• Plants,  quotes

    Wonder

    April 30, 2022
    A bedraggled dandelion from the archives

    Wonder at reality demands the humility to sit at the foot of a dandelion. The proud are so full of themselves that there is little room to marvel at anything else.

    Thomas Dubay

    Our world is a mix of both, those who look with awe and wonder at the world and those who only look in their mirror. Hopefully, many of those looking in the mirror learn to turn away. I’m one of them. As a young man it was all about fishing, camping, anything outdoorsy. Then somewhere between the ages of 18-40 years the focus was on the American dream: the career, a family, a home, a car, the pursuit of money. Seemed to always be some carrot dangling out there. I spent a share of my life vainly looking at the mirror.

    I won’t list all the changes in my life which have allowed me to see life differently. But I do. I’ve heard it called finding a new pair of glasses. With these glasses I’ve discovered I know I don’t know it all, nor do I need to know it all, yet striving to become all that I can be. I’ve come to know it as humility. I become a teacher only by living as a student of life, knowing I will never know it all. Now I sit at the foot of dandelions and ants and sunrises… in wonder of it all!

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  • Avian,  Mary Oliver,  meadowlark,  poems

    You sing, I listen

    April 29, 2022

    Meadowlark, when you sing it’s as if
    you lay your yellow breast upon mine and say
    hello, hello, and are we not
    of one family, in our delight of life?
    You sing, I listen.
    Both are necessary
    if the world is to continue going around
    night-heavy then light–laden, though not
    everyone knows this or at least
    not yet,

    or, perhaps, has forgotten it
    in the torn fields,

    in the terrible debris of progress.

    Mary Oliver, Meadowlark Sings and I Greet Him In Return

    We need rain. So far for the month of April we have .1 inch of rain. Dixon Reservoir is really low at Pineridge Natural Area. As I watch the sun rise four mule deer graze before me. And, the meadowlarks sing and I listen.

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  • flowers,  haiku,  Plants,  writing/reading

    Unopened Gift

    April 27, 2022
    Pink tulips are making their appearance

    pointing skyward
    warm colors of new life
    unopened gift

    ms

    Found this tulip among its siblings outside the coffee shop. They were a gift that made the start to my day brighter. Then… I enjoyed my mocha.

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  • Plants,  quotes,  trees

    The sacred in nature

    April 26, 2022

    We all have within us a sense of the sacred, a sense of reverence, however we may articulate it. It is a part of our human nature…it is a fundamental recognition of the wonder, beauty, and divine nature of the world.

    LLewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Season of the Sacred

    As I walked across campus the other morning I noticed these tree branches with their new leaves popping to greet the blue sky. I stopped, said thank you then took a couple of images. I wonder if I stopped because I heard a whisper from the trees, “Pssst, look at me.” I’m not sure how long ago I began seeing the sacred in nature but I do believe it is a part of our human nature.

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  • Camera Equipment

    Camera bag review… sorta

    April 25, 2022

    I have been looking at the 15L Peak Design Zip Backpack for quite some time but resisting because I felt it was to expensive for my wallet. I have been using two backpacks: the TOPO Designs, in their older version that was 20L in size, and the Lowepro Flipside Trek 350. I was using these two because I haven’t found one that met all my needs/wants. I am very much aware there is no perfect camera bag/backpack and just wrote about it here but this one sure looked promising. I’m not sure if this seemingly lifelong obsession is GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) or indigestion. Anyway, I finally pushed the order button on Feb 5th. Here’s what I think after a few weeks with it.

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  • quotes

    Wonders at Wondering

    April 24, 2022
    Sunset along the Washington coast – 2003

    I stand at the seashore, alone, and start to think. There are the rushing waves… mountains of molecules, each stupidly minding its own business… trillions apart… yet forming white surf in unison.

    Ages on ages… before any eyes could see… year after year… thunderously pounding the shore as now. For whom, for what?… on a dead planet, with no life to entertain.

    Never at rest… tortured by energy… wasted prodigiously by the sun… poured into space. A mite makes the sea roar.

    Deep in the sea, all molecules repeat the patterns of one another till complex new ones are formed. They make others like themselves… and a new dance starts.

    Growing in size and complexity… living things, masses of atoms, DNA, protein… dancing a pattern ever more intricate.

    Out of the cradle onto the dry land… here it is standing… atoms with consciousness… matter with curiosity.

    Stands at the sea… wonders at wondering… I… a universe of atoms… an atom in the universe.

    Richard Feynman
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  • clouds,  landscape,  natural areas,  Plants,  quotes,  reflections,  trees

    More questions…

    April 23, 2022
    Sunset over Riverbend Ponds Natural Area

    Walt Whitman wrote over 150 years ago in his book Leaves of Grass that the United States: is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. It seems like a good question to ask ourselves: How well does each of us hold to the idea we are a nation of nations? It’s also interesting that the first word in our Constitution is we. Which leads to another question: how and who defines “we”? Yes, I’m a thinkin and asking questions again this morning. Hoping you have a wonderful weekend!

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