Japanese Internment Camps in the United States

My friend Stan invited me to a talk at the Holocaust Memorial & Tolerance Center in Glen Cove this afternoon.  The talk was by two women who as children, with their families, lived on the west coast, and were taken from their homes and moved hundreds of miles inland to hastily constructed barracks covered with tar paper.  The government was afraid that these American citizens might be spying for the Japanese!  120,000 people were ultimately imprisoned in these centers.  There were about 10 such centers, with up to 15,000 people in each facility.  Most people were held from 1942 to 1946.  Here's the thing - the majority of these people were American citizens!  The whole program was a travesty of justice, and as someone said today,  "It was one of the darker chapters in American history," and "It was a failure of political leadership."  The stories these two women told were very moving.  And their hope is that if our government even STARTS thinking about some illegal program involving people of other religious faiths being singled out because of their religion, then people will be reminded of this terrible program which began 74 years ago.  (REVISED) Stan wrote me after I posted this, with this comment, correcting what I had originally posted:  "My father was 24 and you can say both sides of my family were incarcerated (parents, their brothers/sisters and their parents.)" Such a shameful act by the United States government.

Catching Up

When Liz was here at the end of March we did some things including visiting the Bailey Arboretum.  I took several different photographs that day but there was so much going on, I didn't have a chance to post them all.  So now I am catching up.  This is the main house at the arboretum.  What caught my eye was the blooming yellow tree.  I *think* that this is a Witch hazel tree.  I can't be sure but maybe someone out there will recognize it.  I love the delicacy of this image.

Here is a closeup of one of the blossoms.

First Flight!

I have had the drone for three days now.  It came with a 55 page manual and I wanted to memorize all of it before flying for the first time.  This drone is a very sophisticated device that uses GPS for navigation, and a "return to home" mode if it looses contact with its controller, among other things.  It has a number of colored lights on it, and you need to know what all the lights mean if they light up.  It was also really windy for two days as well and these drones can't fly in high winds.  But finally, today, the heavy rains stopped late in the afternoon, and I decided to try for a first flight.  It was amazing - this aircraft is actually really easy to control and the flight was flawless.  I can't wait to go looking for subjects that look really interesting from the air.  Stay tuned.

I think I See a Pie Here...

I went into the kitchen and recognized the first signs of a pie!  This is a good thing.  This bowl contains the makings of the filling for a strawberry rhubarb pie!  I can't wait, but I will have to, because this pie will be for a Mother's Day gathering of the family in Connecticut.  The strange lighting is the late afternoon sun shining through blinds covering the kitchen window.

The Rising Moon

I was stuck in bumper to bumper traffic on the Hutchinson River Parkway a few weeks ago, and then I noticed the rising moon.  I was moving slowly enough that I could watch for things in the foreground moving past.  When I got to these trees, I realized they made the perfect photograph with the moon.  I am taking the time to tell you all this story because *some* of you might think I shot this photograph while the car was cruising along at highway speed.

Hey Mister, What's in the Box?

The box?  What's in the box?  Oh...  a drone...  :-)  Yeah, I couldn't stand it any longer, and after learning so much about drones decided I needed one.  It is good that I waited two years to get one, because the Phantom 3 that I got is a great drone that has been superceded by a newer model, and so I got it new, at a bargain price.  Now I have to learn how to use it!  Given the nature of this flying machine it is REALLY important that I know every detail about its operation.  The manual is 55 pages long, and I need to read it all.

Could you imagine if I *thought* that I knew how to use it and then after takeoff it just flew away!  Yikes!  So maybe I will get to fly it tomorrow for the first time.  Maybe not.  Depends on how comfortable I feel about all the controls.  I can't wait!  And of course, since the drone does both still photographs and video, you can look forward to aerial photographs once I get this figured out.

Jessica Cox is a Pilot...

...but she does not have any arms!  She is a motivational speaker and she is amazing.  She was born with no arms because of a birth defect, but was determined to live normally.  So how does she fly a plane?  She uses her feet!  She flies a 1945 Ercoupe which does not have rudder pedals.  She is also a SCUBA diver and has earned a black belt in Taekwondo.

Pilots wear headsets, and here she demonstrates how she puts her headset on before each flight, using her feet.  In the shot below, I forget why she stood on the chair, but it surprised everyone during her talk.

Then she demonstrated how she OPENED a pull-tab can of soda with her feet, and then showed how she drank from the can after it was open.  She also demonstrated for us, how she tied the laces on her sneakers with her feet, before putting them on.

The event was held out at Islip MacArthur Airport in an airplane hangar.  The place was packed, with both adults and kids.

She told a number of inspirational stories, and she has met the Pope and visited wounded veterans at Walter Reed Army Hospital.  She also told humorous stories.  She mentioned that she gets stared at wherever she goes.  At restaurants, everyone assumes that her husband feeds her, so to mess with those staring, when the food comes, she feeds her husband by holding the fork with her feet!  She also told a story of a waitress who came to the table and said to her husband "What is she going to order?"  Her husband replied: "She is missing her arms, not her brain!"  It was an astounding and inspiring evening.