We published nearly 100 travel articles featuring more than 600 of her photographs, and our memories still hum with the places we visited, the people we met, and the moments we shared.
In six weeks, she will enter the rarified air of a solo artist's exhibition at a prestigious museum in New York City. She seems to reinvent herself in each decade, always celebrating the joy in being unapologetically, eccentrically alive. What a joy! What a wonder!
We invite you to journey with us for the next six weeks and experience the joy along the way.
The email arrived on Tuesday morning—the kind of morning where the sun hadn't quite committed to the day yet, and I was still negotiating with Princess Amy over a cup of coffee that had gone lukewarm during my morning contemplation.
"It's official," Ms. Wonder announced, gliding into the kitchen with the grace of someone who'd been awake for hours and had conquered at least three impossible things before breakfast. She handed me her phone, screen glowing with the formal announcement from the curator of the Maritime Museum of the State University of New York.
The Maritime Museum at Fort Schuyler proudly presents Ms. Cathryn Wonder on March 20th from 5pm to 8pm...
There it was—proof that our Rube Goldberg machine of ambition, set in motion by watching The Deal months ago, had actually worked. The audacious belief that a photographer could become the visual poet of cargo ships had led us to this moment.
"Six weeks," I said, doing the mental arithmetic. "Forty-two days. One thousand and eight hours."
"Please stop counting," Ms. Wonder said, though her smile suggested she'd already done the same calculation herself.
Princess Amy, my ever-helpful inner voice and self-appointed life coach, chose that moment to make her morning appearance.
Six weeks? she said with the tone of someone about to read a disaster forecast. That's barely enough time for everything to go catastrophically wrong.
"Thank you, Amy," I said aloud, causing Ms. Wonder to raise an eyebrow.
"Is she at it again?" she asked.
"She's making a list," I confirmed.
"Of course she is." Ms. Wonder settled into the chair across from my desk with the determined calm that meant she was about to organize something. "Well, let's make our own list then. A proper one."
I pulled out a fresh sheet of paper and drew a line down the middle. "Your tasks," I said, labeling the left column. "My tasks," I labeled the right.
"The curator called yesterday," Ms. Wonder said, and I detected that slight shift in her voice—the one that appears when excitement meets vulnerability.
"Dr. Marina Castellanos. She's very enthusiastic about the exhibit. She kept calling it 'the inaugural visual legacy' and talking about 'Fading Queen' like it's the Mona Lisa of maritime photography."
"Well, it is rather spectacular," I said, thinking of the massive image of the SS United States she'd captured in Mobile. Her framing had transformed the ship's industrial hull into something that looked more like an abstract painting than a photograph.
"She wants to schedule a call next week to go over final details," Ms. Wonder continued. "Installation timeline, lighting requirements, the speech I'll give at the opening..."
I wrote it all down dutifully, the tasks multiplying faster than I could capture them. Arrange shipping and insurance. Book travel. Write the speech. Order those postcards with the missing contact information for my covert promotional operative role.
"Don't forget your own travel arrangements," Ms. Wonder reminded me. "Your beautiful, meandering, completely impractical train journey."
"Not impractical," I protested. "It's contemplative. It's the circular journey in action. You'll fly directly to your triumph while I take the scenic route, observing and reflecting like a proper writer."
"Because you're terrified of flying."
"That too," I admitted. "But mainly the contemplative thing."
We worked through the list for another hour, Ms. Wonder occasionally standing to pace when the reality of it all seemed to hit her in waves.
"What if people don't like it?" she asked quietly.
Princess Amy perked up immediately. Finally, she's asking the right questions, Amy said. What if the curators think it's derivative? What if they find it pretentious to call industrial photography 'Hidden Canvases'? What if a lot of things I haven't thought of yet?"
"They'll love it," I said firmly, addressing both Ms. Wonder and Princess Amy simultaneously. "You've spent years perfecting your vision. Your images show people what Georgia O'Keeffe taught you to see—the extraordinary in the ordinary. That's something to celebrate."
Ms. Wonder smiled at me with unexpected warmth. "You know, for someone who can't manage to get on an airplane, you're remarkably good at the pep talk business."
"I've had practice," I said, thinking of all the times I talked Princess Amy down from metaphorical ledges.
Later that afternoon, I found myself at Egret Café, where Island Irv and Lili were holding court at their usual table near the window.
"You look like a man with news," Irv observed, pushing a chair toward me with his foot.
"Ms. Wonder's photography exhibit is official," I said. "Six weeks from now in New York."
"The big time!" Lili exclaimed. "That's wonderful!"
"It's terrifying," I admitted. "There's so much to do, and Princess Amy has compiled a comprehensive list of everything that could go wrong."
"Of course she has," Irv said with the knowing smile of someone who'd met the princess many in conversation. "But you'll manage. You always do."
"I'm taking a train," I announced, as if this were somehow relevant to the discussion.
"A train?" Lili asked.
"To New York. Multiple trains and buses. Probably a few taxis. Ms. Wonder will fly, while I take the long way around."
Irv laughed. "That sounds about right for you. The circular journey and all that."
That evening, as I sat reviewing the to-do list, I realized something that sent a small jolt of panic through my system. I found Wonder in the kitchen, making a diagram of photographs arranged on display panels.
"Poopsie," I said, and my voice must have given away my concern because she looked up immediately.
"What's wrong?"
"The list," I said, holding up the paper with its two columns of tasks. "We forgot something."
I felt Princess Amy lean in with interest, curious about what catastrophe I'd discovered.
"You haven't fully committed to which twenty-three photographs will make the final cut."
Ms. Wonder went very still. In the silence that followed, I could almost hear Princess Amy beginning a new list—this one titled "Problems with Photograph Selection."
Six weeks until the gala. Forty-two days. One thousand and eight hours and twenty-three photographs to choose from hundreds.
What could possibly go wrong?
To be continued next week in Post 2: "Selecting the Stars."
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