IT’S SPRING FOR A DAY AND I’M SO EXCITED….

For the first time since my return from India I hung up my down jacket and strolled down the street in my tiger T-shirt from Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve, exulting in the 80-degree weather and grooving on the flowering magnolias and daffodils. Here’s proof that forsythia can survive under the worst of circumstances. I won’t predict what will happen tomorrow, but I sure enjoyed today!

What a way to fence in a golf course!

Now all we need is leaves on the trees….

Of course I did have a winter respite during my week in southern California last March, when the family gathered to celebrate the end of son Robert’s six months of chemotherapy for colon cancer.  Here are a few pictures to prove it.

Here I am with my oldest, Cary, and my youngest, Robert, hiking in the Santa Monica mountains

Hold that tiger!

It's beautiful in them thar' hills

Son Tom and his fiancee, Carmen, right out of the garden. Martha disappeared before I could get a good shot of her...

Jasmine borders Tom’s garden

Tom is the best plant doctor in L.A.

...and it goes on forever

Marina del Rey, the second largest manmade harbor in the world...right around the corner from Rob and Gwen's home

Just another sunny day

Balona Creek, the L.A. River

Robert is very strong and has a positive attitude. He’s back in business, full swing, which is an appropriate metaphor for someone who invented the almostgolf ball, is running tournaments around the country, and hoping to launch a TV show. Can’t keep a good man down!

From L.A. I ventured south to LaJolla, a paradise on the Pacific, to visit my old friend, Karen dePlanque. We walked around this beautiful town and even treated ourselves to an evening at the famous LaJolla Playhouse and a production of the new musical comedy, Little Miss Sunshine, starring Hunter Foster, whom I had seen years ago in Urinetown, the musical. Can’t seem to shake my addiction, even when I travel, can I?

Here are some seaside shots that will make you want to dive in….

Wildlife abounds

Seals are everywhere! Awake....

...or sleeping

Two really old buddies...Karen and M.P.

Can't get enough of these waves

Artists dot the shore

Should be a great painting….

Birds of paradise everywhere

Coastal flowers in many colors adorn the cliffs

Now the day is over....

This has been a great month for opera, concerts, and theater. I try to be moderate, but living in the New York metropolitan area makes it difficult. Among my favorites were Renee Fleming in Richard Strauss’s Capriccio; the Shanghai Quartet; Carter Brey’s Mostly Music; the incomparable Robin Williams in Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo; Jerusalem, a tour de force for Mark Rylance, and my favorite, Brian Friel’s outstanding play, Molly Sweeney, at the Irish Repertory Theater.

I’m still not finished with India. This kaleidoscopic country confounds and fascinates me. It’s hard to generalize about its people, so I will just pick my particular pocket of experience and try to make sense of it.  Be sure to watch for the photos. They’re coming…slow, but sure.