each day a new beginning...

And so, it's here, the light of a new day. This one is gray with the subtle sound effects of rain. It taps on my roof in soft percussive rhythms and falls from the awning of my west window in large, light-filled drops.
And this morning I'm thinking, I wish I could bottle these early hours, encapsulate them and enter them at will, these hours of peace and quiet that linger in suspension before the active day begins. Before saws, hammers, leaf blowers and dust overwhelm them, and the regular, fevered pitch of construction, reconstruction and maintenance--that's become the norm in this neighborhood--kicks in.

I'd like to stay in the spaciousness of early morning, when my mind is open and fresh from the night's journey and newly hatched. I'd like to bask in the unfettered surprise that is arising -- the dynamic quiet of the bud.

rewards

I try to make it a rule to only post to my blog once every week or two. But recently, we've received a spate of wild and exotic weather. Perhaps it's a reward, or an apology for the months of fog we've endured.
Over the past few days, we've had waves of rain showers and lightning storms mixed with intervals of sunshine and clearing.
The changing patterns of the clouds and the rain-laden foliage, have kept me sprinting in circles with my camera.

gray day: saturated color

Clear is not what we have, nor sunny. Today not only brought more fog (our trend now for a record six months,) but the mist has thickened into something close to rain. The saturated sidewalks are dark with moisture, and the hills obliterated, as if rubbed with chalk.

The thing is, gray weather rewards photographers. It enriches color and obscures the bleaching effects of the sun. And so this kind of dark day -- and I guess it's true for every day, really -- when explored more closely, delivers jewels.

making time for the small things

A visit to La Sumida Nursery, or anyplace where plants and flowers bloom, slows me down and allows me to look more closely at the small things. To see the miraculous faces in the microcosm of nature.

Above: A monarch caterpillar munches on the only thing it eats, milkweed.

Working With Nature

In the years I spent as a model, especially in the 60's, posing for stills, I was the shape in the photographs. My arms, my legs, made up the composition and balanced with the scenery. I think those years of posing and then, studying the photographs afterwards and always asking the same question: "Why does this work and not that?" has added to my delight in finding images and patterns in nature.

Coming across these gnarled branches and twisted shadows, caused me to look twice. Mainly because something in my subconscious picked up the image hiding there: the fence lizard, frozen in her upside down ballet arch. She had become the scenery. How did she learn to be a shadow and a branch?