23/365

I have just a couple of things that were my grandparents, and I treasure them. The desk, where I sit almost every morning and read and study and pray, that was my grandma's. I don't remember not knowing that desk. It was my favorite place in her house when I was growing up. I hid Bic felt tip pens and gumball machine treats in the secret pull-out boxes. I wrote notes on my grandma's bridge pads. The doors of the bookshelves on the desk still rattle every morning when I really get to scribbling in my notebook, a sound that transports me to the same rattle when my sister and I would run across the living room or slam the front screen door too hard.

I also have one painting that came from my grandparents. Today it hangs in my bedroom. I don't remember it from childhood at all. It surfaced as an dusty unframed canvas discovered after my grandpa died. I was the only one interested in keeping it, so by default, it came to my house. The artist signed his name down in the right hand corner, Bambrook.

Walter Bambrook was a friend of my grandparents. I think my grandpa met him when they both set type at the Albuquerque Journal in the mid-1900's. My grandparents had other paintings of Mr. Bambrook in the house.We would see Mr. Bambrook at the New Mexico State Fair Fine Arts Gallery. He would take us over to his paintings on display and show us how he hid animals in the aspen scenes. I had no idea that he was a fine artist- I only knew that he painted the landscapes that were my backyard, the Sandia mountains, the adobes, the changing fall colors.

I'm guessing that this painting was from rather early in Walter Bambrook's career, and not nearly as valuable or appreciated as his later works. That does not diminish its worth in my eyes one bit.