Spinning Wheel Got to Go Round

A few years ago, like many people approaching the (cringe) midcentury mark, I went on a brief sentimental jag, searching eBay for remnants of my favorite childhood places and things, the foremost of which was Roseland Amusement Park on Canandaigua Lake. Being an (ahem) delicate and sensitive child, I had always shunned the hair-raising Skyliner rollercoaster and stomach-churning Tilt-a-Whirl thingie in favor of the joyous yet still somewhat alarming (for a 6-year-old) merry-go-round.

Roseland was a spectacular place to a poor country kid back in the 1960s, when I was growing up. Life on our farm could be hard at times, but there were these little oases ... like Roseland. Even parents loved it, because there was a picnic area under big old shade trees right at the lakefront, so mom and dad could relax with a beer and a hot dog while the kids ran riot on the rides. And the kids could cool off in the lake after working themselves into a lather all day, so by the time we all got in the car to go home, we were exhausted but relatively comfortable (if you can be comfortable with 12 pounds of cotton candy and hot dogs rolling around in your stomach) and very, very happy.

My sister and I would spend our precious ride tickets on Skee Roll and the rest of the penny arcade games, like the scary mechanical fortune teller that spat out pathetically outdated "fortunes" with pictures of Flapper-era girls and slick-haired '30s gents; the ferris wheel, the Golden Nugget haunted house ride, and the evil bumper cars, where I always got myself wedged into a corner and spent the whole alloted time crying because I couldn't move (a metaphor for later life, perhaps!).

But the carousel was the best -- a child's dream, where she could ride a horse that wouldn't buck her off or nip her and that took her floating magically over the crowd, at every turn offering a naturally induced psychedelic multicolored-swirl view of hundreds of kids riding other rides and her parents proudly waving up at her from below. Who needed Timothy Leary when you had a fistful of Roseland ride tickets, a hot sunny day, and the makings of a good third-degree sunburn!

And then in the mid-1980s Roseland came to an end. The rides were dismantled and sold off and the developers rumbled in. Condos, that's what they replaced Roseland with. Bloody condos. Thus began my lifelong disgust with the bulldozer brigades and construction tycoons. But that's a topic for another day.

Anyway, imagine my delight when, on a one-day trip to Syracuse last week, I passed a sign for something called the Carousel Center Mall as I got off the Thruway. A little lightbulb in my head went *ding!* and I remembered that back in my nostalgia-shopping days of a year or two ago, I'd read that the Roseland merry-go-round had been resurrected in some mall in upstate New York. This had to be it!

And it was! I'm almost embarrassed to say that as I strode through Macy's and down endless garishly lit hallways toward the center of the mall where the carousel is housed, my heart beat a little faster as those memories of my many Roseland rides came cascading back. I must've looked like a woman on a mission to buy a new handbag, but what I was looking for so eagerly couldn't be manufactured or purchased in these soulless boutiques.

And then, a right turn down the food court, and there it was at the end of the strip of Arby's and mall-Chinese restaurants and even a Hooters -- there it glowed in her own special little glass pavilion! My carousel! Lighter and brighter than in my memory, but recognizably my childhood merry-go-round!

Of course I had to ride it. I paid my dollar to the grumpy ticket man (Dick Cheney's ne'r-do-well brother?) ...

and approached one of the gorgeous horses, but its size was daunting (how had I ever braved such a huge beast as a 6-year-old??) and I didn't fancy falling off and making a middle-aged fool of myself, so I just settled my well-padded rump into a painted chariot, along with a young mom and her anxious toddler. And then we were off.

Trying to take photos as we whirled around, I got dizzy (or was it the sheer excitement?). For a moment I closed my eyes and just relished the smooth gliding motion.

When I opened them and gazed out the tall glass windows, for a few seconds the mall buildings disappeared and I could almost see my mom and dad way off in the distance, sitting in the cool grass at the edge of the lake, smiling as I rode around and around ...

Would you agree that it was a doubly magical mystery trip if I told you that as soon as I got back in my car to head home, the oldies station I had tuned in halfway across the state played Blood Sweat & Tears singing "Spinning Wheel"? Godshonest truth, I swear. Spooooky.


"Ride a painted pony, let the spinning wheel turn ... "

Click here to learn more about this carousel's life in amusement parks since its creation in 1909 and about how it ended up gorgeously restored and parked in a mall. (I hate to say it, but developers were responsible for that, too.)

Click here to see more of the photos I shot that day.

And click here to find out whatever happened to David Clayton Thomas and the rest of the BS&T gang (you know you've been wondering).

Roseland Park PTC carousel number 18 Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel No. 18 vintage 20th century amusement park rides antique carousels Baby Boomers childhood nostalgia stock photos pictures Darlene Bordwell Stock Photography upstate New York state photographer

Our hairy beastie friends

As my loyal hound sits at my feet while I work today, it seems like a good time to take a break and look at some dog pictures. In an earlier post I mentioned meeting a woman and her keeshonds at the Albany Pine Bush the other day; here's a nice closeup of the two beauties:

And I can't neglect to mention my own gorgeous golden retriever, Sadie. I thought goldens were supposed to be docile and unenergetic, but Sadie is neither. Always raring to go, and just about her favorite thing is to leap headlong after shovelsful of snow! Hey, it lightens the driveway-shoveling task considerably. In fact, sometimes I get laughing so hard I have to go in the house and have some hot chocolate and calm down.

Here she is in a calmer mood:

You can see more of my dog photos here.

photos of golden retrievers pictures of keeshonds spitz dog photos stock photos stock photography Darlene Bordwell Photography upstate New York state photographer

Shameless Self-Promotion, Part Two

How do,

One more piece of SSP* for the day, then it's time to kick back with a cool cocktail and call it a night.

The Summer 2007 issue of Life in the Finger Lakes magazine is just hitting newsstands, and the reason this is a bigga deal here at Chez Bordwell-Patterson is that the issue features an article I wrote and shot pictures for -- my first full package article since college, back in the early Stone(r) Age. Okay, "features" might be a bit strong, but it's in there (on page 32, I think -- as though I don't have it dogeared already). It's called "Porches of Penn Yan." It's a nostalgic little trip with a bit of modern musing tossed in. If you can get your hands on a copy, I'd love to hear what you think, so drop me an email; even if you can't get your hands on a copy, please check out the blog I created to encourage others to share their front-porch memories. At the risk of sounding a bit too much like Goober, let me just say: Drop by, grab a rocker and sit a while!

*Shameless etc. etc.

Many thanks to Cindy Mattoon for the use of her beautiful porch for this shot!

Shameless Self-Promotion, Part One

Hello all,

Some of you are already aware of this (read: sick of hearing me blab about it!), but I was thrilled to have one of my photos selected for the Interactions exhibit and competition at the Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado, this past month. More than 850 images were submitted by photographers around the world; mine was one of 50 selected for the final exhibit and contest. In the end I didn't win or place, but I'm still delighted to have been chosen for the honor of participating by the judge, the curator of photography at Eastman House in Rochester, New York. Here's the image that was selected; it captures a hard-working auctioneer at a farm estate sale in action:

The very creative folks at Digital Railroad, which sponsors my photo archive, had some very nice words to say about the picture, too. If you look at other entries on their blog, you'll see that my work is posted right up there with pictures of Adolf Hitler and, gosh, Brangelina! Hey, it doesn't get better than that, folks. I'm positively giddy with the headiness of it all!

Okay, now I can stop boring you all with my shameless self-promotion! Do I hear a collective sigh of relief? Thanks to all who sent your support and kind words. If you'd like to see more photos from that farm auction shoot, just click here.

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Planet Rescue: One Stupid Victoria's Secret Catalog at a Time

Hey everyone,

Do you feel inundated by the junk mail pouring out of your snail-mailbox, as I do? Do you get multiple copies of the same unwanted 1000-page catalogs every other week? Are you made queasy by the realization of how much paper and energy are wasted in delivering this dreck to your door, only for you to chuck it out on the recycling bin? Check out this great idea:

Reclaim your mailbox: Save time, save trees, save the planet! 41pounds.org

For $41, these folks say they will get you off those junkmail lists and eliminate 80-95% of the junk you receive. In addition, they will donate more than 1/3 of your $41 fee to StopGlobalWarming.org. To me, that sounds like a bargain! Check 'em out!

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A magical place

Howdy all,

It's been a busy, productive, and in many ways astounding couple of weeks. I've got a stockpile of stuff to post about, but for today I'll limit myself to one "discovery" I made in the course of getting photos for a client who needed pictures of the Albany Pine Bush for a biology book. I've lived in the Albany area for almost 9 years and had yet to seek out this environmental gem. Much to my shame -- for once I dipped my hiking boot in, I fell in love very quickly and regretted the delay.

To paraphrase from a site (www.albanypinebush.org) devoted to saving what's left of the Pine Bush from destruction (inevitable? call me a cynic when it comes to humankind):

The Albany Pine Bush represents one of the best remaining examples of an inland pine barrens ecosystem in the world. This gently rolling sand plain and sandy soil is home to a unique diversity of animals and plants, including 20 rare species (the Karner blue butterfly among them) and two rare natural communities. It is also one of the most endangered ecosystems in the northeastern United States. Today less than 20% of the original Albany Pine Bush ecosystem survives. This remaining area is divided by interstate highways, shopping malls, housing developments, and industrial parks and is threatened by further habitat loss.

A bunch of boring pine trees, you say? What's so special about that? Well, maybe it's made more interesting and poignant by the fact that the Pine Bush is surrounded by evidence of man's inhumanity to nature: the aforementioned buzzing highways, strip mawls, parking lots, and housing sprawl. When you see what borders it on all sides, it's incredible that this little oasis has survived at all. And the virtual emptiness (in both the moral and physical sense) of one nearby mall just adds insult to injury; clearly, it wasn't imperative that this land be developed for any urgent purpose. What a waste.

The other night on the local news, the business reporter was predicting that the arrival in our region of the semiconductor giant Sematech would double or triple the region's population. Yeah, that's just friggin' great. The place is already crowded enough -- a fact that's driven home quite painfully when you see what used to be here, before the paving equipment rolled in. Semiconductors be damned!

But for another thing, in spite of the dull roar of traffic that you can't quite escape as you hike this beautiful landscape, the very fact that it is essentially just a "bunch of boring pine trees" is what makes it amazing that the place is so beautiful. Maybe it's the contrast of the incredible spring greenery with the rich-colored soil. Maybe it's the knowledge that fluttering somewhere nearby is the famous Karner blue butterfly that makes the Pine Bush its home (though I wasn't graced with a glimpse of one on my visit). I don't know, but after only one visit I'm convinced that it is one of the precious places left to us here in this region. It will be a crime if it is winnowed down even further.

On my visit I encountered a woman walking her beautiful keeshonds (a fluffy type of spitz dog) and they were kind enough to let me take a few photos of them, one of which I leave with you here. It perfectly captures the magical quality of my visit that day. You can see more of my Pine Bush photos here.


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At last, spring!

Spring comes to the Northeast at last!

daffodils flowers yellow golden floral spring springtime seasons prints pictures photos stock photo photography Darlene Bordwell