John Small. Photos.

Going deeper.

This is one you should see on my other website where more depth and detail can be shown.

Fog. I love fog.

I got up really early.

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My Fascination With Water

Years ago I took a drawing class and sat once and looked at water for a long time trying to figure out "what it looked" like.  Drawing seemed to require that things stand still, like models who return to the same pose, in the same light, week after week of a painting class.  Saying "water", as if it's one thing, sure missed the point.

It's no wonder that there are lots of metaphors about the mind and water.  Turbulent, or still and reflective?

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This made me laugh.

I have to repost these two together.

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Going through the year's photos

This is just nice.  Hurricane Ridge in July.  I took my telescope up and spent the night up there stargazing. 

You know, that was a really great excursion.  I experimented with caffeine and camera ALL night.  If you look closely at the image below, you might see that I'm slightly transparent.  Now how did that happen?

 

I'm also in this picture.

Merry Christmas

Found this view a couple days ago.  Happy Holidays.

 

Discovery Park. Solstice Sunset.

I confess; I was late for sunset.  Which was unearthly golden today.  I notice, when I don't give myself time, how slow traffic is.  Yes, walking around with a camera is often contemplative for me, and infuriatingly slow for anyone with me, but the sun moves across that sky and plummets toward the horizon much faster than you think.  Ironically Solstice means "Sun Stop".  

A rushed state of mind, and "dammit I'm late, the good light is gone." makes the see first, then photograph practice more elusive.  

And it was FREEZING out there so I gave up pretty fast.  

And of course as soon as I give up, something will catch my eye.  The moss on the old asphalt was glowing.  

The more I do this, the more I notice these first glimpse "now that's interesting" impulses that start somewhere in the subtle, easily drowned out bandwidths of the conscious.

I set up my tripod and forgot I was cold.

How many times a day do the quieter "now that's interesting" moments get drowned out?

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The Tall Grass

I'm reposting these images because I ran across a poem that is the perfect companion.

From A fellow blogger, Senshin.  Thank you!

The Summer Day

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

By Mary Oliver from New and Selected Poems, 1992

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Walks around Greenlake.

Some days, I walk over to University Ave (to my favorite coffee, Herkimer) from Phinney Ridge.  Problem is, it takes me three hours because I start looking at things, and I'm not taking that walk without a camera, so...

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I love Winter

I wonder how many people are thinking it's too cold, and hoping for a milder winter than last year.

I, on the other hand, am hoping we get blasted, completely shut down by six foot, car burying drifts, the ice on Green Lake covers the whole thing and people start skating and ice fishing.  I want to snowshoe around and take pictures.  And eat ice cream cones.  Yeah, you heard me.

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