promising way of setting new rules and order.

Anywhere I go I see pink begonias, pink clothes, pink buses, pink buildings, pink trucks and beautiful window displays in pink. With an inspiring sense of dramatic New York chooses pink as a bold, fashionable and personal statement.

The inevitable flurry of pink means two things: while it is a color of the season, it is a new era of acceptance of who we are today.    

The Great Rose Infusion of Summer 2019

The history of wine of this summer really began for me on the hot and bright morning I drove with my friends to participate in The Great Rose Infusion of Summer event, which was held on the spectacular grounds of Soda Rock Winery, Healdsburg, Sonoma County.

The setting of the event was breathtaking - the golden shower of sun beating down with affection upon the fields, the spray of old trees, the vineyards, quite and green, and the fashionable crowds of wine lovers. I slowly strolled about the area, where couples and groups were scattered at tables, filling the heat with words of excitement and laughter while enjoying the excellent rose wines.

I was almost surprised with the quality of the wines. The elegance, complexity and balance of the presented rose surprised me the most. This is a New World for rose wines and thinking of it makes me light-headed and happy, because I love rose! I am delighted to see that rose wine is now an exciting and growing category in the wine industry. 

“Drink wine. This is life eternal. This is all that youth will give you. It is the season for wine, roses and drunken friends. Be happy for this moment. This moment is your life.”
― Omar Khayyam

A Captivating Tour of Spring in Manhattan

On a spring afternoon in New York that felt like the chilly days of winter, I was in the spirit of walking down the streets. A breeze was up. The air was bracing. Fast moving strangers around me walked with the sense that they owned the ground on which they were walking. I felt like a foreigner. I felt lonely.  

But it was lonely only for a few minutes or so until a glimpse of the colorful flowers and a little bird picking up crumbs from the street stopped me on my way. And as I walked on again I was no longer lonely. I was a spring flower hunter. I found myself exploring flowers on the streets with an intensity that didn't leave any room for the loneliness.

There was something gorgeous about these colonies of tulips and pansies on the dusty streets with garbage bags here and there. They added the unexpected delicacy to the rhythm of busy city life.

With the sunshine and the bursts of flowers I had that intimate conviction that my life was beginning over again with the promise of spring in Manhattan. I never thought New York could be mine, but now I do.

Gamba Vineyards and Winery: Rapture of Spring and 2018 Etrusca Natalia Rosé

It has been raining in Sonoma County since January. Forever. The early morning drizzle had stopped and a pure delight seemed to sparkle in every pool and drop of water.

In anticipation of sunshine and pleasure, my dear friend Mary and I chose Gamba Vineyards and Winery for the private wine tasting. It was a prospect of rapture that brought us together through a suddenly golden and inviting spring.

Gamba Vineyards lay here, in the Russian River Valley, as a promise, exposed to the first after long winter sun and to the loving glance of the owners and guests like us. It is time for the vines to awake from dormancy and begin to push water up from their roots, and for the tiny vine buds begin to swell and break open with shoots.

These brilliant tear drops of spring of the vines are most touching.

Our private wine tasting experience was incredible. There was something overwhelmingly homey and welcome about the whole scene - there was this golden sunlight outside, the barrels with Gamba wines, the beautiful solid wood table top, a line of impressive Gamba wines and a great storyteller.   

I was smitten by the new Gamba wine - 2018 Etrusca Natalia Rose - which opens up to you immediately as crisp and refreshing delight with an almost extravagant, but delicate bouquet of melon, nectarine, rose petals and other notable floral notes. It's the wine of youth and early afternoon dreams of friendship and love.  

I was happy to discover that Gamba 2016 Zinfandel - Family Ranches, Russian River Valley - has that strong allure of the aromas and the silky and smooth texture of Gamba 2012 Old Vine Zinfandel I remember from my visit in July 2014.