Fav Artist Friday: Stephanie Buer

A photo posted by Stephanie Buer (@stephanie_buer) on Jul 5, 2015 at 6:53pm PDT

Stephanie Buer is one of my favorite artists – I have this print. I loooove this print.
The original is not a photograph, it’s a painting.

Some people live in the city and have nature on their wall; I live in the country and have urban graffiti on my wall.

You can see more of her awesome work on her portfolio site, HERE.

I think I’ll share links to some of my favorite artists each Friday. What are some of yours?

Image link, in case the instagram embed isn’t loading for you.

Q’s from the other day + A’s

What do your neighbors think of your Bernie support? You live in a red state.
You know, I haven’t found one Republican rancher willing to trade their BLM pasture leases (for which they pay $1.65/AUM*) for my private pasture leases (for which I pay $20/AUM*). I guess there are a lot of closet socialists in these parts?

*AUM stands for Animal Unit Month. A cow with her calf is one animal unit. So, if you have a $1.65/AUM pasture lease, you pay $1.65 per cow/calf pair per month. For example, 100 cow/calf pairs = $165.00/month. With a $20/AUM pasture lease, you pay $20 per cow/calf pair per month, and 100 cow/calf pairs = $2000/month.

If you could change just one thing, one event, one decision in your life, what would it be, and why?
This gets dicey for me, because to answer that question with any detail, I’d have to talk about another person – and not just talk about them, but talk sh*t about them! Which, as tempting as that is, I don’t do on this blog. I’m saving all such stories for a whopping work of fiction I’ll write at age 80. But I can keep it vague and distill it to the part that has to do with me, which is the only really important part, anyway. I wish I’d trusted my gut about someone and acted immediately on those perceptions, even if it meant detonating a bomb (metaphorically), instead of trying to compensate and make things work nicely. Because it didn’t work, and when the bomb finally went off on its own, I lost a lot in the explosion.

Edited to add: Please don’t try to guess who! Why would I ever answer? I’m erasing guesses in the comment section because guessing is grossing me out! And since I post so little about my life relationships on this blog, guessing is also quite futile.

How/when did you find your love of photography?
End of elementary school or beginning of middle school? My memory is foggy and I don’t know how I “found” it, but once I did, it was true love 4 eva. I remember buying my first camera, a used Canon FTb, at Glazer’s in Seattle when I was a tween, with money saved from allowances and odd jobs. I can still remember the sound of the shutter on that camera.

Do you have an all-time favorite picture of Charlie?
Impossible! I was going back through the blog the other day, and was just so glad that I’ve done this, that I’ve taken pictures this entire time (we’re a month away from nine years!), and that I have this catalogue of memories and moments. So much comes back for me, when I look at our old pictures. I remember so much I’d forgotten. And I remember the surrounding life stuff, too – memories about relationships and work and internal reckoning and life events – simply from looking back at pictures of Charlie.

The one question I have always had is in regards to Charlie. If something happens to him (God forbid) would you raise another coyote pup, or do you find it too restricting?
Acknowledging the impossibility of saying anything absolute, it’s very unlikely I would. A) I didn’t seek out a coyote to raise with Charlie, and wouldn’t seek it out in the future; B) this incredible experience with Charlie is because of Charlie, it’s not something I think about replicating because how can you replicate an individual? That said, I don’t find it too restricting, in fact, I’ve created a whole life from those restrictions – being tied to home for Charlie is what allowed me, mentally, to get Daisy, and the rest is ~~history~~ Farmily. So, if there was a coyote in need… and considering I have the space and understanding…. ok, maybe it will happen ^.^

What is your favorite indulgence now that you are living in a rural area, and what was it 10 years ago?
Acupuncture! My first time was late last fall, in a desperate attempt to feel all-the-way-right after surgery (which had been in February). It did (and continues to do) amazing things for me. And, miraculously, I can have it done here in my rural area – just down the street from the grocery store. Ten years ago, I was broke. Buying cheese was an indulgence.

Do you still have your vespa? If so, do you take it out for a run now and then?
Yes! No… I live on a dirt road, it’s more fun and more comfortable to be on a horse than a Vespa. The Vespa is still very dear to me and lives in my office. I’ve willed it to my niece.

Just gonna leave this here –

It’s Almost Time….

….for babies!

Bizarre Fantasy, Realized

Back when I was in high school, a pal and I came up with a brilliant idea for an amusement park – a series of pools, but none filled with water. Instead, one would be filled with honey, another with ball bearings, another with super-saturated salt water, others with types of grain, etcetera. The point was to jump into the pools and… that’s it. Sensory amusement. Obviously impossible to implement due to sanitary reasons.

About a year ago, my ambulance director told us about a special training event, grain bin rescue, open to all Fire & EMS personnel in the region and taking place at the Coors plant. Grain storage warehouses and grain elevators are common around here, as barley (for beer) is one of the big crops in the area. I jumped at the opportunity to attend, even though it was just after my surgery and I still felt 90% non-functional. Not only was it an extremely unique training opportunity, it was one that would get me in the vicinity of a decades-old fantasy. I immediately volunteered to be a “victim” so I could half-bury myself in a mountain of grain.

Grain silos

Turns out pools of grain are extremely dangerous and can cause death and dismemberment.

Barley dust is nine times more flammable than coal dust. Our training was held in a gigantic warehouse (like, the size of a city block); a spark in that environment could cause an explosion that would rattle the building, which would kick up enough dust from the eaves and rafters to cause a second explosion that would level the warehouse. If someone is trapped knee-deep in barley, they have about 400 pounds of pressure on their feet. If they were to be pulled out with a harness from above, they would literally have their body pulled apart (dislocation occurs with about 150 pounds of pressure). In a grain silo, which is an enclosed space, oxygen can be replaced with carbon dioxide if some of the grain is molding. CO2 is heavier than oxygen and sinks to form a puddle in the lowest point. Depending on CO2 vs O2 levels, this situation can cause someone to fall unconscious or even die if they become trapped in the grain and can’t get to oxygen.

As a volunteer, I was asked to carefully climb up the mountain of grain and stand in a particular spot. There were trap doors all over the floor of the warehouse, and I was standing ankle deep in grain, about ten feet up the grain mountain, directly above one of these trap doors. A man with a walkie-talkie said “OK, open it up,” and I slowly began sinking down into the grain, drawn down as the trap door in the floor below me opened and the grain rushed through. The action created a sinkhole and I sunk. When I was buried to my waist, the walkie-talkie guy ordered the trap door to be closed, and there I was, stuck in a grain mountain. It was very, very cold in the grain. It was hard to even slightly wiggle my feet.

Another volunteer, realizing a fantasy he didn’t know he had.

The grain is like a quicksand avalanche – you can’t be pulled out, nor can you dig yourself out without displacing grain from above, which slides down to fill the area you’ve dug and bury you further. To rescue someone who is trapped requires creating a chamber that is immune to the pressure of the surrounding grain. First, panels are placed above to block the fall of grain while rescuers work – you don’t want to go from one person trapped to three or four people trapped.

Then panels, which are slightly curved and slide together at the edges, are placed around the trapped individual. Rescuers use the ladder rungs to jam them deep into the grain, being careful to avoid the buried limbs of the patient. Then, a rescuer climbs into the steel compartment and digs out the patient, bucketful by bucketful. The full buckets are passed to helpers outside to be dumped. One of the panels has ladder rungs on the inside, so that both parties can climb out.