Cultivating Gratitude

Being in a state of gratitude, Say the gurus leads to a mental peace, even bliss.

Pulling the veils off commonality to feel the aha light of warmth that comes with thankful memories of a moment when my father reached out to show me beauty and a miracle of even a broken mussel shell was handed to me, then, long ago on a beach near Amsterdam.

Perhaps, that day, the gift of recognizing beauty was given me, and I am so thankful to creation that I was chosen to follow beauty as a mission, and to share it with those who doubt that whether God, or not, our lives are each a miracle, and while I'm sure chance had a major role, there's something else driving the universe, and when I am in awe of creation, and simultaneously thankful with all my soul for the opportunity to be here today, here, now and fully aware.  Then, gratitude is a sort of bliss, and I search for as many things I took for granted to recognize, as I can.

Wabi Sabi or the art of Decay

      Ah, the forlorn sight of history ignored, wasted, decomposed, and expressed in warped geometric shadows...why do I find this beautiful?  Perhaps because it says more clearly than any words what the ultimate fate of all things will be...decay, and ultimately disappearance...

     Some inner voice, the preserver, wants to shout..."Save this! It's important to the story of that part of Washington State centered on Chelan and Douglas Counties.  The vast open spaces around Waterville and the immense winters long kept these people isolated until machinery capable of keeping roads open in blizzards and snowdrifts from wind.

     Nonetheless, standing before this house brings imagery of a very hardworking isolated family whose neighbors were miles away, and who needed to be prepared for harsh winters.   Perhaps, as a European born child after WWII in Amsterdam with memories of recent war torn buildings I am unconsciously also drawn to my early childhood, as I see the comings and goings of decades and centuries of buildings, people, artifacts, and the lack of interest we show in even the previous few decades, like JFK's assasination almost as antique in the mind of youth as Abraham Lincoln's.

    Words like abondonment, neglect, waste, and a sense of sadness that we have come to this, that families no longer have an option to live 'off' the land to supply their needs unless they can carry a huge mortgage.

Knots in Weathered Siding

     Wood knots share their name with knots in rope for good reasons. Knots are not easy to untie, and wood knots particularly tend to be that portion of the wood with greatest density around which the rest of the wood has to migrate.
It is dehydrated artery and vein of the tree seen in cross section.
Weathered wood from abandoned houses provide inspiration, and reflection on our history and our past, but they also conjure up the analogies of knots in our souls, knots in our relationships, knots tied too loosely, and knots tied too tightly.
As with the tree, our knot should not only be a tie, but also a confluence of nutrients, a path to flowing saps that will determine it strength, continued growth, and contain a template of past years.

     

Because this knot was taken from the siding of an old house near Waterville  off Highway 2, that had long been abandoned, and the house in total disrepair, I couldn't help but think of history, and why we cannot see that our history, what our ancestors, both Native American and European invaders who lived here, had to endure ( before cell phones (-: )and the lifestyles necessary for their survival, 

And yet a knot still exists, larger and more complex than ever, but it is there, part of an even greater knot, or web as knots are hard to untie.  

Likewise the knots in our mind, those harder transfer points of mind, soul, and body.  Here, knots can cause problems, they need to be carefully monitored as not too tight, or too lose.

Families must work with these knot networks to make sure the flow is even, not crusted, and lubricated from time to time, as oil, on a wood knot will help preserve it as well.

Contemposcribe

The closer you look, the more fascinating it gets...

      Another dormancy has arrived...a few hours of precious daylight, sometimes even the sun.  Knowing the landscape, I've learned these early winter days leave fascinating advances and retreats of water vs. ice, and that the frozen fluid shapes reveal a lot about every moment each frozen layer encountered, much like we're learning about our world through tree rings.
Then I sat down, and looked at one bubble frozen temporarily in time, and saw the complex web of tubules and fractures, curves and micro-infrastructure was involved even in the 3 inch bubble, frozen.
Of course I had to do a lot of manipulating the original to reveal this complexity, but that we can illustrate using what we see, although enhanced, is itself a miracle.

It starts with watching the pan too close.  The fluorescent lights up above the stove reflect the surface tension in clear white lines, and the shapes are reminiscent of the primal coming together of the chaos of the universe.

Then, the software for using a digital image as if in a darkroom with a negative and, as Ansel Adams said, "using the negative as a conductor would use the score for directing the symphony."

                                                         As a fractal enthusiast, and admirer of chaos theory and the Mandelbrot set, I couldn't help but jump into some of the vortexes created by even the smallest amount of dry matter sticking above the surface of the soup.  These patterns, which are recognized in other cultures, too, as 'Ur-patroon" by Feininger, or Li by Chinese artists...the repetitive but always changing shapes  morphing, yet following some constants that create patterns on several dimensions simultaneously.  I'm no mathematician, nor scientist, nor physicist, but the underlying harmonies, beauty, and shapes found in the art of our ancestors because they do follow the forces of the Tao, these visual clues that this miracle we call our universe is so magnificent in every detail.                                                        

The patience and openness to experience new paradigms, new perceptions of reality, new entrances to other explanations, is what drives my photography, my image making, and sometimes, even art.

 Abstractions Help Remove Biases

     Looking along the road when the last evening sunlight shines through some golden grass and a knapweed with junky but still quite circular backgrounds, it helps to overcome the inner bias that trash along the road and unrecycled trash should not be lying like an eyesore along the road...this road being North Dryden Rd in Chelan County, and the collected detritus of the "King Ranch" which lies there predictably every year all seasons for photo studies of rural decay and wabi sabi...I'll probably miss it all when someone finally orders the country to remove it because of the toxic waste leaking down the bank into the river below.

Morphic Resonance or Waves or Vibrations or Ripples or Reflections

     Perhaps my first 'aha' awareness moment in life came when I saw the rings from a penny I'd thrown in the water...
My mind melted with the reflecting lines of the buildings of Amsterdam spiraling out with ever wider wavelets and my why? light went off.
     Now, in a time when we speak of curved time and space, quantum reality of chance, molecular and microbiotic universes the question, "Which is real, the reflection or the reflectee?" it becomes necessary, as usual, to have to say "Both"
     I suppose it all sounds  kind of New-Agey, but there does seem to be an analogical relevance to ideas of vibes and harmony, flow, and meditation to arrive at new paradigms of our existence, how it is interacting with all of its parts, and how the slightest act will have lasting consequences once the interacting vibrations and their ripple effect are fully understood.

The Threshold of Winter

Frost on the puddle, even in the afternoon, yet still one yellow Cottonwood Leaf against an otherwise stark black and white background enriched by a multitude of etched webbed crossing lines from several dimensions, both reflected and real.

It is here that my brain analogizes reality into the patterns I see in life, the contrasts we are brought up with, the irreconcilable blacks and whites, not willing to grey.

This Poem Came to Mind as I Posted This on My Flickr Site

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pictoscribe/10683218215/

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The Threshold of Winter's Hold

The Threshold of Winter's Hold

Papa taught me about Black and White,

and Color or No Color,

Then Warm versus Cold

And soon Right and Wrong?

Depending on whose point of view,

Realistic - Unrealistic.

Bad or Good?

And often it would come down to"We'll see!"

Bare branches, Fallen leaves,

Darker nights, Shorter days.

First frost.

Crystals shake hands with fluid molecules ...

 the dance 

of 

hydrogen and oxygen.

Staring down, at the basics,

The lines etched in fluid,

Ever changing states of being,

Amazing grace,

Seen from the right angle,

Open to each moment,

Like a final gasp.

                               

Looking into the universe of a cup of coffee.

Observation

     Looking into a cup of coffee after installing the new ultra-light daylight lamps in four bars, and suddenly I see the surface tension of the round cup and the liquid, the floating particles of powdered milk and my eyes are drawn into memories of recent science theories of infinite numbers of universes, and warped space, vortexes, black holes, and just looking at my coffee cup, I suddenly understand it all.  (-: