I had THE best day.

I was up early on Sunday to drive Mom to the airport and decided to spend some quality Kate time. So, I went to one of my favorite places in the world: The Fort Worth Botannical Gardens. I have a lot of fond memories of exploring this place while my dad did a bridal or engagement portrait. I got a brand new skein of felting yarn (I'm kind of obsessed with felted purses, photos will follow), a couple peanut butter sandwiches, and my picnic blanket and explored a little before camping out at my favorite spot.

Words can hardly describe how I feel when I enter this area of the gardens. It is secluded by a grove of saplings, with overhanging branches everywhere. The day I went, when I walked through this tunnel of green, I actually took a sudden breath, not a gasp, something more solemn, more peaceful. It was like realizing a place is sacred.

I sat there crocheting to my heart's content, watching people pass by and read the plaque by the tree and making up stories about their lives and who they are, as people often inadvertently do and probably did with me that day as well, the young hippie smiling contentedly as she listened to her ipod on random and crocheted a huge pink, purple and orange bowl. One family came by, the man was American, but the wife and three children spoke a language I don't believe I've ever heard before. It did not sound oriental or germanic, I'm thinking it was middle eastern or Indian (as in India). It was one of the most beautiful languages I've ever heard. The eldest girl watched me as I crocheted, hovering behind her mother, obviously asking her questions and recieving answers in words I could not understand. I told her what I was doing, and she got the scared confused look children get when strangers talk to them, as if she were weighing wether I was safe or not.

I looked around often, stopped, and said "God, you MADE this!" I felt peace the entire time.

When I finished my purse and was sore from sitting for so long (I was at the gardens about three hours, and at least two hours of that were sitting!), I walked out into a wedding! An army man and his bride married right in front of the main fountain and their guests simply stood and watched, no chairs. A photographer in a very bad hawaiian print shirt ran about, getting nearly into their faces and blocking everyone's view for the majority of the vows.

Afterwards, I went to the Kimbell Art Museum to see the Asian exhibit on its last day in the museum. I was captivated by the screen paintings and the artists' creative use of negative space as positive space, especially noticeable in the paintings of gibbons and other monkeys. And of course I got to see some of my favorite paintings on permanent collection there, including Caravaggio's "Cardsharps."

Then, across the street to the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art to revel in lines, contours, and amazing statements. My favorites were by Keifer, a German artist who grew up post-war, trying to resolve the nation's recovery from Nazi Germany in his own mind. His sculpture of a book with wings ("Book With Wings 2") was one I had to come back and look at again and again. If I had a photograph of it, I would stare at it constantly.

As I drove home, listening to a book on cd (which I rarely do, but my mother got me hooked on it) I was exhausted but felt so at peace and just happy. It was a very good day, I got a lot of good photographs, and I came back feeling like I had just had a nice long therapy session.