COURSEY HARRELLS FERRY MILLERVILLE OLD JEFFERSON PA R K V I E W SHENANDOAH TIGER BEND WHITE OAK
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W e d n e s d ay, F e b r u a ry 25, 2026
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Danny Heitman AT RANDOM
Birdwatching teaches me the beauty of waiting Last fall, my friend Tom reached out one Saturday to report that his yard was bare of birds, though he’d set out three feeders full of seed. How long, I wondered, had the feeders been in place? “An hour,” Tom told me, laughing at his own impatience to get results. I reminded him, as I often remind myself, that birdwatching isn’t like ordering a movie on Netflix. Sometimes, you have to wait a while for something to see. It was late afternoon, and songbirds often eat more in early morning or around dusk. I headed over to Tom’s house to help him keep vigil. We each poured something cool to drink and sat down in a quiet corner of the yard, chatting softly as we cast an occasional glance at the feeders to see if they’d drawn their first visitor. We talked about jobs and children, friends and neighbors, the passage of time, and whether an old oak a few feet away had reached the end of its life. Tom’s feeders remained vacant as we caught up on things, though he shared a video the next morning of a chickadee arriving to sample the feast. I wasn’t sure what I’d liked the
STAFF PHOTOS BY ROBIN MILLER
‘American Radicals’
‘I Stole Time, Reminiscing On a Future, I will Have Forgotten’
Painting of Weary’s goddaughter, Jordan, sitting on her dad’s shoulders during a Mardi Gras parade
ä See AT RANDOM, page 2G
Did the royal Windsors bow to Rex and Comus royalty? BY ROBIN MILLER
Staff writer
The year was 1950. Edward, Duke of Windsor, abdicated the throne of England 14 years earlier to marry American socialite and twicedivorced Wallis Warfield Simpson, passing the crown to his brother, Albert, who became King George VI and was the father of Queen Elizabeth II. As for the former king, Edward was free to do what he liked. In 1950, he and his duchess hopped an ocean liner and crossed the Atlantic to North America. New Orleans’ Mardi Gras was their eventual destination. They arrived in the Crescent City to
Mike Weary, artist-in-residence and artist liaison for the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge, stands at the entrance of his solo show, ‘The Rise of the House of Weary,’ at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum.
OPEN ‘HOUSE’
Artist Mike Weary looks inward, forward for inspiration in his first solo museum show BY ROBIN MILLER Staff writer
ä See CURIOUS, page 2G
PROVIDED PHOTO BY ARTHUR HARDY
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor at New Orleans’ Mardi Gras in 1950
A wooden cutout featuring a painting of Mike Weary’s 3-year-old daughter, Evie, is included in an installation in the artist’s solo exhibit, ‘The Rise of the House of Weary,’ at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum.
Friends from New Orleans always recognize the weathered man draped in a red dress in Mike Weary’s painting as a competitor in the city’s annual Red Dress Run charity race. But not all of Weary’s friends are from New Orleans, so the subject is lost on some. The painting’s title confuses them even more: “I Stole Time, Reminiscing on a Future, I will Have Forgotten.” The work is Weary’s favorite in his retrospective exhibit, “The Rise of the House of Weary,” running through April 12 in the Louisiana Art & Science Museum’s second floor Main Gallery. For Weary, artist-in-residence and artist liaison for the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge, the painting is about more than the dress and much more than the Red Dress Run. The piece, along with the show’s other paintings, also offers a slice of his life. “That’s me,” Weary said, gaz-
‘THE RISE OF THE HOUSE OF WEARY’ WHEN: Through April 12. Hours are 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Wednesday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. WHERE: Louisiana Art & Science Museum, 100 S. River Road. ADMISSION: $16, adults; $13 children ages 3-12 and seniors age 65 and older. VISIT: lasm.org. ing at the painting. How so, when Weary is decades younger than the guy in the picture? “It’s a self-portrait of me as an older man,” he continued. “I was trying to examine and understand my masculinity and the toxic traits of it while mirroring back to ‘The Portrait of Dorian Gray.’ ”
ä See ‘HOUSE’, page 2G