Tag Archives: nature

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Beyond

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Do you have a photo which invites the viewer to look beyond? Are there hidden depths in the background? Is the focal point just a framing for the rest of the picture? If it’s not clear why we should look beyond, tell us! Lead us through the story in your photo.

December 22, 2012,  just at dusk.  I am upstairs, in bed, cold, alone.  The world did not end, even though the sun is far away.  I feel disconnected from warmth.  I look out my window.  The neighbors advertise their jolly associations, but I do not belong to that club.  I look beyond…the sky is aflame, fire licks around the turquoise expanse of our atmosphere, the sun invites me to the outer edges of my vision.  There is the belonging, there the community, there the warmth.  Beyond.  The Universe is bigger than we imagine, and so are we.

Beyond

Beyond

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Illumination

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“Lights are functional — everyday objects in our rooms and on our streets. Yet lights can be powerful symbols: signs of life, curiosity, and discovery. ”  So goes the challenge description for this week.  My first instinct was to think of the photos I took New Year’s Eve of candlelight at the table.  I’ve been experimenting with low key lighting and how to bump my camera settings to accommodate that.  But I’ve already posted some of those.  My next thought was to post one I took yesterday, and I think it’ll be my choice.  True to my own natural preference, the light I’ve chosen is the very essence and source of life, curiosity, and discovery – the Sun.  At this time of year, we drift farther away from our sustaining Star.  A gauzy shroud interferes.  We are in a state of indirect, ethereal contact.  Our longing is enhanced and unsatisfied.  We pause to ponder the diminishment.  Physically, we may suffer on a cellular level. Emotionally, we may avoid or embrace this spiritual journey into greater darkness. 

I was walking through the Arboretum at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.  I came to the crest of a hill from the north and descended towards the Visitor Center when I saw this tree lit from the south by the winter sun.  I hope you like this interpretation of Illumination:

Winter illumination

Winter illumination

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Changing Seasons

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Changing Seasons is this week’s theme, but  Nature is always changing, and the parameters we use to describe a “season” are artificial.  I would imagine that any nature photo would depict change in some way, so I am anticipating a lot of cool nature shots will be hitting the blogs this week.  Yippee!  I do have one to share, taken last February as ice was melting at Wehr Nature Center.  Spring arrived very early in 2012.  Climate change is noticeable here in Wisconsin, as it is in many parts of the globe.  How do you live with change?  Happily accepting and learning from it?  Resisting and avoiding it?  Oscillating on that spectrum somewhere?  It’s always interesting to observe myself when change manifests.  The challenge for me is to be gentle and not judgmental in that observation. 

I have another picture to share, but I can’t post it except in words.  Late last night, I heard the call of a Great Horned Owl outside.  It was the second time in a week that I’d heard it.  Steve had heard it a few days ago and called me in to his office to listen.  I thought at first it was the hoot of my own breathing in my head as I grew quiet to listen.   Then, unmistakably, a pattern emerged.  I looked up the audio track on the internet to identify what kind of an owl it was.  We went outside to look.  It was coming from west of our house, but a street lamp shone in the mid distance making it impossible to see anything in the trees in that direction.  Last night, I heard the sound again from the bedroom.  I looked out the east window at the top of the stairs and saw a silhouette in the tallest bare tree in the neighborhood.  It looked like a huge cat with pointed ears, bunching and stretching way up in the tree.  The cloudy night sky reflected the city lights just enough to show an outline.  The wavy old glass, dirty and screen-covered, made it even more difficult to make out, even with binoculars.   But there he was, large and spirit-like, hooting in the night air.   I knew this mystery could not be captured on film, so I resolved to keep it in my head and share it in story. 

changing seasons

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Wehr Have You Been?

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Yesterday, I returned to the Wehr Nature Center where I had volunteered as a trail guide for their school programs before I got a job as a historic interpreter.  It was good to see the place again, the furry and scaly and feathered and leafy friends as well as the humans.  I was helping sell snacks for their Homemade Holiday event.  Families bustled about creating holiday decorations and cookies throughout the building, while a moist, gray blanket of fog settled warmly outside.  When the activities were over, I grabbed my camera and headed out for a walk around the lake.  Dusk crept up, and Canada geese honked loudly from surface to sky, jockeying for shelter for the night.  It was as if I was looking at an old friend wearing an expression I’d not seen before.  Some things had changed: new fences were in place.  The duck blind at the edge of the lake had been repaired.  I felt like we’d both been out of touch for a while.  I sat down on a bench to renew our acquaintance. 

December silhouette

December silhouette

Old and new

Old and new

Wehr

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections

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I do a lot of reflecting in my mind.  Every so often, I also do it with my camera.  This week’s photo challenge prompts me to share a few shots.  It’s not coincidental, probably, that my reflections show the natural world off some man-made surface.  A window.  A puddle in the pavement.  How often do you feel that you’re looking at real life through the rear-view mirror?  What is it that keeps you from turning fully around and facing it head on? 

reflections

reflections 2

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Two-Minute Cosmic Worship Break

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My mother serendipitously re-sent me a video that I had been searching for amongst my 4,000 saved e-mails.  I am in need of this video on a regular basis, and once you see it, you’ll know why.  I think I may have posted it before, but like looking up to see the horizon, it must be done often to stay sane.  Enjoy, re-blog, share…repeat.  (Not like shampoo instructions, which are entirely bogus.  Who lathers twice in one shower?)

I can’t seem to get the screen posted right here, so click this link until I figure it out.

Well, okay, it seems that WordPress requires a space upgrade to get the screen to show.  Please click the link, though.  I promise your two minutes will be rewarded!

 

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Special Photo Challenge: Inspiration

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The WordPress Daily Post sent me an interesting challenge: “For this special mid-week photo challenge, we want to see portraits of you doing something that inspires you to blog.”  The challenge for me is that I am rarely in a photo, as I’m usually the one behind the camera!  However, I found a selection of 5 photos that may serve this purpose. 

The theme of my blog is “Striving to live gracefully in my 50th year.”  I began it on my 49th birthday, and its purpose was to give me a vehicle for sharing my journey toward maturity in writing and pictures.  I find inspiration for growth all around me.  These pictures illustrate just a few examples.  Here is a self-portrait of me wearing the corset that was part of my costume as a historic interpreter.  That job inspired many posts about history, lifestyle, and preservation.  Here is a picture of me with my father before he died of Alzheimer’s disease.  I have met others who are caring for a parent with dementia through this blog, and questions of facing mortality, change, loss and frustration with grace have inspired many posts and comments.  Here is a picture of me hiking in Zion National Park.  Nature inspires me and demands my maturity every day.  How are we to live in harmony on this planet with all other living and non-living things?  Here is a picture of me with my children and my partner and other members of Team Galasso setting out on a walk to raise funds for the American Diabetes Association.  My husband died almost 5 years ago from complications of diabetes, namely heart disease.  The process of grieving his death and parenting our children drives much of the writing which finds its way into my blog.   And finally, here is a picture of me beside a campfire with an abandoned lamb who is dying of starvation without its mother.  It illustrates the compassion that inspires me to blog, to connect with humanity through words and photos, to face the reality of our common suffering without looking away, simply to be present in the world, aware, and alive.

Me and Dad, in the final stages of Alzheimer’s
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Hiking in Hunting Season

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It was a quiet Sunday along the Ice Age Trail…until the Packer’s football game ended.  “Blaze orange” jackets and shotgun blasts began to add noise mid-afternoon.  Steve and I are both creeped out by the gun culture.  Not that we don’t acknowledge the usefulness of procuring food and enjoying exercise.  The violence that these weapons invite seems to us completely unnecessary.   Is that an integral part of “hunting”?  Why is hunting a social norm in the Midwest?  I don’t remember fall being a time when people went hunting when I lived in California…they were mostly anticipating ski season.  Anyway, here’s what I shot on my excursion:

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Renewal

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This prompt complements my previous post for today, I think.  Renewal, new beginnings, evolution, the marvelous process of life.  I have two photos that illustrate this concept, both taken with my old camera (the little Lumix, not the Rebel T3i).