New Year's Tanka

The moment that brings in
new life, light and hope
arrives glistening and gleaming
splashing out on the dark shore
an auld lang syne

Let's Hope It's a Good One

After reading accounts of Saddam Huessin's execution, more accounts of violence and continuing to question and work against the insanity that we call a war in Iraq, I couldn't help but pull a phrase from John Lennon's "Happy Xmas(War is Over) and share the sentiment for the fast approaching 2007:

Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear

I caught this little girl in Yosemite, I thought it fit.

I Want...

Two happenings today that inspired tonight's note. I was having my hair done at the salon and was sitting by a full plate glass window when two little guys wandered by on their way to the movie theatre next door. We had quite the non-verbal conversation till their mother laughing, pulled them on their way. I had a big smile on my face too.

Someone connected me to John Denver's mid-70s song written for a benefit dedicated to children, called "I Want To Live". It is a wonderful song, full of word images, pleas and still as appropriate today as it was 30 years ago:

"...I want to live, I want to grow
I want to see, I want to know
I want to share what I can give
I want to be, I want to live ...."

This picture of a brother and sister was taken a couple of weeks ago and seemed to fit that spirit.

Post Holiday Blues

Took today off from work as I was still feeling a bit tired from the holiday rush . I did a bit of post holiday shopping with some gift cards, but was soon back inside due to the weather. It got cold, rainy and raw quickly. The kind of day where you want a cozy corner, good book and something warm and soothing to drink.

Due to the shopping trip, I decided to work on this photo in Photoshop and turned it out as a cyanotype. It reminded of a time when you went shopping with your mother and would dart under the skirts to hide and pretend an whole other world existed. I saw a toddler do just that when I was preparing to take this photo.

Lessons

Christmas day and I'm celebrating gifts and lessons. Ruth Bernhard died earlier this week at 101, and ironically I was given a biography about her as a gift this am: Ruth Bernhard Between Art and Life. There is a signed piece of her work in our college that the head of the program had obtained and this began my interest He had been lucky enough to meet both her and Ansel Adams when he was a student. I prefer her work and philosophy.

As I was sitting and sipping Republic of Teas "Tea of Inquiry", a green tea with roasted rice and eating Meyer Lemon Sables which I had made late last night (thanks to Molly at Orangette) I perused the chapters and found this:

"...I always aim to help people have clearer vision and thus to live more fully-the basic development of a creative person and a good photographer. We may not verbalize the most important aspects of our lives, but we often can photograph them as equivalents of our feelings. Thus creative work is born of emotional necessity. It represents the fulfillment of an artist's thoughts and feelings. Art is communion: speaking from heart to heart. The camera is only a tool for the photographer. The artist is only successful only if she can use the tools at hand to express feelings. Feeling produces identification with the subject...I try to become the subject of my camera. I seek harmony. I want to express the connection we have beyond time and beyond the body to all of nature."

As I struggle to make the transition to becoming a flaneuse photographer, these are lessons to learn indeed.

Dancing the Light

The solstice just passed and the days are subtly growing longer. The old reflection is there, connected to the present, reaching to the future..

We dance ever slower as the leaves fall and spin
And the sound of the Horn is the wailing of the wind;
The Earth is wrapped in stillness and we move in a trance,
but we hold on fast to our faith in the dance.

The sun is in the south and the days lengthen fast,

And soon we'll sing for the winter that is past,

Now we light the candles and rejoice as they burn,

and Dance the dance of the sun's return.

Lord of the Dance (traditional)