no words needed.

love my own work

I have an extremely limited audience 

physically or online

so it is good that I enjoy my photos and my art projects.  

I am my own best fan.  

Smiling.... yep smiling. 

 Me enjoying my very own talents.  Full of myself.... ho ho....

 sage leaves

 many leaves

Arugula

borrowed from a friend the meaning of life..

What is the Meaning of Life?

Meaning is a concept that humans have created. We give meaning to behavior or events. Do plants or animals have “meaning?’ However the question is a worthy one. Allow me to revise it: “What is the purpose of life?”

The purpose of life is to uncover and execute the purpose of life. For me that purpose has been to learn that life is an unfathomable gift. Each of us is the recipient of countless gifts moment by moment. And, one of the ways to understand these countless gifts is to countthem. I first encountered this through a Japanese practice called Naikan.

Take a breath, look around and begin to innumerate what you are receiving at this moment. The wind cools me as I sit on the porch on a comfortable chair designed and fabricated by people I’ve never met. This computer assists me in gathering and storing these words compliments of a word processor that corrects my spelling and saves these thoughts. Someone spent great effort to create and execute this technology. Right now an electric oven is cooking potatoes to nourish me for lunch. Farmers planted and harvested these potatoes. In the distance I hear a foghorn that signals location for fisherman and boaters on the ocean nearby. A fleece blouse keeps me warm and fashionable. This blouse has a chain of makers and movers who brought it to me in the mail. People working in the Social Security Administration who sent me a check this month have allowed me to pay for this blouse.

I believe that the purpose of life is to come to know the myth of the “self made person.” No one has ever ‘done it on her own.’ Every human continues to live thanks to the efforts of others who make things and do things that support life.

Once I began to see this realistically I was moved to join this chain of givers in contributing something back that is useful or helpful. I can never repay all of those who create the conditions of life, but I can do a small part in giving something back to the world. I can use my daily calories to either contribute to the solution, or if I am mindless to the problem.

The Dalai Lama wrote: The True Meaning of Life: “We are visitors on this planet. We are here for ninety or one hundred years at the very most. During this period, we must try to do something good, something useful, with our lives. If you contribute to other people’s happiness, you will find the true goal, the true meaning of life.”

***

~Patricia Ryan Madson, author, professor Emerita from Stanford University.
www.ImprovWisdom.com

Bestest autumn colors

            Autumn fall arrives every year about the same time yet it is never the same twice. 

It is my favorite season for many reasons. 

 This year has been stunning and slow moving.... like good sex. 

 I have been picking up leaves to paint with and paint 

and this year really studying the colors.  

One thing about watercolor is color you notice it and try to duplicate it. 

 Not so easy that. 

 Leaves are bright and dull and pastel and primary and so much more AND they change overnight.  What is not to love when nature gives you this show.

River walk

Did the long walk down through the field, out to the beach and back through the bog. 

peas please

Really a few fewer peas would be pleasant.  

We have been feasting on them daily for awhile now.

They have all come in at once after waiting forever.  

Like asparagus and strawberries, one day you don't have any and then you have many many.

They are all so good in season and aren't we lucky to have them?

July has flowers

we are born and grow into our talents

 Nature is all around us and it thrills me and sometimes saddens me.  I wish it was something that I had learned at someone's knee and knew.  I am self taught and really kind of lost.  I know more than many, but not a great deal.  Are all the names important?  What I know is that nature has changed dramatically over the years.  It is so around us that you can't miss it.  More winds, more ticks, less birds, butterflies are just a little piece of the changing world here in our space.

This week birds would be the theme.  First I found a intact bird's nest which had been on a light on the garage, but had fallen.  I took it photographed it and put in on a planter attached to the garage.  It disappeared I thought.  I decided maybe it had slipped into the planter and it had AND a bird laid an egg in it.  No sign of birds.  Abandoned.  Probably best.  Not an easy place or safe.

Then Woodpecker ran into LR window the other day when Shunka and I were sitting out.  The bird damn near fell on the dog.  Shunka paid no attention to stunned bird.  I got gloves after looking at that beak.  Picked him up and took him down into the garden planning to put him on the ground.  He had a hold on the gloves and wasn't leaving so I sat on a rock and waited for him to pull himself together.  Took about 15 minutes when he took a deep breath and flew off. Nothing quite so neat as being that close to the wild.

And last I found a dead hummingbird which had also crashed into the LR window.  So small, so beautiful and so dead.  I placed it in the garden under flowers.  May it rest in peace.   

contemplation

Enough

Doing Enough

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once,

but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. 

Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this world,

will help immensely.  It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom

will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good.

What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts —

adding, adding to, adding more, continuing.

We know that it does not take “everyone on Earth”

to bring justice and peace,

but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second, or hundredth gale. 

—Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Two Lives..... really.....

MY SOUL HAS A HAT  

I counted my years
& realized that I have
less time to live by,
than I have lived so far.

I feel like a child who won a pack of candies: at first he ate them with pleasure,
but when he realized that there was little left, he began to taste them intensely.

I have no time for endless meetings
where the statutes, rules, procedures & internal regulations are discussed,
knowing that nothing will be done.

I no longer have the patience
to stand absurd people who,
despite their chronological age,
have not grown up.

My time is too short:
I want the essence,
my spirit is in a hurry.
I do not have much candy
in the package anymore.

I want to live next to humans,
very realistic people who know
how to laugh at their mistakes,
who are not inflated by their own triumphs
& who take responsibility for their actions.
In this way, human dignity is defended
and we live in truth and honesty.

It is the essentials that make life useful.
I want to surround myself with people
who know how to touch the hearts of those whom hard strokes of life
have learned to grow with sweet touches of the soul.

Yes, I'm in a hurry.
I'm in a hurry to live with the intensity that only maturity can give.
I do not intend to waste any of the remaining desserts.

I am sure they will be exquisite,
much more than those eaten so far.
My goal is to reach the end satisfied
and at peace with my loved ones and my conscience.

We have two lives
& the second begins when you realize you only have one.

poem by Mario de Andrade (San Paolo 1893-1945) Poet, novelist, essayist and musicologist.

__________________________

March 2019

 When do you thing we will see all this snow go off?

left behind

Each and every day of our entire lives we leave behind us a trail, 

an energy,  DNA, whatever.  

We move forward, on in life and yet a part of stays. 

For years we held a circle here in our home, on the lawn, in the yurt.  

Many people came on a Sunday afternoon and sat and talked, ate and left.  

They left a bit of themselves, their energy, spirit whatever you care to call it.  

It remains.  

Some of these people who sat with us have moved on to other places

 and some have left their earthly bodies, yet I know they still walk with us 

as do the cats, the dogs, the butterflies that have been here.  

That is such a reassuring feeling knowing that we and all others are still a part. 

Being one with all we are knit into this fabric of life.

Our little brains have a hard time holding on to this.

There is much that is bigger than us. 

Perhaps we should not think too hard, just be and believe

 and enjoy.

 

truely I believe

I was looking at Percival Periwinkle the other night and the light dawned.

Do you believe in magic and miracles?  

I do.

I believe in things unproven like fairies, time travel, spirits,

and

unicorns.

I have often felt if I looked at the right time I would see a unicorn in the fields.

They are out there.  Maybe like Brigadoon they are hidden in the mist.  Maybe it is just timing.

Why do I know this?  No clue.  Just do.

Percival Periwinkle came to me last summer/fall when I was mowing the fields.  Well actually I was mowing one of my overgrown path's in Joey's field.  Mowing, mowing and I spotted a wee fuzzy that was there in the middle of nowhere.  We have 80 acres, Joey twenty. This was way far from the house. O my my I thought.  This is wonderful!  This was a cute oh so cute new friend who I put on the mower with me and after finishing mowing I headed home.  

Got home! no new friend!  He had poofed.  I searched, retracing my mowing from pick up to home.  

You must understand that this is way tricky as I don't mow straight.  I am a creative artistic mower.

It took me days to refind my cute oh so cute friend.

Took him home and gave him a bath as he smelled like pee, fox pee?  dog pee?

Not so cute that!

He improved immensely, but he is a little bedraggled. Tough world out there.

How did he end up in the field and how long has he been there?

No clue.

My cute so cute purple friend has been hanging out on my bed upstairs

 until I recently  decided he should join me downstairs in the Ritchie Shunka bedroom.  

It was then that I decided a name was in order and after many starts a name was found.

Percival Periwinkle just perfect!

While feeding the Shunk the other night I was looking a Percival 

peeking out from behind the pillow and the 

light went on.

Why had I not seen this immediately?

Just take a good look at Percival and you will get it.

UNICORN  one horn is the translation.

There was a unicorn in the field.  In the middle of nowhere a Unicorn appeared 

Percival.

The field is probably full of them that I had not seen,

BUT One appeared and came to me 

because I believed and now is my friend.

Truly I believe this.

Nuts you say. Nuts to you say I.

If you believe positively and full heartedly, 

it is.

I believe in miracles, magic and unicorns and so much more.

Blessed be.

pondering