John & Anne Wiley

2010/11/24

Flock

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,Relationships,SB Region — John @ 09:58

When I was a kid, on one or two years we had a “flocked” Christmas tree. In case you don’t know, it’s basically a cut tree that’s been sprayed with asbestos or something to give the appearance of being covered with snow. Well looking at cropped versions of my zoom pix from Monday’s flight in the mountains, I found this one where you might be able to see “flocked” trees at the top. Click to see the largest version, or better yet visit my Photo Page by clicking the link in the right column ->

3471 Snowy Trees

3471 Snowy Trees

This year we’ve been contemplating and talking about what this season means to us. Maybe that’s why the flocked trees stood out to me. Fun to remember the good times I’ve enjoyed walking in terrain like this, looking up at the trees, and hearing the song of a small plane humming in the distance. The more places we’ve been, the greater number of perspectives we can embrace where we are.

2010/11/20

Eyes

Filed under: Aviation,Has Photos,Inner World,Random,SB Region — John @ 03:10

I really enjoy Anne’s photographic eye. Not just because it gives me a window into her soul by letting me see what she notices, but because she opens my eyes to new ways of looking.

0805 Casino Gull

0805 Casino Gull

On the beach where she walked during my dental appointment is the Coral Casino where rich folks hang out, and it has this cool ornamental light on top. On the beach walk rail, she paused to make eye contact with a crow.

0803 Innocent Crow

0803 Innocent Crow

This one apparently wasn’t involved with a “murder” as described in the PBS Nature episode “A Murder of Crows” (not about homicide, in case you didn’t know). Ever since watching that, we have a new fascination with crows because they’re incredibly smart and have a social life similar to humans in many ways.

Another item on the “eyes” theme today is this cool hands free flashlight/reading light we found at Costco, that’s handy for one of us to read without disturbing the other. I also used it tonight to go out and pick up a few fallen avos while keeping my hands free.

Each end has two LED light bulbs, a spotlight and a wide angle, with a push button for off, spot, wide, or both. So with both on and the beams pointed at different areas it did a good job of lighting up a wide swath of the ground so I could find any fallen avos before the skunks and critters do. Then I pointed the beams one above the other to nicely illuminate an entire aviation magazine page I was reading. We’ll probably put at least one of these in Tripp as a handy light for ground operations before/after night flights and on our “fly-camping” trips. Are we the last people to discover this useful $7 item?

 

2010/11/17

Mountain Drive

Filed under: Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Random,SB Region — John @ 20:40

There’s a road along the hills named Mountain Drive that we’ve enjoyed many times, and yesterday it was fun in new ways. We saw a hawk circling above this rock outcrop and remembered recently seeing it from the hawk’s perspective.

3453 Hawk's Rocks

3453 Hawk's Rocks

We weren’t that close though! The whole valley is beautiful, and in some ways more so down here than 1/4 mile up where it loses some significance by being so easily surmountable. It’s an easy glide on the wings of a hawk.

3448 Hard Climb

3448 Hard Climb

Just out of view to the left is a lower ridge that the sun was about to hide behind, but a thick bank of fog was stretching silent fingers trying to catch it.

3460 Moon Sun

3460 Moon Sun

In between, a zone of magical shapes waited in the quiet as approaching fog drained away sound and warmth to absorb the edges of fading day.

3455 Shape Dancer

3455 Shape Dancer

2010/11/16

Up Hill

Filed under: Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 10:06

Sometimes it’s flat for miles. Other days you’re coasting on a gentle grade. Lately it’s been small hills, and it was a great sunset walk in the neighborhood. Colors and shapes, a bit of exercise, and pausing to chat with acquaintances and neighbors. Another warm evening that fully began at the top of the hill admiring a serene pepper tree bathed in sundown.

3434 Warm Pepper

3434 Warm Pepper

Nearby an old woodpile far from any home, structure or fireplace waits for something.

3439 Wood, Colors, Shadows

3439 Wood, Colors, Shadows

Turning toward the light, we see another tree offering hints of the dusky shapes it will show against the starry sky once the nearest star’s fire has faded beyond the horizon. Perhaps an owl will sit on top waiting for residents of the woodpile to emerge for breakfast.

3441 Transparency

3441 Transparency

2010/11/14

Art

Filed under: Inner World,People,Random,Relationships — John @ 22:37

Well maybe you’d already guessed that this might be another short inward ramble, but I really thought today would be a standard photoessay. Here’s the deal: we watched “Smoke Signals” last night and having managed to refrain from zipping it were delighted by the ending poem, so I’m sharing it here with this “Their Father’s Daughters” link to the original poem from which this poem ending the film was adapted.

How do we forgive our Fathers?
Maybe in a dream
Do we forgive our Fathers for leaving us too often or forever
when we were little?

Maybe for scaring us with unexpected rage
or making us nervous
because there never seemed to be any rage there at all.

Do we forgive our Fathers for marrying or not marrying our Mothers?
For Divorcing or not divorcing our Mothers?

And shall we forgive them for their excesses of warmth or coldness?
Shall we forgive them for pushing or leaning
for shutting doors
for speaking through walls
or never speaking
or never being silent?

Do we forgive our Fathers in our age or in theirs
or their deaths
saying it to them or not saying it?

If we forgive our Fathers what is left?

-adapted from “Forgiving Our Fathers” in a book of poems
titled Ghost Radio, by Dick Lourie
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