From The Vault Of Art Shay: Kalina

By Art Shay in News on Oct 3, 2012 6:00PM

$Kalina\'s birthday girl mother, Tzvetlanka, leads Kalina\'s mother-in-law in a raucous countryside two step.\r\n$ $Reaching down to pat the head of a fast moving grandchild, the birthday mama works her way around a table.\r\n$ $Kalina\'s beloved son, Edouard, basks in the sunlight of his grandma\'s smile. When Florence had to change from her regular bed to a hospital bed, Kalina brought Eddie along for muscle. She was really appalled at my non-Bulgarian conduct of offering a teen a tip for hard work. \r\n$ $Kalina and her Bulgarian husband Kristian, elated.\r\n$ $Ivan and Rita in an unusually quiet moment for Ivan, who is usually the life of any party, and at least once in my finder had his wandering hand removed from the shapely ass of his dancing partner.\r\n$ $Undaunted by belly or constraint, Ivan continues his lively demeanor this time with Toni.\r\n$ $Eddie, Kalina\'s mother-in-law Stanka and Christian amuse the newest Bulgarian-American of their clan, Anthony, age 4 months.\r\n$ $Metal sculptor Dan Blue was happy between two graceful dancers.\r\n$ $Kalina takes a break from preparing an all-out delicious dinner for 100 Bulgarians and three outsiders. Mom and Kalina\'s sister Livia watch the exemplary behavior of Livia\'s son, Anthony.\r\n$ $Determined to finish his second dessert, Uncle Stoyan plows through the Bulgarian pie yet again.\r\n$ $Hot dancer Poly teases her husband by hanging a napkin across his aging face.\r\n$ $Another hottie was long-legged Marina whose reticulated stockings, under those short Sofia shorts, matched her blouse. That\'s Ivan again in the background, grabbing his new partner for support.\r\n$ $The joy of Balkanizing with dear friends expresses itself in the nationalist anthem Mila Rodino. \r\n$

Kalina ceremoniously lights the 70 candle cake of her mother, who sets about the task of blowing it out. She needed help from the life of the party.

(Legendary Chicago-based photographer Art Shay has taken photos of kings, queens, celebrities and the common man in a 60-year career. This week, Art spends time with the people who got him through the past few months.)

The blonde bundle of energy wrapped up in Kalina Borissova cheerfully kept my dying wife Florence alive for her last painful weeks of ovarian cancer. At 8:30 each morning, Florence would awaken and yell, “Kaaaleeena!" Wherever I was in the house, I knew I was off the hook for dressing my wife, getting her down to breakfast, and giving her the shot of morphine that allayed her terminal pain.

Kalina became a member of our extended family of friends. Erica de Glopper (my gifted archivist), on the days she came down from Wisconsin to help bring you and many others, my pictures, became Kalina's friend, too. Dan Blue is a master metal sculptor, a veteran street fighter and crime fighter. As well as a dear friend of Erica's ,mine and Florence's too. He's brilliant, gifted and tough.

Thus it was that last Sunday we were the only outsiders at a fantastic Bulgarian party for Kalina's mother, who was turning a youthful 70. What with the artful cooking and Balkan mountain dances—the party lasted seven hours. In the four hours we were able to join Tzvetanka Goranova with my camera aimed at her wild celebration of being one of America's 250,000 thriving resident Bulgarians— one of millions of people occupying the mountainous redoubt at the foot of Europe, just above Turkey and those dire Bosporous Straits, whose capital's name, Sofia, echoes through its music and literature like a wild chime and a wild time.

If you can't wait until this time every Wednesday to get your Art Shay fix, please check out the photographer's blog, which is updated regularly. Art Shay's book, Chicago's Nelson Algren, is also available at Amazon.

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