Travels in the 2nd half

   I love art museums. Sometimes the art that I see inspires me to write. Here are some stories that were inspired by three paintings created by Edward Hopper that I found at Yale Art Gallery.   Inspired by Sunlight in a Cafeteria She loved her table. In a corner by the window, she had lunch here every day. At noon, the sun came in at the perfect angle, and it kept her warm all winter long. It was a place to escape. She could sit, without being cat-called by construction workers. She was away from the men in the office, who could be too free with there words and their hands. No papers to file or letters to type. Just tume to sit and think. She thought about her dad, who was living back in Indiana. He was alone on the farm since her mother died last year. He wrote a letter every week, “checking in.” But the subtext was always “when are you moving back home?” He couldn’t accept that the city was now her home. A place where she could be herself...

Small quirky museums and roadside attractions are some of my favorite places to visit. Yes, The Met and the Louvre have the big-name art pieces, but I love stopping to see the ways that ordinary people have devised to entertain themselves and each other. Driving back to New York from New Haven gave me the chance to explore such a place. Everyone remembers PEZ candy and their wonderful dispensers. What you might not know is that they are manufactured in the town of Orange CT, just west of New Haven. They are still producing those little pills and keeping their selection of characters up to date.   Early Pez Dispensers PEZ were first manufactured and sold in Austria by Eduard Haas III , and the HAAS family still controls 67% of the company today. The name PEZ came from the word PfeffErminZ, German for peppermint, which was the original flavor. The mints were sold in tins, similar to the way Altoids are today. In the 1930’s the HAAS company began to sell d...