Sunday and Monday Glass flowers and Trinity church

It is Monday afternoon. Normally I write this jumble of words every evening but sometimes it becomes too much of a chore. Last night I reminded myself that it is supposed to be a holiday and thought ‘too bad, write later’.

Yesterday, Sunday, after my coffee and croissant I caught the T on my way to Harvard . Harvard Square was a bit of a mess with people setting up stalls on the sidewalks and roadways. I walked through some of the campus to Harvard Yard, took a few photos and found the Museum of Natural History. Several people had recommended that I look at the glass flowers. Just as well because I might not have gone. Between 1887 and 1936 father and son artisans Leopold and Rudolph Blaschka created these 4000 exact models of 850 plant species. Each species is illustrated with a scientifically accurate lifesize model and magnified parts. They were amazing. I then spent some time looking at a display about the archeological dig in Harvard Yard in 2007 that unearthed the Indian college attended by Caleb, the Wampanoag in Caleb’s Crossing that I referred to when I was in Martha’s Vineyard. I walked through some other interesting displays on Native Americans.

After the Museum I walked with a guy I’d met from California back to Harvard Square which was quite busy . We had a sandwich and then walked further to another square, but it also was crowded and noisy. After talking about everything and nothing, including learning to be less disciplined and learning to be frivolous, for several hours we caught the T back to Park St station and parted ways. I caught another T in the direction of the gallery I was going to. After a few stops there was an announcement that after the next stop it was an express to a stop past where I wanted to go. There was a mad scramble to get off but I pushed my way through the crowd to get to the map on the side of the carriage and realised that the stop it was going to expressly was only 1 past where I wanted to go. It would be quicker to stay on and walk back. I had bumped into a local guy who was standing near the map and we got talking – he was going to another museum near the one I was going to and he said he was staying on too. We walked back from the T stop chatting together. He insisted on diverging from his route to make sure I got where I was going. 2 interesting gentlemen to talk to in the one day!

The Museum I went to was the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Isabella Stewart ,1840 to 1924,from New York married a Bostonian Jack Gardner . She was very rich, liked travel, bought lots of things and built a large ‘palace’ to put them in. There were some interesting individual paintings and other objects, but I did not like the whole effect. It was too cluttered for my taste. There was , eg, a painting lowish on the wall with a table below it covered in an intricate piece of material with a vase or 3 and a few other nick nacks – all too close for my visual comfort. I much preferred the Frick gallery in New York. You got the feeling that Mr Frick had bought the paintings to enhance the spaces that he and his family lived in, rather than buying nice things for the sake of it. Maybe I am being harsh – many people now go and visit all Isabella’s lovely things. You get in free if your name is Isabella or if your birthday is the same as hers (14 April) - but you have to go on that date. Rats.

There is a new addition to the gallery which includes a glassed walled café where I had coffee and a desert. I sat at a communal table opposite another guy. We exchanged pleasantries. He was there to meet someone for a meeting and appeared to have no interest in art. I asked a few general questions about Boston but he did not know. I think he was pleased to escape me when his friend came.

I caught another T to Copley Square , SE of where I am staying. There I took some photos of Trinity Church reflected in the John Hancock Tower. This reminds me – sorry, no photos yet. Maybe later. Anyway, the Hancock Tower is very tall, with very reflective blue glass panels all over it. It was designed in the 1960’s and was very contraversial. It was supposed to be finished in 1971 but in the winter of 1972 some of the panelling loosened and 500lb sheets of glass would come crashing to the ground unexpectedly. Not good. Then it was found that in high winds the top moved so much the office workers were getting motion sickness. Supposedly all is now well.

The library faces the square . It is similar to the library in New York but instead of 2 lions guarding it, there are 2 women in vaguely ancient Greek dress – one representing Science and the other Art. I preferred Patience and Fortitude. The brochure I got for the inside had the description of various rooms but no map. All the rooms ran off each other in a muddled way – or maybe it was just me that was muddled . I never found the room I was looking for which had some frescoes, according to the guidebook very good, by John Singer Sargent, but I did not try too hard.

I then went into Trinity Church. It was wonderful. Well, to me it was. I just sat for a while, listened to the organist practising. According to the guidebook, it is routinely voted one of USA’s 10 finest buildings, dates from 1877, is granite and sandstone Romanesque, interior designed by John LaFarge – a painter, but mainly stained-glass designer. The outside was like lots of European churches I have seen, but the inside was much plainer, still with lots of lovely stained glass and paintings but no twiddly bits. It is definitely a ‘working’ ( as opposed to ‘museum’) church .They have 3 adult choirs and a choir of 8 to 18 yearolds who sing at Wed night evensong. Amongst other things they have a Ghanaian drumming class. ( A suitably frivolous thing to do) I wandered round taking photos, some of which are OK, of the stained glass. Some of it, apparently a new technique developed by LaFarge , was almost garish it was so bright.

I was quite tired by the time I got back and went around the corner to a small Italian restaurant. Ryvita and cheese did not appeal. I had a nice dinner.

It is now Monday night.

This morning I woke late, unusual for me, at 7.50 and had a very slow start. I had not arranged my timing properly - the next 2 places on my list are not open on a Monday. So, the foci were : find somewhere to support the Boston Bakes for Breast Cancer scheme, have a look in a wool shop I read about, go to a shop that sells some brightly coloured, completely frivolous, shoes I have seen, look at a gallery that specialises in nice US made crafts and go to an Irish pub. I managed 3 out of 5. The gallery was closed on Monday too. The wool shop was good. I bought a book of childrens patterns knitted top down and mostly in one piece, so no sewing up. I fear another visit to a PO will be needed to send the stuff I have bought home. I walked the length of the main shopping street in Back Bay looking for a café that supported the breast cancer fundraising but noone were obvious. At the far end of the street I found the shop that sold the shoes. I liked them , but they did not have the right size. A shop further away, but on the same T line did. I ummed and ahhed.- another part of Boston to see. I had lunch first at a café in a bookshop nearby that had wifi and I looked up the long list of the Boston Bakes supporters. The shoe shop was in a fairly average part of town – not upmarket like the area I had been in. There was a small pocket of new shops where the shop I wanted was. Maybe someone is trying to regenerate the area. I came home via the Wholefood Market that I went to on the first day. – one of a chain that has lots of nice stuff and lots of prepared stuff. They were giving the profits from the sale of their jumbo choc chip cookies to the Boston Bakes fundraiser, so I bought 1 and some coffee and sat outside and watched the world go past and thought of my friends who have had breast cancer and especially of my friend who is currently undergoing treatment. I only ate a small part. Jumbo in the US is big.

.Until I read some of the history of Boston, I had not realised how important the Irish were. They started arriving in the 1820’s . They were considered socially inferior, they undercut the locals in the job market, they were Catholic – the opposite of the Puritans . The potato famine in Ireland led to many many more immigrants. There were riots and nastinesses. Then other nationalities came. Then JFK – the pride of Boston’s Irish Catholics. There are Irish pubs everywhere . I thought I should go to 1. This evening I walked past the 2 Irish pubs in this area. I have found this before – it is much harder to walk into places on my own when I am tired than if I am not. Pubs have shut doors you have to open. A little thing but it is still hard sometimes. I thought – I feel no need to go into a Starbucks or a Macdonalds, so why should I go into an Irish pub? I went to a restaurant in the same building as me. It is not as fancy inside as it looks from the outside and I had a nice piece of salmon and glass of wine.