“As symbol, or as the structuring of symbols, art can render intelligible — or at least visible, at least discussible — those wilderness regions which philosophy has abandoned and those hazardous terrains where science’s tools do not fit. I mean the rim of knowledge where language falters; and I mean all those areas of human experience, feeling, and thought about which we care so much and know so little: the meaning of all we see before us, of our love for each other, and the forms of freedom in time, and power, and destiny, and all whereof we imagine: grace, perfection, beauty, and the passage of all materials to thoughts, and of all ideas to forms.”
― Annie Dillard, Living by Fiction
Tag: photomanipulation
A few new art pieces from the last week.
Apathy
And the Sea Shall Rise
Somewhere in Florida the Sun Also Rises
Cotton Candy
The Fountainhead
To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.
And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.Howard Zinn
In the Shallows
Starlight
I went through a long period where I wasn’t using the camera much at all. But I’ve been making an effort to use it every day now. These are some recent shots and manipulated images that I like. I hope you do , too.
Red-shouldered Hawk
Back before Christmas, I ordered a new hoodie from the Human Rights Campaign. It has a simple rainbow equality graphic on the front, a simplicity that I find appealing. I woke up to a cooler morning than we’ve had lately and decided to wear the hoodie on my morning walk with Mimi. I also decided to take a few selfies in the bathroom mirror before we left the house. I knew I wanted to post a new essay here and thought the shots might inspire me to add something to my self-portrait series.
A few from a walk Mimi and I took to the park the other morning. I will have more writing coming very shortly.
Thanks again to Paul – wwwpalfitness for nominating me. 🙂
Three quotes for three days
And once again, I will simply invite those who visit this post to participate in the challenge if they would find it interesting to do so.
When I decided to take on this quote challenge, I knew that I wanted to focus on poetry in looking for quotes to feature. That led me to my own collection of poetry books and gave me a chance to revisit some old favorites. One of the books I pulled off the shelf was The New Naked Poetry, an anthology published in 1976 which features some fine poets. Two of them, Peter Everwine and Philip Levine, were actually professors of mine when I attended college at California State University, Fresno many years ago. My original intent had been to include some quotes from their work. But then I noticed something. Of the 26 poets included in this anthology, only three are women. Now that may have something to do with the focus on naked poetry which is loosely defined as poetry without adornment – no formal structure, no rhyme, etc. But I suspect it may also have something to do with the time period in which the volume was published. In any case, I decided to include one quote from each of the three women for this post.
Well, yesterday I had another day of not feeling so well followed by a night of not sleeping so well. Today I do feel much better but very, very tired. By today, I had hoped to be finished up with the three day, three quote challenge as well as having a new piece of short fiction to post. There’s always tomorrow. As they say.
Since I know I’ll get sucked into the DNC coverage tonight, I’m going to stop worrying about trying to get caught up more here until tomorrow morning. See you all in the new morning!
I ran across an article not too long ago that talked about people who are happier living alone. These are not people who hate other people. They have close friendships. They even have intimate, sometimes romantic, relationships. But at the end of the day, they prefer to go home to their own little corner of the world, to embrace solitude. I am one of those people.