you will never know where the door leads until you risk its opening
Weekly Photo Challenge: Door
Open Door
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Category Archives: humanity
Treasure Chest
the tool box is mine the knowledge -- the legacy -- comes from my father
Photo 101 Assignment Sixteen: Treasure and Close-up.
Warmth
warm sunlight
warm colors
warm smile
warm embrace...
a moment that warms my soul.
Photo 101 Assignment Nine: Warmth & Quality of Light
Dancing Water (photo essay)
Along a street that I have driven hundreds of times in the past, my eyes were drawn this morning to a water feature in front of an office building. The early morning sunlight sparkled brilliantly off the cascading stream that cycled through a structure of concrete, rough boulders and river rock. I pulled over to check it out.
The fountain itself isn’t much to look at. With a casual glance from the street, one sees a sheet of water pouring over a concrete crossbeam and disappearing amidst some nondescript boulders.
Closer examination reveals that the water has been intentionally channeled (“choreographed,” one might say) to flow in streams that dance and glisten in the sunlight as they freefall to the rocks below.
I am reminded of the phrase “water over the dam,” which implies that something is over and done with and cannot be retracted or reconsidered. How many of us live as though the decisions and actions of our past have left us in a freefall of dire consequences over which we have no control?
Maybe water over the dam should mean that whatever happened in our past, “good” or “bad,” served to push us beyond sitting stagnant behind a wall of mediocrity, and has freed us to dance and sparkle in the sunlight on our way to something new.
We can choose to see the fountain as half empty or half full. Oh, wait, that’s an entirely different analogy. Never mind.
I’m glad I stopped to look at the fountain, and I’m going to try to be more observant of my surroundings in the future. Who knows? Maybe tomorrow I’ll find some water under the bridge.
World Oceans Day (photo essay)
Expansive and deep,
beautiful but volatile,
ample force to turn
vessels to splinters.
Teeming with life,
ceaselessly churning,
an indefatigable
dynamo.
Kissed by the sun,
caressed by the winds,
extolled by poets
and sailors alike.
Sustainer of life
as we know it on Earth,
yet with all its
grandeur and might…
still fragile.
What could be big enough to threaten and endanger our oceans (and thus our planet)?
Microplastics.
Microplastics particles, which are smaller than five millimeters in size, likely pose a massive environmental and human health risk when they enter our natural waterways.
Toxins including DDT, BPA and pesticides adhere to the particles, and because they can resemble plankton, they’re often ingested by small aquatic life. The toxins biomagnify as they move up the food chain, accumulating in birds, fish, marine mammals and potentially humans.
June 8th, 2015 is World Oceans Day.
What can we do to help “turn the tide” on the dangerous amounts of plastics polluting the oceans?
- We can work to increase awareness of the issue. Here’s a video of how one artist is doing that: Invisible Ocean: Plankton and Plastic. But it doesn’t have to be that complicated.
- We can choose not to buy and use products that contain plastic microbeads (as in certain brands of toothpaste, facial cleansers, soaps…).
- We can avoid using disposable plastic bags. (Take the Better Bag Challenge.)
These may seem like small steps toward tackling such a large problem ( just “a drop in the ocean,” so to speak), but that’s how things get done. Small actions lead to big changes.
Let’s act today.
Thanks to Jane (Just Another Nature Enthusiast) and her challenge at UNLESS: Earth-friendly Chroniclers: Challenge 11~ “Healthy Oceans – Healthy Planet” for the inspiration.
On the Way
On my way today
I paused to watch others
who were on their way.
I wonder when any of us will
actually arrive,
and whether we will even realize it
once we do.
Weekly Photo Challenge: On the Way
While Sitting on the Porch
While sitting on the porch
of the rustic cabin in the quiet pine forest,
I sense the faint beginnings
of the restoration of my soul.
I scan the wooded vistas,
seeing so much farther than
the usual confines of my restricted horizons,
seeing so much deeper into the reaches
of my self-forsaken heart.
Listening to the magpies
and the ospreys and jays, and
those pale green birds with the
beautiful songs that dance across the air,
I feel my inner voice begin to hum,
seeking out that melody that has for far too long
been scorned into silence.
I inhale deeply of the fresh forest air,
and I am finally able to exhale, long and slow,
releasing the toxic fear and tension
that I have been holding inside me
as if it were my last dying breath.
I can abide comfortably for once
among the trusted few that accompany me.
A light joke, a sweet hug…
fists and jaw and heart unclenching
like a leaf unfolding into new growth,
I open to the freedom that is offered
in the security of this sacred environment.
It is the quenching of a thirst long overdue.
Amidst the stillness of nature,
my own nature steps tentatively forward,
and I welcome my reawakening soul
as one would welcome the arrival of an old friend…
while sitting on the porch.
In Work
In Work I am co-creator with the One Creator, co-creator with all in the One Creation. In Work I sow seeds for the Harvest. A touch, a smile, a benevolent word… all are seed for Creation. Yet, what is the fruit of my work? When I dance on the shore and add my voice to the songs of the waves, can I know today that my song will touch a soul months, years, centuries from now? Can I know the steps of my dance will be remembered and retraced, long after their mark has been washed clear of the sandy beach? If this is so, shall I not rewrite the song? Make the tune more melodious, or the words more noble, perhaps? Add a swift spin or an elegant dip to the dance in vainglorious tribute to me… But then creation Work will have ceased and ego work commenced. And if my singing is lost to the uproar of the sea, if the imprint of my dance disappears with the sweep of the next tide, do I withhold the song, refrain from dancing? For Whom am I Working? If I cease the Work of sowing, I cease being a co-creator. And then what am I? In strained faith, I continue to sow. The harvest of my work I leave to the Harvester, Who knows when fruition is complete.
Mother’s Day
No need to honor my motherly love. Indeed, the honor is mine.
Pink
“Is he part Shar-Pei?” she asks. She hands my latte out the drive-through window. “All those wrinkles!”
Bella glares from the passenger seat, indignant at being mistaken for a male, let alone a Shar-Pei. Look at the pink collar, for Chrissake!
“No, she’s just a worrier, so her forehead wrinkles. Part boxer, part lab.” Part opportunist, waiting for me to set my drink in the cup holder between us.
A pink collar doesn’t necessarily indicate gender, I tell Bella as we drive away.
I know of a male dog named Pink. He’s black. He wears a pink collar. His owner, holding onto Pink’s pink leash, spoke of a prior pet dying of cancer. This is his tribute to the deceased pet. Pink doesn’t seem to care what color his collar and leash are. He’s comfortable in his masculinity. And he’s not a worrier like Bella.
I’m not going to worry either, I decide. I don’t want to get worry wrinkles on my forehead, lest someone mistakes me for a Shar-Pei and tries to collar me.
Bella is skeptical that that would ever happen. Her wrinkles unfold a bit as she stretches to lick the foam off the lid to my latte. You should worry, though, she tells me. After all, you think you’re conversing with a dog.
And next time? Ask for non-fat. My collar is getting a bit tight and I need to watch my figure.
Shar-Pei indeed!
What Rhymes with Stanza? 