Line round pizza pan with parchment paper; set aside. Melt butter in large saucepan set over low heat; stir in 5 cups marshmallows, stirring constantly 3 to 4 minutes or until completely melted. Stir in vanilla. Remove from heat and immediately stir in 8 cups popped popcorn until coated. Spread onto pizza pan about 1-inch thick to resemble spider web. Refrigerate 15 minutes or until firm.
Meanwhile, melt remaining marshmallows in microwave about 20 seconds or until melted. Using spatula, string strands of melted marshmallow over popcorn spider web to create cobweb effect.
In heatproof bowl set over saucepan of hot, not boiling, water, melt 3/4 cup of the chocolate chips; let cool slightly. Pour chocolate over remaining popcorn in large bowl, folding gently to coat. Spread mixture on waxed paper–lined baking sheet, separating into 8 small clusters. Affix 2 candy eyes on each popcorn cluster. Refrigerate for 10 to 15 minutes or until set.
Melt remaining chocolate chips. Cut licorice into 1-inch lengths. Use small spoon, dab circles of chocolate onto spider web. Affix chocolate-coated popcorn onto chocolate circles. Affix licorice lengths to chocolate popcorn clusters to resemble spider legs. Refrigerate for 15 minutes or until set. To serve, cut into smaller pieces. Makes 1 web.
Catching unwelcome wildlife comes naturally to a local trapper.
Tracking coyotes, grappling with alligators or having a snake land on your head after it falls out of a tree might be disconcerting to most people. For Dan Eaton of Evans, it’s all in a day’s work.
For more than 25 years, he has owned and operated CSRA Trapping Services to conduct the humane removal of unwanted wildlife from properties. He started the business after a local farmer called him and asked him to trap beavers on his property because they were keeping him from moving his cows from one pasture to another.
“I said I would do it in a couple of months, but the farmer said he would pay me if I did it then,” Eaton says.
Bats & Birds, Squirrels & Snakes The job is a natural for Eaton, who has been trapping animals since he was 10 years old. Growing up on a farm in southern Illinois in the 1970s, he trapped minks, muskrats and raccoons.
“When you’re only 10 years old, you have to trap the animals you find around ponds and creeks,” says Eaton, whose uncle taught him how to trap.
Now, he traps animals such as coyotes, alligators, snakes, foxes, raccoons, possums, squirrels, bats and birds with his business that is licensed by the Department of Natural Resources in Georgia and in South Carolina.
“If it walks, crawls, flies or swims, and you’ve got ’em, we get ’em,” says Eaton.
During his career, Eaton has been bitten by frightened or angry critters only a couple of times. Of course, he has a foolproof way to protect himself from bites. “I don’t put my hand in the animal’s mouth,” he says.
He uses various tools of the trade such as cages, foothold traps (which have no sharp edges), choke sticks and snake tongs to humanely snare wildlife. He reaches into crawl spaces with a claw to catch uninvited animals. Under regulations, Eaton has to check his traps every 24 hours. He takes care of the animals based on state requirements, which can range from euthanizing to relocating the animal.
According to Eaton, people’s reaction to wildlife should depend on where the animal is and what it is doing.
“If you see an animal in your yard, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s living there. It could just be passing through,” he says.
Wily Coyotes From 2014 until 2016, Eaton was part of three-year University of Georgia study to understand how coyotes thrive in the South, and how they differ from those in the North and West.
He trapped about 75 coyotes altogether, and he had to weigh, measure, photograph the teeth and put a GPS tracking collar on each of them.
Biologists also took DNA and blood samples from the animals, and the scientists hoped to learn how coyotes navigate agricultural fields and woods and how they hunt.
The technology allowed researchers to follow the movements of the coyotes to see how they dispersed and populated new areas. Biologists also hoped to develop management strategies to reduce coyote populations by gaining an understanding of their movements and patterns.
The ability to monitor so many animals simultaneously shed light on coyote behavior and identified traits of resident coyotes, which exhibit strong allegiance to areas, and transient coyotes, which have nomadic tendencies.
Eaton says it’s a challenge to trap coyotes. For the study he used beaver-based bait to entice them to put a paw in a 3.5-inch, circular foothold that was buried underground in a 100-acre area.
“They’re pretty smart. They’re harder to catch. Everything else is pretty easy. Coyotes learn, and I learn from them,” says Eaton. “They’re survivors. Just when you think you have something figured out, they do something different.”
Coyotes are also a concern in suburban areas, where they can prey on small pets, and Eaton finds it particularly gratifying to catch predator animals. “Coyotes are the apex predator in Georgia,” he says.
Later, Gator Coyotes might be wily, crafty creatures, but alligators, well, not so much.
“Their brain is the size of a golf ball,” Eaton says. “They’re not smart.”
Not that it’s effortless to trap a gator, though. This summer Eaton caught a 4-foot alligator that was taking a dip in a pool at a Burke County home. “He didn’t want to come out of the pool,” says Eaton.
He had to guide the gator to the shallow end of the pool with a long-handled skimmer and pull it out with a catch pole. After taping the alligator’s mouth and legs together, he put it in the back of his truck and released it in the Savannah River.
“You can tape alligators’ mouths shut with two fingers,” says Eaton. “They don’t have any strength when they open their mouth. It’s all when they close it.”
Another alligator that he recently caught in a residential pond in Louisville required different tactics. “We had to wear him out first,” Eaton says.
The trapper got in a boat, caught the 3-foot alligator with a fishing pole and let him pull the boat around until he was exhausted. Eaton released this gator into the Ogeechee River.
He even caught an alligator in downtown Augusta by throwing a towel over its head and jumping on its back.
Fear Factor (Or Lack Thereof) However, the call he dreads the most is the one to trap moles. Not because of anything the little varmints do, however. “It’s not a quick fix, and everybody wants a quick fix,” Eaton says.
So far, his most unusual task has been capturing a red-tail boa constrictor that was a one-snake welcome committee for new homeowners who found it after moving into their house. The boa had belonged to the college-aged son of the previous owners. His parents thought he had taken the snake to college with him, but it actually had escaped from its aquarium – much to the chagrin of the new residents.
Eaton’s biggest fear on the job comes, not from the animals, but from the possibility of falling off of a roof or a ladder. He took a 40-foot fall from a rooftop about three years ago when he was trying to trap bats. He had to have shoulder surgery as a result of the fall, but he still caught the bats.
Largely self-taught, Eaton is a member of the National Wildlife Control Operators Association, and he has taken certification classes through the organization. He is a member of the Georgia Trappers Association, and he has a good relationship with the state Department of Natural Resources.
“I have learned a lot from other people, and I have taken classes and seminars through associations,” he says.
Since animals tend to appear on their own time, trapping them is not a 9-to-5 vocation. And it’s no wonder Eaton has no qualms about tangling with wildlife for a living. After all, he spends his spare time jumping out of airplanes and teaching freefall and tandem skydiving lessons.
“I’m not smart enough to be scared,” says Eaton. “Nothing surprises me anymore. I expect the unexpected.”
Anytime, anywhere.
“I got bitten by a copperhead once and had to go to the hospital, and I wasn’t even on the job,” he says. “I was picking up wood in my own backyard.”
As for any snake that freefalls on top of him out of trees in the woods, he has a matter-of-fact method of slithering out of its path. “I grab the snake and throw it one way,” Eaton says, “and I go the other way.”
If you build it, they will come. The Rock Garden in Calhoun, Georgia is a testament to that.
If you’re looking for a relaxing way to spend an early fall afternoon, then you might want to consider visiting Paris’ pre-fire Notre Dame Cathedral or the Colosseum of ancient Rome. Yes, we know you can’t travel back in time and that air travel to Europe is restricted now because of the coronavirus pandemic. And you can hardly visit Paris or Rome in a day.
However, we know a secret. Tucked behind the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Calhoun, Georgia, The Rock Garden: A Place of Prayer, is home to more than 50 miniature stone structures, including the Notre Dame and the Colosseum. And since a car trip to Calhoun just might be the next-best thing to international travel these days, the peaceful little place, which is not more than an acre in size, is waiting.
“It’s designed as a nice, quiet place for people to come admire nature, meditate and think about their creator,” says Mike Miller, maintenance manager of The Rock Garden.
While the setting might be humble, visitors nevertheless should prepare to be impressed.
Solitude and Serenity The intricate mini structures are made out of tiny stones, pebbles, shells, odd pieces of broken glass and china, ceramic tile, wire, cement and other craft materials. The creations also include other cathedrals, a monastery, castles, towns and bridges, and they’re all designed to mimic their larger counterparts. They share another common characteristic as well.
“All of the structures are from medieval times,” Miller says.
In addition to the Notre Dame – complete with stained glass windows, of course – and the Colosseum, a stroll along the stone garden paths leads to other historic places. Visitors can get a glimpse of a diminutive Dover Castle, a fortress that is known as the “key to England” and has played a crucial role in the country’s defense for more than nine centuries.
They can explore the little town of Bethlehem, which took a year to build, or Nottingham, where legendary outlaw Robin Hood stole from the rich to give to the poor. Paris, the City of Lights, when it was merely a village, is represented as well.
A replica of Japan’s Himeji Castle can transport visitors to East Asia. Also known as White Heron Castle because of its elegance and white appearance, the structure is widely considered as Japan’s most spectacular castle for its imposing size, beauty and well-preserved grounds. Unlike many other Japanese castles, this feudal building never was destroyed by war, earthquake or fire and survives to this day as one of the country’s 12 original castles.
An unfinished replica of Jerusalem also is underway. While construction has been put on hold, Miller says it could resume in the fall.
Some of the other constructions have religious themes as well, and some places have scriptures inscribed in walkways or walls. The Ten Commandments tablets are embedded, broken, in one of the walkways.
“We also have painted rocks with Bible verses and promises on them to emphasize God’s love,” Miller says.
The Rock Garden is a great place for a family outing, or – just in case you haven’t had enough me time lately – it’s the perfect spot to find a little bit of solitude and serenity. While you might be alone with your thoughts, however, you’ll still have some company with you.
If you peek inside the buildings, you’ll see porcelain people in various rooms and nooks and crannies of the tiny structures, and porcelain animals dot the landscape. Some of the figures are only 2 inches tall.
Self-Guided Fun The whimsical garden is the brainchild of DeWitt “Old Dog” Boyd, a California native who started creating the tiny villages for his eight children as a family game. Each time his family moved, he would reconstruct a tiny village for his children. He also made an alter-ego porcelain figure for each child.
“He was a sculptor by trade, and he would make intricate little figures,” says Miller. “This started as an amusement and a hobby for him.”
In 2007, the self-described “scoundrel” started the rock garden to keep himself “out of trouble.” Later, his wife, Joyce, joined him in his efforts, and she started building most of the structures in 2014 while he concentrated on the porcelain figures. The couple has since moved to Mississippi, but their children and 20-30 grandchildren have carried on the tradition.
“DeWitt was not trying to emphasize anything in particular,” says Miller. “He had no master plan. He just got permission from the church to start building there. The only thing he followed through on was the medieval setting.”
Originally, the tranquil spot was intended to be a prayer garden. However, it was renamed The Rock Garden because of 1 Corinthians 10:4, which says “. . . that Rock was Christ.”
Visitors can forget their troubles as they roam through the rock garden on self-guided tours, and free, onsite parking as well as picnic tables also are available.
Depending on the season, garden flowers include roses, hydrangeas, clematis, ferns and hostas. In addition, visitors can walk on a shady, 1-mile, unpaved trail behind the garden. The trail runs along a creek, up a steep hill and down the other side to the opposite side of the garden.
The property also includes a pavilion, which serves as a music or a wedding venue, and an enclosed Prayer Place. Hearts with the names of couples who were married in the garden are embedded in the rock walls that surround the Prayer Place.
About 300 to 400 people a week visit The Rock Garden, says Miller, and they come from all across the country.
“The Chamber of Commerce says it’s the biggest draw in the city,” he says.
If You Go: What: The Rock Garden: A Place of Prayer When: 8 a.m. – 8 p.m., seven days a week Where: Seventh-day Adventist Church, Highway 53 South, 1411 Rome Road SW, Calhoun, Georgia How Much: Free, but donations are accepted More info: (706) 629-5470 or The Rock Garden Facebook page
Regardless of the type of camera he has in his hand, a local documentary filmmaker and photographer loves to preserve special moments in time.
Growing up in Wisconsin, Augusta resident Mark Albertin knew little about the South other than the often distorted portrayal he saw of it on film and television. However, his maternal grandmother was born and raised in Augusta, so he had a connection to the region.
He moved to Georgia in 1986, but he strengthened his ties to the South even more when he made his first video – a tribute to his grandmother – as a birthday gift for his own mother years ago.
“It all comes back to the roots of where it started,” says Albertin. “I never met my grandmother, but I wanted to know who she was. My mother talked about us like we were soup. She said we came from good stock.”
As it turns out, that dive into his ancestry was a gift to himself as well. After making the video, Albertin started Scrapbook Video Productions in 2000 to produce documentary films. He made a $30,000 investment in equipment, including a high-end video production camera and editing equipment, to start the business.
“I was bitten by the bug, and I wanted to do bigger and better things,” he says. “It allows me to do the projects that I want to do.”
Many of his productions, which range from stories of towns to noted individuals, have aired on PBS and received awards from film festivals across the country. His newest film, Finding Home – 20th Century Voices of Augusta is slated to premiere late this year or early next year. Albertin had planned to hold the premiere in August at Imperial Theatre, but it has been postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
This film is a revised version of Augusta Remembers, which aired on Georgia Public Television in 2000. For the original documentary, Albertin interviewed his grandmother’s contemporaries about life in Augusta from the early 1900s to the 1940s. In Finding Home, Albertin has added interviews with local residents about living in the area from the 1950s through the 1980s.
“The documentaries that include oral histories are essential. We need as a nation to listen to our older people,” Albertin says. “It gives us comfort and support and makes us feel better to know that other people lived through hard times.”
School of Hard Knocks Albertin, who also is a professional photographer, is a self-taught filmmaker. His original skill set is in color separation for the four-color printing process. That process is flat and two-dimensional, he says, so he started attending video boot camp training classes in Atlanta and Charlotte in his spare time.
In addition, he says, “I went to the school of hard knocks where you’re up until three in the morning trying to figure something out.”
Like many documentary filmmakers, Albertin says, he followed the lead of celebrated documentarian Ken Burns, who uses archival footage and photographs, to transform a film from a product with boring narratives and static images into something more compelling.
“Ken Burns showed us that you can use voices, sound effects and music from the time period,” says Albertin. “The key is to pull people in, and you can do that with writing, sound effects, voiceovers and real people. The audience needs to engage with the film and feel a connection to the people and the subject matter.”
Albertin enjoys every aspect of filmmaking from adding movement, sound and sound effects to conducting interviews and writing the scripts. “It’s a blast to do this stuff,” he says. “It allows me to really be creative.”
He spends 80 percent of his time on video, 15 percent on photography and 5 percent writing. “I love all three of those things, and I find ways to mesh them together,” Albertin says.
He also likes to meet people and talk to them, and he has learned firsthand from people’s oral histories what it was like to live through trying times such as the Dust Bowl or the Holocaust.
“If these people are good storytellers, they take you somewhere you’ve never been,” says Albertin. “I can feel their pain when they tell me their stories. People in the twilight of their lives want to talk about their experiences for posterity.”
He spends a lot of time doing research and tracking down people, and he wants those he interviews to feel like they have been heard and respected.
“The people that know that history are the ones that are going to come and watch a premiere,” says Albertin. “The main audience that I’m appealing to is age 70-plus. To capture their stories and preserve them is a wonderful thing to do. The feeling that I get in my heart and soul is something I can’t explain.”
He often relies on narration early in his documentaries to set the stage, and he says the narrator can “make or break” a film.
“Each film has a different formula, depending on what the storyline is,” Albertin says. “Sometimes you start with the ending first. They’re not always chronological.”
Feeding the Senses Some of his other documentaries include Displaced: The Unexpected Fallout from the Cold War, about the development of the Savannah River Site that displaced more than 5,000 residents in rural South Carolina communities, and Discovering Dave: Spirit Captured in Clay, about a literate slave potter who lived in Edgefield, South Carolina and wrote verse and poetry on his pots. He also has done a Remember series about various towns such as Augusta and Savannah in Georgia, St. Augustine and Jacksonville in Florida, Beaufort, North Carolina and Topeka, Kansas.
He made the award-winning War Stories – Augusta Area Veterans Remember World War II, in which he spent four years interviewing local veterans from all branches of the military to highlight their World War II experiences.
This project began as part of the Veteran’s History Project, which was undertaken by the Augusta Richmond County Historical Society to add to the Library of Congress Veterans History Project. To collect these oral histories, Albertin went to Brandon Wilde and interviewed 20 veterans a day.
“You’re not going to get rich making documentaries,” says Albertin, who also does promotional spots and commercial videos. “It’s the satisfaction of preserving something and creating something that makes people laugh or cry.”
The reaction to his work is something that Albertin usually experiences secondhand, however. He says he never sits in the theater when his films premiere. Instead, he dispatches his wife to join the audience while he settles in the lobby.
Maybe he should rethink that plan, however, because his wife usually tells him he should have been in the theater to see the positive reaction to his films.
“When I’m gone, I will have hopefully left something behind that people can learn from,” says Albertin. “Film was, and hopefully one day, will become a social event again. I love film because you’re seeing two things happen. You hear and see, so you’re getting two senses fed at once.”
Documentaries need to be fair and balanced, he says, and he covers difficult issues such as racial injustice in his films.
“It’s something we need to see and hear. We need to understand that it can happen again, and we need to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” says Albertin. “Everybody has their own angle on what happened.”
Blending In When he photographs a subject, Albertin approaches it from different viewpoints as well.
“Photography is an extension of video,” he says. “It’s trying to tell a story with pieces in an artistic manner. It’s all about the storytelling. Sometimes one picture is all you need. Sometimes you need multiple pictures with multiple angles.”
His love of photography dates back to his childhood when he would borrow cameras from his father, who was a medical illustrator. And that interest “never went away.”
“I love going out and playing with old cameras. The results you get are totally different from digital,” says Albertin.
He prefers photographing landscapes to people because he finds it less stressful. “Those places are where I find peace,” he says of landscapes. “They’re getting harder and harder to find.”
He says it’s pleasant to go outside – other than having to lug all the gear around. He likes to capture the light or early morning dewdrops on leaves. When he goes into the woods, he usually is alone.
“You have to sit still for a while to blend into a setting,” Albertin says.
He is just as likely to shoot in black and white as he is in color, depending on what he wants to accomplish.
“To me, color is really at its best in the spring,” says Albertin. “Black and white is a more spiritual medium. I use black and white when I want people to notice the object and the composition. Black and white can do amazing things if you use the right filter.”
Whether he is making films or photographs, Albertin hopes his work provides people with an escape.
“I want people to be able to leave their stress, their worries and their problems behind and get into another place and see what I saw,” he says. “To me, that is another way to do something good.”
While covid-19 is a known respiratory syndrome, evidence is emerging that the virus can affect heart health as well.
The novel coronavirus has its name for a reason. From devising improved treatments to understanding its effects on the human body, the medical community is discovering more and more about covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. While covid-19 is a known respiratory syndrome, evidence is emerging that the virus can affect heart health as well.
“In cardiology journals we have seen volumes about the development of the relationship between covid and cardiovascular issues in the past six months,” says Dr. Mac Bowman, medical director, cardiovascular practices at University Health Care System. “That’s the acuity and majesty of an organized, scientific approach. We continue to learn.”
An Ounce of Prevention People who are most at risk for cardiovascular ailments can be susceptible due to genetics or to lifestyle choices. However, Bowman emphasizes that the best way for people to avoid cardiovascular issues is to mitigate the risk factors that make them prone to heart disease.
Genetically susceptible people have a family history of heart disease, heart attacks, stroke and diabetes. While family history cannot be changed, other risk factors, which Bowman calls the “big four” — elevated blood pressure, tobacco use, abnormal lipid status and blood sugar levels — are modifiable.
Blood pressure readings should not rise above 134/84, Bowman says. As for tobacco use, regardless of the form, he says, “The appropriate amount is zero.”
Levels of HDL cholesterol (the good one) should be higher than 40 – 45 milligrams per deciliter – “the higher, the better,” and levels of LDL cholesterol (the bad one) should be below 85 mg/dL. “That has changed,” says Bowman. “It used to be below 100.” And finally, triglycerides should be below 150.
A fasting blood sugar should be 100 mg/dL or less, or a normal A1c, the average blood sugar level for three-months, is 5.7 percent or less.
Other modifiable risk factors, which have become more prevalent with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, are a sedentary lifestyle and stress that, in turn, exaggerate risk factors for cardiovascular disease.
“This has turned most individuals, most households, most work places and most hospitals askance to the direction it was before,” says Bowman.
With more people working from home, lifestyle habits have changed. “Home is supposed to be a safe space where we do the things that make us feel warm and fuzzy,” Bowman says.
However, some people who have been spending increased time at home are more isolated or are juggling work, school and childcare responsibilities. They have gained weight because they’re eating more and making poor nutrition choices. They don’t sleep well, and their heart rate and blood pressure are higher. In addition, Bowman says, homebound people are watching coronavirus news coverage that can be “depressing, disheartening and frightening.”
“If you don’t have an effective way to deal with that, it can have adverse consequences,” he adds. “It’s important to face concerns honestly and forthrightly and face them with a plan.”
In Control First and foremost, Bowman recommends that people focus on the things they can control to safeguard themselves from covid and other health problems.
“Social distance. Wear a mask. It’s not a political statement. It lessens your ability to infect somebody else, and it protects you,” he says. “Keep yourself in the best physical and mental shape that you can. Get fresh air; go outside; walk; dance; and take your medications.”
Even people who naturally are tightly wired can find ways to dissipate stress, and physical activity is a good way to relieve tension.
“Exercise in a fun and healthy way helps blood vessels relax and helps people burn off energy in a positive way,” Bowman says.
Since the coronavirus pandemic began, people have postponed or skipped doctor’s appointments. However, Bowman stresses the need for cardiovascular patients to keep their regularly scheduled appointments.
“We try to identify evidence of a problem, and most importantly, we try to help them rectify that problem,” he says. “We do it as a team.”
At his office, like other medical practices, the staff has taken precautions to make patient visits as safe as they can. Social distancing and masks are required, and patients’ temperatures are taken. “We try to make them feel as comfortable as possible,” Bowman says.
For patients who are apprehensive about going to the office for an in-person visit, his practice offers video visits, telemedicine and phone calls to discuss lab results and medications.
“We try to give them options,” he says.
Patients’ family members currently cannot come with them to office visits, but the patients themselves often are the best advocates for their health.
“If you have a pre-existing condition, it’s important that you listen to your body,” says Bowman. “Especially if you’re in a high-risk group where you have high blood pressure, diabetes or you have felt pressure in your chest before, you can’t stay home and talk yourself out of being seen by a doctor.”
Cardiovascular patients that avoid treatment can suffer serious consequences. When people suffer a heart attack at home and delay treatment, Bowman says, they lose heart muscle and don’t get it back. This also could result in congestive heart failure later.
“People need to take care of themselves. Don’t delay if you have an issue. There are ways to be treated,” says Bowman. “The later we see you, the less we can do.”
However, taking precautions doesn’t take the risk factors down “to zero.”
“Just because you’re high risk doesn’t mean you’ll get covid, but you need to be more hyper-vigilant,” Bowman says. “And there’s twice the possibility you’ll have cardiovascular involvement.”
Covid and Cardio The cardiologist says 20 percent of covid patients will have some enzyme elevation, which indicates that the virus has affected the heart muscle. For those who are at greater risk for heart disease, the probability of enzyme elevation jumps to 35 percent to 50 percent.
“The heart very early on identified itself as a strong player in this situation,” says Bowman.
The higher the cardiac lab abnormalities such as cell damage, inflammation or heart wall stress, he says, the greater the potential for cardiac adversity, including death.
“With covid, inflammation of the heart doesn’t mean it has irrevocable damage, but some people could have less stamina,” he says. “There are questions about the residual effects of people with moderate inflammation.”
If the virus attacks blood vessels, it can increase the possibility of a stroke. In addition, blood clots can form when small vessels in the extremities become inflamed.
“Because covid affects the blood vessels and everything traveling to the heart, it can cause life-threatening blood clots to the heart,” says Bowman. “Multiple organs can become affected, and they don’t show improvement.”
Research has shown that even athletes who have been infected with the coronavirus could be at risk for heart complications, he says, and there is a question of “how soon is too soon” for them to return to action.
Meeting the Challenge Of covid patients, Bowman says, 75 percent to 80 percent feel bad for two to three weeks, and 10 percent to 15 percent require hospitalization. Another 5 percent to 8 percent go on a ventilator, with a minimal likelihood of getting off of it.
Covid-19 has challenged physicians to try new strategies, the cardiologist says, and treatments have changed since March.
Initially, patients on ventilators laid on their backs. Now, however, they are put in a prone position on their stomachs, and they are improving faster. “In the covid age, it’s a routine part of pulmonary maintenance,” says Bowman.
In addition, he says, covid patients are being treated with the medications remdesivir and dexamethasone as well as blood plasma that has been donated by people who have recovered from covid-19. Patients also are put on blood thinners earlier now to treat complications of the disease.
Physicians are still learning about the virus, Bowman says. For instance, they have found that some people have T-cell lymphocytes that fight the virus and protect them from covid.
“The cells stay in the blood and have memory to attack covid, but we don’t know why,” he says.
However, Bowman calls herd immunity “potentially dangerous.”
The science is unclear if those who have contracted covid-19 are immune to future infection, and the intermediate and longer term consequences of the coronavirus are unknown. And, under a herd immunity strategy, those who are affected less severely by the disease still can pass the virus to the elderly and others who have a higher risk of mortality.
Bowman, who has been practicing medicine since 1977, believes testing and a vaccine are key to battling the pandemic.
“Getting quick testing is the next big thing we need to do, with results available in 15 minutes to two hours. Contact tracing goes out the window when it takes a longer time to get results,” he says. “Quick testing would be a usable weapon. We ought to have it. I don’t understand why we don’t.”
He is optimistic about the development of a vaccine as well.
“I believe as we get a vaccine, and we will, it won’t be an instantaneous answer. But it will be better,” he says.
The cardiologist believes people should have no reservations about getting the vaccine, but that people in high-risk categories should be the first to receive it. He also says he has never seen anything like this virus in all his years of practicing medicine.
“It’s real. It’s real. It’s humbling. It’s eye-opening. It’s challenging in every way, shape and form,” Bowman says of covid-19. “Everywhere you look, it has changed a norm. Doctors are no different. We need a level of insight, energy and humility. There is no comfort zone.”
Nevertheless, he is quite comfortable with his mantra to remind people to try to stay as healthy as possible until the pandemic ends.
“Six feet apart. Avoid crowds. Sunshine when you can. Regular exercise. Good nutrition. Wear your mask,” says Bowman. “And say your prayers – before, after, in reverse and upside down.”
Photos courtesy of Rhian Swain, Wesley L. Stewart and Colleen Beyer
A husband and wife, who teach art at local schools, like to mix their individual styles when they create public artwork together.
Artwork is meant to be shared, and there is nothing that husband and wife artists Wesley L. Stewart and Colleen Beyer enjoy more than spending time together to create art.
“Typically, visual artists travel a lonely road,” says Wesley.
Currently, however, they have gotten a double dose of gratification by working together on a project and sharing their talents with the community. Since October, Colleen, who teaches art at Harlem High School, and Wesley, an adjunct professor of art appreciation at Georgia Military College, have been collaborating on a public art project in Harrisburg.
During the academic year, Wesley and Colleen, recent winners of the 2020 Greater Augusta Arts Council Kath Girdler Engler Award for Public Art, worked on it for two hours at a time. This summer, though, they have worked in larger chunks of time to complete the project.
Concrete Canvases The couple won a grant from the Porter Fleming Foundation in 2108 to do the artwork on the Calhoun Expressway underpasses at Eve Street and Crawford Avenue. The concrete “canvases,” which are about 100 feet long and 30 feet high, are on Georgia Department of Transportation property, and it took a year to get approval from GDOT for the project.
“We submitted our idea, but they really wanted the artist to work with the community on the design,” says Colleen. “We walked through the neighborhood and picked out flowers that were prominent. We painted bees because there are some beekeepers in the neighborhood. We wanted to mix our styles of art.”
Colleen usually creates two-dimensional paintings in acrylic or watercolor. Influenced by nature, botanical forms and mark-making, she often paints animals, plants and portraits of children and pets. Her pieces begin with a charcoal drawing.
“I like 3D, but my brain doesn’t really work that way,” Colleen says.
Wesley prefers abstract, linear designs, and he draws, paints and welds. He incorporates color to accentuate specific areas of the work or the surrounding area where it is placed.
Primarily a three-dimensional artist, he developed an interest in sculpture, especially metalwork, when he worked for the family business – Stewart Sheet Metal.
“I’m a metal guy. I do a lot of sculpture work,” says Wesley. “That’s why we work well together. We’re good at different things.”
For the public art project, they painted the massive underpasses with sloping sides beneath the concrete stanchions supporting the expressway. Colleen painted the sides with whimsical plants, flowers, vines and bees, and Wesley painted intricate black and white graphic designs on the uprights.
“It’s not a flat surface,” he says. “This is the largest artwork we’ve painted.”
They went through a learning curve to paint the space technically. In a split-second decision Wesley tried to reach a little farther to make a final swipe of black instead of moving his ladder, and he took a tumble. Even though it’s hardly discernible, he still laments the slight smudge his fall left behind.
“We see imperfections that the average person wouldn’t,” Wesley says.
They painted the spaces to be viewed up close, not just from passing vehicles. After all, Colleen says, the neighborhood gets plenty of foot traffic.
“The intent of our work is for people to notice a place that they never noticed for days, weeks, months or years,” says Wesley. “We want to bring attention to places that people forget about.”
People also do photos shoots at the underpasses, much to their delight.
“We want people to enjoy our work and take pictures with it,” says Wesley. “We want to inspire other people to get involved with art by buying it, taking art classes and asking their communities to fund public artwork.”
Challenge & Connectivity Of course, being art educators, they also enlisted the aid of local students in the public art project. Children from the Boys & Girls Clubs of the CSRA painted with them for a day.
AP students from Westminster Schools of Augusta also helped them with another Harrisburg art project at Hillside Park, which they finished this winter. For this public art piece, they decorated a chain link fence at the park with “Put-in-Cups” in a design that was chosen by a committee of the Harrisburg/West End Neighborhood Association.
“We bought a bunch of different colors and arranged them to look like pixelated flowers,” Colleen says.
The cups interlocked in the fence, but it required a bit of elbow grease to attach them.
“The cups are made for chain link fences and can withstand winds of 100 miles per hour,” says Wesley.
The couple seems to like teaching art as much as they enjoy creating it.
“It’s really fun working with students. This was my fourth year at Harlem, and it has been fun to see my students’ growth from freshmen to seniors,” says Colleen. “I like the act of creating and pushing through to create something out of nothing. I like the challenge and problem solving that comes with it. You learn a lot of skills like time management and how to pay attention to details.”
For Wesley, art means conversation, contact and connectivity.
“I just enjoy having the conversations with people so they tap into something about themselves they didn’t realize before. Art is about contact, looking up and feeling the surface. Art connects us to each other,” he says. “You get to live people’s stories that you couldn’t otherwise. A lot of our history is told through art like cave paintings.
“I love looking at other people’s artwork and techniques,” he adds. “I like making art and talking about it. We like that other people like our artwork.”
Pride in Public Art Colleen and Wesley, who met in graduate school at Georgia Southern University and first collaborated on a team project called “Eagle Nation on Parade,” hope to keep sharing their artwork with communities.
“It’s art that is accessible to everybody,” Colleen says of public art. “You don’t have to go into a museum or gallery to see it.”
They painted a floral and linear mural at Pineapple Ink Tavern, and Wesley is part of a team that is working on an art project at Beacon Station apartments.
In addition, his artwork can be found at Frog Hollow Tavern and Farmhaus Burgers. He also has a sculpture on the first floor of the city’s Municipal Building, and he created artwork on two traffic boxes in Augusta. His outdoor, public sculptures can be seen on the University of North Georgia campus in Dahlonega and in the downtown areas of Lakeland and Kissimmee in Florida.
They continue to apply for local and regional calls as a couple, individually or as part of a larger artist team to create more art in public spaces.
“Public art creates a sense of pride. It’s singular. There are not multiple copies. I think a successful culture has robust public art,” says Wesley. “We would love to have more opportunities to create public art. We would love to break into Columbia County at some point.”
Colleen agrees. “We’re always looking for the next challenge,” she says.
1 beef top round steak, cut 1 inch thick (about 1-1/2 pounds)
1 small eggplant, cut crosswise into 1/2-inch thick slices
2 large red or yellow bell peppers, cut lengthwise into quarters
1 medium zucchini, cut lengthwise in half
1 medium yellow squash, cut lengthwise in half
1/2 cup grape tomato halves
9 cups mixed baby salad greens
Salt and ground black pepper
Shaved Parmesan cheese
Marinade:
1/2 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1 tablespoon spicy mustard
4 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
Combine marinade ingredients in small bowl. Place steak and 1/2 cup marinade in a plastic bag; turn steak to coat. Marinate in refrigerator 6 hours or as long as overnight, turning occasionally. Cover and refrigerate remaining marinade for salad. Spray vegetables, except tomatoes, with nonstick cooking spray. Remove steak from marinade; discard marinade. Place steak over medium heat and arrange vegetables around steak. Grill, uncovered, 16-18 minutes for medium-rare (145 degrees), turning occasionally.
Grill vegetables 7-15 minutes until desired tenderness, turning occasionally and basting with remaining reserved marinade. Remove and cut vegetables into 1-inch pieces. Cover steak loosely with foil and let rest 15 minutes. While resting, toss lettuce, tomatoes and grilled vegetables with remaining 1/2 cup marinade. Divide vegetable mixture between 6 serving plates. Carve steak into thin slices and arrange over vegetables. Season with salt and pepper, to taste, and top salad with shaved Parmesan cheese. Makes 6 servings.
After the coronavirus pandemic upended the wedding plans of a local bride, she and her fiancé had to shift gears to plan a completely different ceremony.
For Augusta native Allison Goodwin and her new husband, Jared Bishop, their wedding day was a walk in the park. Not that this was the scenario they originally had in mind, however.
Allison and Jared had planned to have an outdoor wedding March 28 at the Taylor Grady House in Athens, Georgia with 175 well-wishers in attendance. They still got their outdoor ceremony that same day. Instead, though, they exchanged vows in front of seven family members and their officiant at Bluff Creek Park in Oklahoma City, where they were living at the time. The remaining 30 to 35 guests that were able to attend watched the ceremony from their cars
The change of venue on short notice came courtesy of the coronavirus pandemic and its accompanying restrictions.
“I went through so many emotions,” says Allison. “At first, I was really sad and heartbroken from all of the planning I had put into the wedding. I had dreamed of this day since I was a little girl. I felt like it had been taken away from me because I couldn’t celebrate with my family and friends.”
She not only went through a roller coaster of emotions.
“At that time no one, including government officials, knew what to do,” Allison says. “Multiple times a day for multiple days, everything changed from hour to hour. We were getting really frustrated, but we knew that March 28 we were going to get married no matter what.”
Let the Scramble Begin Allison, who moved to Oklahoma City three years ago to work for Young Life, and Jared, who grew up in Edmond, Oklahoma, met each other through church and mutual friends. Once they got engaged, they already were on a tight timeline to plan a wedding because Jared was scheduled to start his residency in orthopedic surgery in Little Rock, Arkansas on July 1.
They had planned to drive from Oklahoma to Georgia on the Monday before the ceremony. About a week before their wedding day, however, they heard that Athens was shutting down. They had trouble getting in touch with anyone at their venue, and other friends who were getting married said their venues were cancelling on them.
“When we realized we had to change our plans, we went through a long list of options,” says Allison.
They ultimately decided to get married in Oklahoma City at the park. However, because the Oklahoma governor had ordered that all nonessential businesses in counties affected by covid-19 had to close by midnight on Wednesday, March 25, Allison and Jared had to fast-track some wedding day customs.
They had hired an Oklahoma City photographer for their wedding, and she took traditional wedding photos such as the bridal portraits, the first look and the reading of their letters to each other that Wednesday. They scrambled to find a local videographer to document those events that day as well.
“Most of our vendors were understanding, and almost everyone gave us a full refund,” Allison says.
They formulated a text to send to everyone to announce the change in plans. “It was the most efficient way,” she says.
‘So Much Fun’ Only 10 people, including Allison, Jared and the officiant, were allowed at the ceremony. They were joined – properly social distanced, of course – by Allison’s parents, Ginger and Bret Goodwin, and Jared’s parents, brother, sister and his sister’s boyfriend.
Originally, the wedding party included five bridesmaids, seven groomsmen, three ushers, three flower girls and two ring bearers. “None of the people in the bridal party except for Jared’s brother and sister could come,” Allison says.
Two of her bridesmaids, including her sister, were pregnant, and two of them have young children, so they weren’t able to make the trip to Oklahoma.
Jared had asked his brother and his best friend to serve as his best men, but only his brother could stand with him because of the limited number of people who could attend. However, his best friend, along with some of the other groomsmen, were there in their cars.
Jared’s sister became Allison’s maid of honor “and everything else.”
By the week of the ceremony, they also had ordered and paid for flowers for the entire wedding party from a local florist – another last-minute find. However, she ended up using the flowers to make bouquets for Allison for the wedding and for her bridal portrait.
“We got married in part of the park that was closer to the street, so our friends and extended family parked in their cars,” says Allison. “When we were pronounced husband and wife, everyone honked their horns.”
They livestreamed the wedding on Facebook for the rest of their guests.
After the ceremony, Allison and Jared cut their cake and had champagne. Then they walked down the row of cars to greet their guests and pass out cake to them.
“That was so much fun,” Allison says. “It was way more fun than we thought it would be, given the circumstances. With the extra things stripped away from the ceremony, it made it more about the marriage than the wedding.”
Still to Come The couple will not have another ceremony, but they are planning to have parties in Georgia and in Oklahoma at some point.
“We hope to have original pieces of our reception for the parties,” says Allison. “We’re looking forward to it.”
They had scheduled a party at the Taylor Grady House for June 13, but they had to cancel it as well because of more coronavirus restrictions.
“Since we were moving to Arkansas from out of state, the hospital needed for us to quarantine for two weeks,” Allison says.
Their honeymoon to St. Lucia also was lost to the pandemic because of international travel bans. However, they hope to turn the trip into a one-year anniversary celebration instead.
“It’s been a wild past few months,” Allison says. “We’ll remember all of the stories we’ll get to tell because of coronavirus and all of the support we’ve gotten from family and friends.”
When she was growing up, a Columbia County bride used to joke about having a backyard wedding. Little did she know. . . .
As a wedding photographer, Georgia Miller Latremouille is used to rolling with the punches. After all, things seldom go exactly as planned. For her recent marriage to Andrew Martinez, however, the punches she had to roll with for her wedding day were more like a series of hard-hitting body blows.
Georgia and Andrew got married March 28 in the early throes of the coronavirus pandemic shutdown, and they quickly had to improvise their plans on the fly because of the ever-changing CDC guidelines.
“At the beginning, it was so scary,” says Georgia.
Though it was stressful at the time, she now says she wouldn’t change a thing about their wedding.
“It was so special, pandemic and all,” she says.
Silver Linings Georgia and Andrew, who met in 2017 during a mission trip to the Philippines, originally planned to get married at Enterprise Mill in front of 300 guests. Instead, they tied the knot in the backyard at the home of Georgia’s parents, Donna and Yves Latremouille, in Martinez with about 20 family members and friends in attendance.
About 10 days before the ceremony, Georgia and her mother first realized that the wedding they had been planning wasn’t going to happen.
“I came home one night, and my mom looked at me. She looked really upset,” says Georgia. “She told me about the CDC guidelines that limited the number of people we could have at the wedding. It was so sad. We both just cried together.”
After an 18-month engagement, however, Georgia and Andrew agreed that delaying the wedding was not an option.
“We wanted to get married and start our life together,” says Georgia. “We had a week to figure everything out. We spent two days calling and texting everyone.”
And then they had to reconfigure everything. Originally, the wedding party was going to include seven attendants for each of them, but they ended up with only a maid of honor and a best man. Two of Georgia’s friends who were supposed to be in the wedding were able to attend, however.
“My dog got to be in the wedding. That was a silver lining,” says Georgia. “He wouldn’t have been there otherwise.”
Chairs for family members were grouped together at the ceremony, but otherwise, the seats were placed 6 feet apart. One person served the food at the scaled-down, backyard reception.
Instead of a sit-down dinner, they served a variety of sweets that included a small wedding cake and a cookie cake that her uncle made for them at the last minute.
“Almost everything we did was not in the original plan,” says Georgia.
They already had paid for the flowers, and, although they were able to cancel one order, they had to figure out what to do with the rest of the blooms. With a little creative thinking, they decided to create a beautiful floral arch of roses, peonies and other flowers for the ceremony.
“I’m obsessed with flowers. I knew that was one thing I wanted to spend a lot of my budget on,” says Georgia. “The flowers would have been spread all over the venue. Instead we put them all into one arch.”
In addition, she says, “The day before, my mom and I went through the neighborhood and foraged for lilac. We had planned to do that anyway.”
Her friend, Caroline Cain, played the violin for the ceremony, just as originally planned.
“The whole thing was memorable. It made me realize how important the person you’re marrying is,” says Georgia. “As a wedding photographer, I always worry about the details. But I realized we weren’t getting married to have this big thing. There were so many great moments.”
The people who had watched her grow up were there, and some of them took on roles they otherwise would not have done. Her aunt fluffed up her dress before she walked down the aisle. Her uncle made them a cookie cake. Her brother became an impromptu bartender.
“And my dog was sitting on my dress as we got ready,” Georgia says. “I got married at the house where I grew up. I had always joked about getting married in our backyard, and I would highly recommend a backyard wedding. There isn’t anything like it.”
Twists of Fate Georgia and Andrew did a Zoom call with a handful of people during the reception, but they didn’t livestream the wedding because they thought they might have another ceremony at a later date. However, Georgia says, “Afterward, it was so perfect, I didn’t want to do anything else.”
They originally rescheduled their vendors to have a party in July, Georgia says, but it is still too soon to have a large gathering.
“I love all my vendors. They were all great. Everyone has been nice, helpful and accommodating,” she says. “We might have a smaller celebration with friends and family later.”
However, her weekend availability is at a premium because of her wedding photography business. Of the dozen or so weddings she had booked to shoot this spring, only about five of them took place – on a much smaller scale. The rest have been postponed.
Georgia and Andrew, whose family lives near Savannah, also rescheduled their honeymoon to Grenada for November. Instead, they went to Beaufort, South Carolina after their wedding.
“My family has an old cottage there that was built in the 1940s, and it has not changed since then,” says Georgia. “It’s no resort. The shower is outside, but it’s my favorite place in the world. It’s like camping with walls.”
Even before their wedding, Georgia and Andrew knew all about the twists of fate that life can bring. Georgia is the youngest of four children, and her older siblings are triplets. Andrew is a triplet, too. So it seems almost natural that destiny had a hand in their wedding plans.
“I don’t think I would have changed anything,” says Georgia. “People sent me the nicest messages. After we got married, I felt so loved and celebrated.”
Pour grape juice, Sprite and lemonade in a pitcher and stir until mixed. Place in fridge to chill. Use a melon baller to scoop out flesh of the watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew melon.
Place melon balls on a cookie sheet lined with foil and freeze. Once frozen, add 3-4 cups of the melon balls to the pitcher. Stir in lime juice and a few fresh mint leaves. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes to allow the flavors to blend. Place remaining frozen melon balls in individual glasses for ice cubes and pour in spritzer. Garnish with fresh mint and serve. Makes 6 servings.
A couple that has plenty of get up and go can put on the brakes at their Clarks Hill Lake home when they’re ready for some down time
For two people who live life to the max, empty nesters Christine and Chris Walker took a minimalist approach when they downsized to a two-bedroom home on Clarks Hill Lake two years ago.
The exterior of the contemporary house is made of stucco, hardy board and 1-inch-thick cultured stone cut into 12-inch-by-24-inch pieces. Inside, the clean lines and open spaces offer the perfect backdrop to showcase the Walkers’ collections of art, sports memorabilia and automobiles.
“We have a fast life with the business we have,” says Chris, who owns Southeast Utilities of Georgia and also builds custom Ford F650 super trucks. “When we’re not working, we can spend time at the house for quiet and solitude. The lake is our passion. It’s our release.”
Sporting Life The Walkers, who used to spend almost every weekend at Clarks Hill, knew they wanted to build a house on the lake. When they first saw the property they now call home, however, they didn’t like it. “The lot was completely wooded,” says Christine. “You couldn’t even see the water.”
After a second look, however, they reconsidered. Now the footprint of the house occupies space that once was filled with giant boulders, and the front door marks the spot where a giant white oak tree stood.
“Everybody in the family helped prep the land for the house,” says Chris. “After the land was prepped and organized, then we built the house. It made the placement of the house easier. I oversaw or built everything.”
It took the Walkers about a year to build the house, and they moved into the Appling home two years ago. They also took a collaborative, but unorthodox, approach to the design of the house.
“We designed the garage, and then we designed the house around it,” says Chris. “I designed and engineered the house, and Christine was in charge of the interior design.”
A garage-first approach might be unconventional for most people, but not for the Walkers. Chris raced formula cars in the 1980s, and the custom truck builder also collects vehicles, which he houses in the 4,000-square-foot garage.
His collection includes a special edition, handmade Rolls Royce, which has a special sound system for opera and classical music with copper speakers and coils; a handmade, all carbon fiber 2019 McLaren 720s; a 1958 Jeep pickup, which was fully restored for Jay Leno’s garage; and a 110-year anniversary 2019 Morgan three-wheeler. He also has a fully electric, carbon fiber Lito Sora fighter bike – the motorcycle that Daniel Dae Kim’s character, Chin Ho Kelly, rode in “Hawaii Five-O.”
Chris collects professional sports memorabilia as well, and the garage is full of jerseys from pro athletes. “I’ve been collecting jerseys half my life,” says Chris. “I built trucks for a lot of these guys.”
He has signed jerseys from super truck customers including NFL stars Albert Haynesworth, Chad Ochocinco, Plaxico Burress and Irving Fryar and NBA greats Shaquille O’Neal and LeBron James. His collection also includes jerseys worn by professional athletes such as Dan Marino, Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Russell Wilson, Joe Montana, Larry Bird and Greg Maddox.
Another sports memorabilia display in the garage features a collection of frames that each hold a photo of a Masters Tournament winner, his autograph and a badge from the year he won.
Other wall displays include boating memorabilia – Chris races boats now, with Christine at his side as his navigator. He stores his 45-foot and 47-foot race boats in Lincolnton, but the Walkers, who love to travel, keep their 26-foot Chris-Craft Catalina at their Chigoe Creek dock. The dock bears the name “Walker’s Cay,” which they fittingly call their lake retreat after the northernmost island in the Bahamas.
During the winter, they go out on the lake about twice a month. The rest of the year, they’re on the lake four times a week.
“There’s a little island where we like to go to meet friends,” says Christine. “When we’re at home, we’re usually on the lake.”
Designed to Entertain Even though the house only has two bedrooms, it was designed for sleepovers and entertainment. The house features four-and-a-half baths (including a full bath outside), and all of the couches turn into beds so friends and family who come over to play are welcome to spend the night.
Frequent guests include their children, Savannah Walker and Cameron Morbey, who live in the area. Their other two children – son Christopher, his wife, Alejandra, and their son, Eliah, who live in Florida, and daughter Whitney Weathers, her husband, Jim, and their daughter, Sadie Jane, who live in North Carolina – visit as well.
Just inside the front door, a floating staircase leads up to the entertainment room – a favorite hangout for the Walkers when they’re not traveling or on the lake. To build the staircase, they put that giant white oak tree from their property to good use. Chris had it milled, and he used the wood to make the 18 steps and the railing for the staircase.
“I would say what I wanted, and he made it,” Christine says. “He’s detail-oriented and romantic. And he listens.”
The entertainment room features a black bamboo floor, which is made up of planks that are 4.5 inches wide. “I like the sexiness of black hardwoods,” says Christine.
The room also features black trim work, teal walls and exposed A/C and heat duct. “It’s the one room that pops out from the rest of the house,” Chris says.
Railed openings on one wall overlook the living room on the first floor, and big picture windows on the opposite wall offer a view of the lake. Furnishings include white couches and a stamped aluminum coffee table. A chalkboard barn door opens to a full bath, which includes a vessel sink and a shower.
For fun and games, the room includes a pool table, a poker table, a dart board and a flat-screen TV. The entertainment room is full of more sports memorabilia as well. Chris’ collection, which he has amassed in 30-plus years, includes a pair of boxing gloves signed by Muhammad Ali; a half-dozen coins used for the opening coin flip in various Super Bowls; countless autographed NFL helmets signed by the entire teams (including a Patriots helmet from Tom Brady’s first Super Bowl); and an autographed football from the undefeated 1972 Miami Dolphins’ perfect season.
He also has a baseball from the 100-year anniversary of the World Series, which was signed by all of the living World Series MVPs; a case full of Hall of Fame bats; and a 1997 World Series trophy that belonged to Florida Marlins closer Robb Nen. “I taught him how to fish,” Chris says.
He loves all professional sports teams, but the south Florida native is partial to the Dolphins and the Marlins. Since moving to Georgia in 1996 (Chris was sold on Columbia County after a convenience store clerk told him “around here, you get your gas first and then pay for it”) he also has become a fan of the Falcons and the Braves.
The entertainment room leads to an open-air porch, where Christine and her girlfriends like to sit during “game night” at the Walker house. The porch features a fire pit surrounded by four square stools and an outdoor kitchen with a teppanyaki grill. A spiral staircase connects it to another porch below.
Spacious & Sleek A vaulted ceiling brings a feeling of spaciousness to the living room, where big picture windows overlook the landscaping in the front yard. “We don’t like curtains and doors,” says Christine.
However, the doors they have were made in Italy with solid wood, and they’re lined with aluminum strips. A two-sided, vented, propane-burning, slate fireplace separates the family room and the kitchen.
Chris made the open shelves in the kitchen from the oak tree they had milled and mounted them with industrial plumbing pipes that he painted black. The oak ceiling was made from the tree as well.
In addition, the kitchen features deep drawers and cabinetry with no hardware, a farmhouse sink, stainless steel appliances, a walk-in pantry with a pocket door and a chandelier, and countertops of vein-free, manmade material. A clear vase, which holds oil-based, floral décor, sits on the adjoining dining area table.
The master bedroom also features a vented, propane-burning, slate fireplace as well as a mirrored wall, a walk-in closet with an island in the middle and a “futuristic, crazy” chandelier.
“Every room has a chandelier, but that’s the only light fixture in the whole house that Chris picked out,” says Christine. “In the rest of the house, we have frou-frou chandeliers.”
Two oversized Oriental porcelain vases, which had belonged to Christine’s mother, stand in the corners on one side of the room. Doors lead out to a balcony on the other side.
The adjoining master bath has tile flooring, a stand-alone tub, a walk-through tile shower, two trough sinks and a separate water closet.
The antiques that Christine once favored have been replaced with sleek, modern furnishings, and artwork has a constant presence throughout the house as well. “Art can be passed down for many generations,” Christine says.
An oil painting, which they watched the artist finish on a river in Bangkok, hangs on one wall in the living room, and a hand drawing by Picasso hangs on another wall. A print called “Vintage” by Erté, a Russian-born 20th-century French artist and designer, hangs in the kitchen.
Tucked under the floating staircase, a hand-cut bronze sculpture, “Callisto” by Michael James Talbot, sits on a granite base. An abstract oil on canvas triptych lines the wall by the staircase.
They got a wood carving on the back porch in the mountains of Taipei, Taiwan when they took Christine’s mother there. “He is carved out of a tree root,” says Christine. “He has to be by a door because he wards off any bad spirits and brings in health and happiness.”
In a back hallway, the Walkers grouped 25 of their favorite black-and-white family photos in black frames with white mats. Even the laundry room is a gallery, where two pictures that Chris had done for his wife for Christmas one year, hang on a wall. To honor her penchant for footwear, one of the pictures is an oil painting of a shoe and the other features hundreds of shoes hand-etched with Xs and Os in copper.
While artwork is a necessity in the home, the couple took the opportunity to shed anything they no longer needed when they moved into their lake house. And that minimalist attitude hasn’t changed.
“If we don’t use it, we don’t keep it,” says Christine. “Except for clothes, shoes and pocketbooks. You can’t have too many of those.”
A former photojournalist, who now works in the corporate world, is having his first show since his recent return to photography.
For some people, the commute to and from work is a daily grind to be completed as quickly as possible. Then there is photographer Patrick Krohn. He manages to turn his 5-mile commute into a 30-minute trek every morning and afternoon.
“My commute takes longer because I stop and take pictures all the time,” he says. “I’m always looking around and seeing how I could make a photo from a scene.”
Krohn, who spent more than 10 years as a photojournalist and now works as a price analyst in the corporate world, recently returned to his first love of photography after almost 15 years. He primarily photographs landscapes and nature.
“It’s easier to do on my schedule,” he says. “The landscape is always there. It’s on its own time. It doesn’t require planning.”
Krohn will share his work with a photographic show, “Some Eclectic Musings of a One-Eyed Dog,” at 4P Studios in Martinez from March 31 – May 2. The photographs will include landscapes that he passes going to and from work each day as well as scenes from recent trips to the Pacific Northwest and to the Lake District in England. All his original works will be available for purchase.
With his journalistic background, Krohn takes a documentary approach to his photography. Resisting preconceived notions before he ventures out into the world with his camera, he just gets excited about photographing what is presented in front of him.
“I’m not changing anything around me,” Krohn says. “I find things and explore them as I would as a journalist. I find nature as it is and see it the way it is. I enjoy discovering something and then composing it in a nice way. I have always been fairly creative, but photography just clicked with me. I enjoy the creativity of being out and about – even in the pouring rain.”
Carolina Bay Nature Preserve in Aiken is one of his favorite places to take photographs. Unlike typical bays, Carolina Bays are oval or roughly circular depressions that are common in the lower elevations of the Carolinas. They tend to collect water and often develop communities of plants and animals that are unusual in the surrounding area.
“There are no vistas in this area, but there’s a lot of great nature if you just look at it,” Krohn says. “There’s nature all around us. I keep going back to the same places at different times of the day.”
Krohn, whose photography business is called One-Eyed Dog Studios after his one-eyed rescue terrier, Rogue, also teaches photography workshops at 4P Studios and at Art & Soul in Aiken.
“I enjoy putting classes together,” he says. “I like letting people know there’s so much you can do with photography. There’s no failure, just figuring out if you’re doing things right or not.”
If You Go: What: “Some Eclectic Musings of a One-Eyed Dog,” a photography exhibition by Patrick Krohn
When: Tuesday-Friday 1-5 p.m. and Saturday 1-4 p.m. March 31 through May 2, or by appointment; free artist reception 4-6 p.m. Sunday, April 19
A Q&A with the chief medical officer of Augusta University Health System.
By now, all of us have heard more than we ever wanted to hear about COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. In early April, however, Dr. Phillip Coule, vice president and chief medical officer of Augusta University Health System, shared valuable information about the disease. At that time, the Martinez resident, who graduated from the Medical College of Georgia in 1996, said the area could pass its peak load of cases by late April. The Q&A has been edited slightly for clarity and space considerations.
Q:What is it like working in the hospital on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic?
A: The team and our ICU staff are working incredibly hard, and they’re doing a fantastic job. There are lots of cases in the community as well as patients transferred from Albany. The patients in the ICU are very sick. We have two designated COVID-19 ICUs, but morale is high in the COVID-19 medical ward.
Q:How was AU Health able to develop a test so quickly?
A: If there’s a hospital version of “Doomsday Preppers,” we’re it. We have a leadership team that’s forward thinking. We have people who are constantly monitoring the latest trends in healthcare and what’s emerging. We were closely following the coronavirus developments in China and knew we needed to be ready. Everybody realized what could happen here and started preparing for the worst and hoping for the best. We started pursuing multiple testing platforms early on.
We knew the world was coming to town for Masters Week. Our goal was to have testing available by late March. We were pursuing different test platforms with different supply chains. We realize that Augusta is an international city and travel-associated cases were occurring early on in this. We realized Augusta needed to be prepared for a pandemic.
We didn’t make any changes after the Masters was postponed. This was widespread, and it accelerated our response.
Q:Which departments at the hospital have been affected by staff reductions?
A: These are unusual times. The shelter-in-place order is causing some people to defer some of their healthcare needs. That has decreased the need for surgeries that can be postponed, but we’re looking at ways to get patients back in the system.
Q:Can you tell if social distancing and sheltering in place are working?
A: We certainly do not want to let up now, but there is some reason for optimism, cautiously so. The combination of business closures, identifying and testing cases, and other measures have helped. There’s some evidence that we’re bending the curve. We need to keep doing what we’re doing.
Q:When do you think things might return to normal, and what will that look like?
A: My hope is that by the end of May or the beginning of June, we start to see things return to normal. We might see a loosening of mandatory closures. Restaurants might reopen with caution. We have to wait and see what happens before we get back to completely normal, but we don’t want to loosen up and then have things get out of control again.
We’ll feel a little better about the relaxation of the measures going into the summer. If we can get the ability to do antibody testing, it would allow us a better opportunity to know what’s really happening with this disease. Since some people only have mild symptoms, we haven’t been able to identify the true denominator. We hope to see signs of herd immunity where a lot of people don’t get the disease in the short term, making it harder for it to be transmitted.
Q:When do you think you will be able to start testing for antibodies?
A: Hopefully, by summertime. We are pursuing different options to test for antibodies, but we don’t have funding yet.
Q:How does this pandemic compare to anything else you’ve seen during your career?
A: This is unprecedented. I was involved in the response to 9/11, and I thought that was the only time I would see a disaster of that magnitude. Then I responded to Hurricane Katrina, and I thought that was the only time I would see another disaster of that magnitude. Then COVID-19 happened, and I’ve never seen anything like it.
It’s also remarkable to me how quickly people have adjusted to social distancing. We went from handshakes to fist bumps to elbow bumps to waving from six feet away. I’m hoping we go back to hugs. I’m hoping we go back to normal.
Q:What do you think things will look like in May?
A: I think we’ll know by then how we’ve weathered the storm.
Q:Is there a silver lining in any of this?
A: I’ve never seen a team pull together like the AU team has pulled together. We’ve done a world-class job in responding to this pandemic. That includes our pastoral staff, volunteer services and patient family services.
There are so many bright spots in this, I can’t count them all. Companies large and small have offered to donate masks. We can’t accept hand-sewn masks because there is so much variability in them, but we have accepted hand-made caps. My wife helped organize a sewing brigade to make the caps. They have been wildly popular. Everyone has loved them. People have fired up 3-D printers to print face shields.
We’ve had an incredible outpouring from the community. The support from the community has been great and very much appreciated. The parking lot prayers* were especially inspirational, and the food donations have helped to lift the morale of the staff.
Q:If there is one thing you would want people in the community to know, what would that be?
A: The importance of social distancing. It’s incredibly important for us to remember. Houses of worship and funerals will present the greatest risk to our most vulnerable populations. It may be necessary to modify things like that in the short-term so we can get back to normal in the long-term. And I’ve never been prouder of our entire team and the com
Appling resident Cole Phail must be feeling good after the Greater Augusta Arts Council announced that he won its James Brown Mural competition in an online voting contest.
His mural, “The Spirit of Funk,” will be painted on the side of the building located at 879 Broad Street in Augusta. Phail used a variety of art styles such as realism, graphic style and impressionism in his submission.
Phail’s painting also included lyrics of Brown’s greatest hits as well as the singer’s various nicknames and titles. Brown’s catchphrase, “I Feel Good,” is the theme of the mural.
“My hope is that the viewer will get the full impact of the life of James Brown with a casual viewing, but will be enticed to spend more time studying the details layered throughout,” Phail says in his artist statement.
Place pudding mix in a large bowl and whisk in cold milk. Set aside and let thicken about 5 minutes. Layer glasses with wafers, pudding and banana slices until almost full. Top with Cool Whip and garnish with more wafers and bananas. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Garnish with fresh mint before serving. Makes 6 servings.
1/4 cup butter
Some of the other constructions have religious themes as well, and some places have scriptures inscribed in walkways or walls. The Ten Commandments tablets are embedded, broken, in one of the walkways.
In 2007, the self-described “scoundrel” started the rock garden to keep himself “out of trouble.” Later, his wife, Joyce, joined him in his efforts, and she started building most of the structures in 2014 while he concentrated on the porcelain figures. The couple has since moved to Mississippi, but their children and 20-30 grandchildren have carried on the tradition.
Depending on the season, garden flowers include roses, hydrangeas, clematis, ferns and hostas. In addition, visitors can walk on a shady, 1-mile, unpaved trail behind the garden. The trail runs along a creek, up a steep hill and down the other side to the opposite side of the garden.
Let the Scramble Begin
“Most of our vendors were understanding, and almost everyone gave us a full refund,” Allison says.
By the week of the ceremony, they also had ordered and paid for flowers for the entire wedding party from a local florist – another last-minute find. However, she ended up using the flowers to make bouquets for Allison for the wedding and for her bridal portrait.
About 10 days before the ceremony, Georgia and her mother first realized that the wedding they had been planning wasn’t going to happen.
Chairs for family members were grouped together at the ceremony, but otherwise, the seats were placed 6 feet apart. One person served the food at the scaled-down, backyard reception.
In addition, she says, “The day before, my mom and I went through the neighborhood and foraged for lilac. We had planned to do that anyway.”
A former photojournalist, who now works in the corporate world, is having his first show since his recent return to photography.
Krohn, who spent more than 10 years as a photojournalist and now works as a price analyst in the corporate world, recently returned to his first love of photography after almost 15 years. He primarily photographs landscapes and nature.
“There are no vistas in this area, but there’s a lot of great nature if you just look at it,” Krohn says. “There’s nature all around us. I keep going back to the same places at different times of the day.”
If You Go:
