Since my wife Muri and I moved to California in 1971, we have vacationed in Maui 7 times. The first time we were here with our good friends, Don and Jackie, we spent half the time on Oahu and half the time at Napili Bay (perhaps the prettiest bay on Maui). The second time, we brought our two children and spent time on both Maui and Kauai. While Kauai is beautiful and less
One of the best things about our time spent in our Little House in the Desert has been watching the desert sunsets from our patio, which looked over the San Tan Mountains. Last night, Arizona offered me one more sunset before we leave for good. As always, my camera was nearby and I recorded it to share with you. It is a fitting farewell, I think.
Friday afternoon, I drove to Arrowhead Ranch, a camp and retreat center in Lake Arrowhead, for a retreat with a group of about 40 men from my Thursday Night Men’s Meetings. That is my official … if not totally genuine … reason for not posting since last Wednesday. The truth is, nothing inspired me to write. Yes, Jack London said, You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club, but since writing is my avocation not my vocation (avocation sounds so much more grown-up than hobby, doesn’t it?), sometimes I choose to just wait. Or retreat, in this case. But here I am, back again. Did you miss me?
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Yesterday, before I went to my Thursday Night Men’s Meeting, I decided to take a walk in the park. I have been maintaining about 8,000 steps a day since I got a Fitbit for Christmas … it was really just what I needed to remind me to get out and walk. At this point in my life, remembering to walk has a double, even triple benefit. For one, I usually listen to music while I walk and any day I listen to music is a better day than one with no music. And I usually bring my camera on my walks, giving me an opportunity to get the creative juices flowing. I reached the park just as the sky was beginning to fade from cobalt to pastel blue and wisps of pink were collecting along the horizon. I’ve always found twilight to be the most peaceful time of the day … and perhaps the most photogenic. (more…)
I have always found photography an interesting and frustrating artistic medium. After all, if I were to stop people at random, in, say, the Brea Mall, how many do you think would say, Oh, yes, I paint in oils, or Watercolor is my favorite medium. How many would confess to loving to work in charcoals? But almost everyone takes photographs, particularly since the advent of capable smartphone cameras. I know quite a few people who regard themselves as photographers whose photographs, while beautiful, seem to be nothing more than snapshots taken in very beautiful places. To me, a photo becomes art when it illuminates some familiar place or thing in a way I’d have never seen through my own eyes. That can be a matter of composition, or lighting or even a particular moment in time that makes me say, Wow! How did the photographer ever catch that? Sometimes it takes serendipity, just being at the right place at the right time. With camera in hand, of course. But look at Thomas Mangelson’s signature photo, Catch of the Day. Does that look like serendipity? Yes, right place, right time plus endless patience.
If you’ve been coming around Older Eyes – Bud’s Blog for a while, you know … I am very fond of birds. There is absolutely no doubt that I inherited it from Mom, whether that was an inheritance via genes or simply watching her feed the birds in our yard for my entire childhood. There was always a bird book near the kitchen window in her house and I have never been without a bird book since my wife, Muri, and I have had a house of our own. I never heard my mother say this but I’m sure she’d agree have agreed with what I say: Birds are among God’s most beautiful creations.
So, it’s photo Tuesday and I thought I’d post one of my favorite bird photos. Bird lovers have been promoting our local Yorba Regional Park as a habitat for Western Bluebirds. As a result, anyone with a camera and some patience can get some photographs. The best itme is the spring. After the males put on their brightest plumage in preparation for mating, the juveniles, plain gray with the first hints of blue tinting their wings, show up, beautiful in their own way.
Speeding along winding Connecticut road in an Alfa Romeo convertible, crisp autumn wind in our hair and our lives ahead of us. A canopy of color overhead and fallen maple leaves, reds, yellows and browns, rising again in our wake. When that is your best memory of autumn, California autumn can seem dull. But if you look, there’s beauty beyond the fact that it isn’t followed by freezing temperatures and foot-deep snow. Connecticut autumn shouts, LOOK!!, California autumns whisper, Look carefully, my friend. I’m here.
This photo was taken with a star effect lens in our local park when the sun was low enough to brighten the colors of the usually muted Sycamore leaves and to glisten in the dew drops clinging to the leaves and branches. New England, it ain’t. But it’s beautiful in its own right.
Last night we returned from a vacation to visit family. As I said in Wednesday? Cleveland, family vacations are not all joy at our age. We get to see our siblings struggling with age, just as we are, and we are unfortunate to have two sister with dementia. While it was good to see them, no one would describe it as fun. We headed home with some sadness, some for what our family members are facing and some from knowing we will be far away. The latter is particularly true of our time with my brother, Glenn, and his wife. Time and circumstance has kept us from spending much time together as couples and our visits with them were the best of what family is about. Yesterday, our flights home were delayed, I lost a bit of electronics on one flight, and things were not at all as we would have liked them when we pulled up to our house. So, I enter this Friday afternoon with two tablespoons of sadness, a teaspoon of determination, and maybe a dash or two of hope.
I was about to take a nap after a mostly sleepless night and the first song on my naptime playlist was On Golden Pond, written and played by my favorite pianist Dave Grusin. The theme and the movie, starring Katharine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Jane Fonda, seem to capture exactly that mix of emotions. So, pre-nap, I’m posting today’s song for Friday … On Golden Pond, accompanied by the lovely cinematography of the opening titles of the film.
Have a great weekend.
In keeping with my commitment to start blogging again, I’m going to try posting a photograph each Tuesday. If you’ve been coming around for a while, you know that Older Eyes spends a lot of time at the park and he has his best walks with camera in hand, reminding him to be mindful. No, it’s not a National Park or a wilderness park, and the wildlife I see on my walks rarely even draws a glance from the (mostly) dog-walkers, which is a shame. Because there is wonder in the details of the most common creature, like this Snowy Egret I caught waiting for a meal to swim by in one of the park’s lakes.
Did you know that the species was slaughtered for its plumes in the 19th century, but protection brought a rapid recovery of numbers, and the Snowy Egret is now more widespread and common than ever. Widespread and common, but still beautiful.
You have probably heard by now that Southern California is in the midst of a severe drought. How severe? It depends who you listen to and the degree of hysteria they choose for their particular brand of reporting. It has been going on for at least three years, while some sources see it as part of a 15 year mega-drought and others say it has been proceeding for decades. California governor, Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown, never one to shy away from hyperbole for politics’s sake, has called it epochal. This is for certain … reservoirs are historically low,
some virtually empty. The state has mandated a 20% reduction in water use, with individual counties and cities determining how to enforce the reduction. In most places, hosing down driveways and patios or using a hose to wash a car can result in $500 fine. Most cities have also instituted a twice a week watering rule that also limits how long you can water on each sprinkler station. Here in Anaheim Hills, even numbered homes water on Thursday and Sunday and odd ones water on Wednesday and Saturday for a maximum of 8 minutes each station. I have read that in Socal’s warm summer climate, lawns can not survive that level of watering. (more…)
Older Eyes 