Vineyard, Matakana NZ.
Calm Before The Calm
Orewa Beach, Auckland NZ
As calm as an ocean gets.
A beach as flat as a pancake.
Gorgeous, idyllic, serene et cetera.
Fantastic for a day, a week maybe.
What if your life was this scene, endlessly?
That’s not being calm, that’s becalmed ; the doldrums, in which your ship stalls.
Maybe it’s just me, but when matters are progressing really smoothly for any length of time, it’s easy to go on auto pilot, to think: “I’ve got this.”
And that’s precisely when I need to beware.
I don’t wish for turbulence, storms or (god forbid) shipwrecks but if they occur, they (if nothing else) take away my driftwood-like complacency…
Trinity
Three,of course, is a prime number – only divisible by itself.
The sculpture piece pictured here, with its three conjoined hands, speaks of unity and that which only itself can divide.
A flesh triangle of simple form and strength, against a spiky palm backdrop.
“We are all in this together, come what may” it says to me.
Bottled
…and sometimes it was you that drank that bottle dry.
They picked the shards from your scalp.
Stitched your wounds.
Had faith in you, and faith that you would share that faith, when you had lost it.
Even when all has been drained…
DON’T
LOSE
FAITH.
The Same Voice That Calls
“Whether we call it sacrifice, or poetry, or adventure, it is always the same voice that calls”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Just one question really – what is it that calls you over your known edge, past your fear, to that thing beyond ?
Blow Your Own Chimney!
Chimney Tops, Pittenweem, Scotland
Albeit a bit of a global warming horror show, I was delighted at this rooftops vista in Fife.
Rows and rows of chimney pots like soldiers on parade. Dozens of the buggers! And hundreds more throughout the village…
It wasn’t cold enough in mid-autumn for smoke to have been puffing from the chimneys.
Had it been, the ghost of my coal mining grandfather would surely have smiled…
Monolith In Monochrome
After yesterday’s flirtation with neon in Eighties Palm Regret, it’s back to basics and a return to black and white.
The subject matter is a million miles from palm fans waving in the breeze, even though the the scenes in the pictures were only metres away from each other.
Water sculpted rock – pure, solid and immovable.
The shape is as fantastical as any by an abstract sculptor, all layers and angular beauty.
I was a little awestruck actually, but strangely reassured by the rock’s transformation over time by the elements.
I’d like to think that time and adversity sculpt us all into striking and unique entities.
Eighties Palm Regret
Palm fans, shot on the weekend, get some (probably regrettable) 1980s neon hues.
No idea why, as I spent most of that decade running from that particular art and fashion tendency.
Possibly it’s a bad flashback to a time that had no regrets about itself, even though it damn well should have. I am looking at you, Boy George and Wham…
And I had a thing for potted palms at the time, thinking they were the height of interior decorating sophistication, dragging them around from one short term abode to the next.
Ah, good times…
I Believe You Are A Rock Star
Food That Pleases
Majestic Diner, Atlanta GA
You don’t come to this joint, or others like it, for the haute cuisine.
You might though if you’re hungry, famished even, need coffee (and lots of it), chat with a friend, or just hang out at any time of the day or night. And you can see your meal cooking on the grill in the kitchen before you get it.
The art deco neon signage in the top picture proclaims the simple pleasure of food.
The diner is described in utilitarian fashion on the internet thus: “Landmark diner serving classics including blue-plate specials & grits 24/7 since 1929”.
Heritage, check.
All day, every day, check.
Grits, check.
And not just any grits. Buttered grits. That come with your eggs.
Cheese, too, in your “de luxe burger”. All kinds, as long as its American or Swiss, and you don’t mind that the Swiss sort is probably American too. If you’re eating the burger, you don’t mind, because you’re probably starving or just not that fussy.
It’s all splendidly functional, yet the old school diner revels in its own American history and mythology, as told in film, story and song. Tom Waits’s ‘Nighthawks At The Diner’ album and Suzanne Vega’s ‘Tom’s Diner’ are memorable examples of the latter.
Everyone needs to eat, and diners are non-denominational temples to food where the sacraments are served to the faithful, good, quick and hot.
Egalitarian, in that the rich and poor, the loved and the lonely, and those of every stripe in between, get the same service and can all chow down or sip coffee in proximity to each other, without anyone really giving a flying f**k about who you are or why you are there.
Food, and a vibe, that pleases…
Cross The Sky
Deconscecrated Church, Glenfield NZ.
The simplicity of the circled cross, a stark symbol against the deep blue sky.
The symmetry of the angled white timber work under the eaves.
Two gleaming halves, mirror images.
They drew me in, these minor miracles, when I visited the building yesterday.
The former church has lost its sacred status to fulfill other uses today, but its uncomplicated appearance still has a striking purity about it…
A Postcard From Asia
Magnolia Dream
‘Magnolia Dream’
………………….
The soft, creamy hues of the magnolia flower with its opulent scent – summer signifiers.
So grateful to have a large tree in our backyard, and I took and made this picture last night after some evening rain had fallen.
The distinctive aroma of the flower was magnified by the warm, moist air.
When the tree was planted by us 20 years ago, this image was the dream in my mind…
‘Truly Twisted’,Twisted
Yesterday’s post Truly Twisted‘s vine picture gets the gothic makeover.
I have the flu and am struggling in the fizzing positivity stakes, in case you couldn’t guess. Rehashing an image is certainly not beneath me today.
Today’s not so inspiring words to match come from the heavy metal heart of Glen Danzig:
“Got a little twist of Cain, from the god below “
(Danzig, ‘Twist Of Cain’)
Murder, check. Satan, check.
…add them to the list of unpleasant twisty things.
Truly Twisted
Twisted things get a bad rap mostly.
If you twist the truth, you lie, and that is not generally a good thing.
Except we often don’t want to call a lie out for what it is sometimes.
So a liar ‘gilds the lily’, is ‘economic with the truth’ or just ‘a little disingenuous.’
A twist on a twist, as it were.
Snakes are twisty, sorta unloved and often deadly.
Actual twisters are beautiful , but wreak havoc and destruction in their paths.
‘Twists of fate’ are random and unpredictable.
Truth is ,we are all twisted in some way.
Biologically. Socially. Environmentally. Psychologically. Intellectually.
That just comes with being human.
However, being twisted does not prevent a spiral staircase; a double helix; a rope; or a vine, being purposeful, strong and creative.
I’ll leave it to you to add your own twist to things…
Young Growth
Maize, Glenbrook Beach NZ
A young crop of maize in rows on a friend’s land today.
Such a sense of order and design is very appealing to the neat freak in me!
We have got to set definite plans for new ventures and things that will grow us, I know.
But sometimes, despite those plans, growth is haphazard or sprawling. At other times nothing appears to be happening at all. Or worse, the new seedlings wilt and die.
To grow is to accept that there will be pain, frustration and unpredictability. There is a need to be patient when there is no immediate yield. I need to remind myself of this almost daily – at times I am a lousy sharecropper in my own life growth.
To leave your field bare is not an option though.
“Don’t go through life, grow through life” – Eric Butterworth
Fronds/ Shadow
My Back Pages
“Ah, but I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now “
– Bob Dylan, ‘My Back Pages’
An elderly gentleman sits on a park bench in the Auckland Domain, quietly reading a book and listening to something through his headphones.
He would pause from thumbing the pages and look up from time to time to gaze around at his fellow parkgoers; walkers and people watching the ducks at the adjacent pond.
Reading is a luxury to me in an oft time-cramped existence, but this fellow seemed to have all the time in the world to focus on his book.
Ironic, considering that he has, in all probability, less time left on this planet than me(that is no certainty however!).
I was slightly envious of his ability to immerse himself in his book and music, or whatever he was filling his ears with.
I wondered what he was reading – fiction or non-fiction; thriller, humour or biography?
To read is to be curious about life.
And I bet he had an interesting life story himself.
What might his back pages read like?
Warning: Do Not Touch The Lobsters
A worn but perfunctory warning on the side of a concrete lobster tank on a Fife harbourside.
In my mind’s eye I picture a time when the sign was freshly painted, and when the lobsters were more abundant than they, sadly, are today.
A tank full of delicious, thrashing, spiny crustaceans…
And then a young Gordon or Alistair, or somesuch, ignoring the warning, reaching in , almost losing a finger or two in the tank, and screaming pitifully for his ma….
Do.
Not.
Touch.
The.
Lobsters!
The Shade And The Space
The cool greenery of native bush is a shady lure as the summer continues to heat up in Aotearoa/ New Zealand.
A refuge from the amped up glare amongst the palms and ferns.
There is just something tranquil about disappearing into a grove of trees and being immersed in green light, the sun battling to break through the leafy canopy.
For however long you are in the bush, it is as if the outside world is irrelevant and time stops ticking.
We all need a place to go like that, I think.
ebb then flood 