Mindful, Day 33, Determination

These are photos of battered and burned palm trees in an oasis. As I look at them closely I see more and more about how they try to protect themselves from this harsh environment. The layers of overlapping palm fronds and "bark" create a thick, overlapping cover. The materials themselves are dense and hard. In the first photo the palm is burned, missing it's top and covered in layers of dead fronds but it looks like it is still trying to survive.  I think of determination, I think of marks and scars adding to overall beauty and individuality, I think of how you just get up and try again to survive another day.

Mindful, Day 31, A Room With a View

 I am taken with this structure - all that remains are the bare bones of what used to be what? A cabin, a trading post, a cafe? Sitting partway up the Indian Canyon road with a view in every direction. The light is beautiful pouring through the empty window panes and creating patterns on the floor and walls. I especially like the one small rectangle of blue sky so vivid in the corner. If only the walls could talk.

Mindful, Day 21, Patternmaking Again

Still working my way through photos from LACMA (Los Angeles County Musem of Art). It is  interesting to look at the  indivdual photograph and the screen full of thumbnails on the computer and see the pattern of the patterns. I always gravitate to strong shapes, light and shadow and movement before anything else. This shot is up looking up at the ceiling through the giant metal sculpture that you walk under as you enter the building. I could spend hours just shooting the this one sculpture, the light and the patterns as they change and not go one step further.

Mindful - Day 5 Look Down

We went for a walking tour today through an older area of Palm Desert and saw many wonderful old homes where an assortment of celebrities have lived. You don't see a lot of details because of the walls and landscaping but the guide had great stories about the people who had lived in them at various times and you got to look up at the mountains, around at the trees and flowers and down at the pavement. One area really caught my eye because of the great pattern and range of grey tones.
So today I found joy in everything around me but most especially in what was at my feet!

Mindful Day 3 - At the car wash

I love going through the car wash especially those that have the swinging, sudsy worms that swish over your car! I can't capture the changing  patterns on the windshield from the water, soap and worms fast enough. In Mary Oliver's poem, Mindful,  she writes of finding joy even in the ordinary stuff of each day. I found it in the car wash.

Light lines

 

Following the light around the house and finding patterns everywhere.

Kaleidiscope App fun

I have a new addiction. I loaded an App on the IPad that creates kaleidscope images out of anything you point the camera at. I have been walking around with the IPad shooting everything in sight.  It is so much fun to see what different objects become in the App. I see all kinds of fun projects using these images.Here are a few of the many, many shots I took.