September 13, 2013

September 13, 2013

    There are giants in the world who because of the fast paced technilogical world we live in are generally ignored, as are those women and men of the past whose contributions of their experience and knowledge are reduced to sound bytes for easy consumption. One of the 20th century's giants in my opinion was Abraham Joshua Heshel, Jewish Theologian, civil rights activist, writer and an authentic "Mystic" meaning someone who has had direct experience of ultimate reality. In Heschel's case this was direct experience of God. 

   I could go on and on talking about this remarkable man, instead I offer a show from PBS by Christa Tippet which is a wonderful biography and overview of a modern day "Giant." Click on the following link to hear this broadcast.

https://app.box.com/s/a9gm49gvl4rapxqkzj1c

    "Surely God will always receive a handful of fools - who do not fail. There will always remain a spiritual underground where a few brave souls continue to fight. 
   Yet our concern is not how to worship in the catacombs but rather how to remain human in the skyscrapers." 

                From: The Insecurity Of Freedom, Abraham Joshua Heschel 1959

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   Lee and I spent last week on Campobello Island in Canada where it rained for around five of our nine days there. Only once did I grumble about the weather, at five in the morning when the forecast was sun all day. Stepping out on the deck of the tent cabin we rent cleared the air of resentment as the shear beauty of Herring Cove in heavy fog was the view. 

   Here are a few photos from the week with only a few brief explanatory labels to identify the scenes. 

    

    Lubec Maine from the Mulholand Point Lighthouse across the channel.

Herring Cove. We stay to the right of the trees in the center of the image.

This is a color photo of a cormorant in flight. Nothing was added.

View in fog from Liberty Point.

Somewhere on Campobello

A Great Blue Heron at dusk who caught and swallowed a snack of a fish that was 9-10 inches in size. It went down that long neck in only a second or two. 

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Some Humor:

  

Peace and Equinimity until next week,  

                                          Bill Lagerstrom

August 28, 2013

  August 28, 2013

     First, my experience with a jar of peanuts a few days ago and how that relates to the theme of this weeks post, which is "Weeds." I ate a few of the "peanuts" and was immediately disappointed with the taste which seemed to aproach something akin to chalky cardboard. Turning the jar over I read the ingredients which explain everything about what is offered as food to us by the huge companies that supply around ninty percent of all the packaged goods on the supermarket shelves these days. I offer the list of this jar's contents below the photo which I took a few minutes ago. 

    Weeds you ask .... well the weeds of industry for instance in their many forms, not only food, but everything that grows in our sight several thousand times a day through the barrage of a continuous stream of "Buy Me!"  (Not all garbage as there are many useful things that I do buy having first seen an ad somewhere, this computer for instance.) 

   Then there are the weeds I photographed Monday morning within fifty feet of our door that have a quality of wonderful beauty which is usually passed over as not worthy of a second look by most, including myself.  I ask you to look at them with a sense that God does not create junk, and that all life has an inherent quality that is well worth the effort of stopping, taking a few breaths, and looking more closely. 

    Weeds may be only weeds in the garden of our life, but let's be careful not to throw out those that have real value, exceptional qualities that bear a second look. 

Ingredients: Peanuts, Sea Salt, Cornstarch, Sugar,

   Malt Todextrin, Monosodium Glutamate, Yeast,

   Corn Syrup Solids, Paprika and other spices,

   Extractives of Paprika, Hydrolyzed Soy Protien,

   Natural Flavor, Garlic and Onion Powder.

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   I start with a quote from Cliff Browder's Blog about New York City. Please visit his site as it is  is exceptionally well written and never dull or uninteresting. A real treasure.

 " But why frightening, you may ask?  Because any intensity becomes, in the end, threatening.  Among the various images of nature that appear on my computer screen are huge flowers in full bloom, filling the entire desktop screen: rich, exuberant vaginal blossoms that threaten to devour the viewer: again, intensity of life.  I’ll let the Freudians analyze this as a personal obsession of mine, but I insist that it applies to us all, that any intensity of life implies destruction and intensity of death, following which life will rise again.  Okay, a cliché, a stereotype.  Can’t help it, that’s what potted plants with huge leaves, and goldenrod sprouting out of rotten wood, and sunbathers basking in the life-giving but lethal sun say to me.  (“Lethal”? you may ask.  Just check with your dermatologist, and maybe a meteorologist as well.)  So once again I celebrate the richness of summer, the frightening intensity of life.  And I hope we all do, each in our own way. "

                                                                                      Cliff  Browder

From his Blog: No Place For Normal     -  http://cbrowder.blogspot.com/

   

Goldenrod

Please click to enlarge and see the small, now dried flowers encased

This and the next photo are leaves from the same stalk.

The holes are made by insects and beetles that obviously enjoyed their taste.

Above - "There's a crack in everything, that's how the Light gets in."

                                                                                         Leonard Cohen

Below - Even in death, the shell of life still reaches for the Sun. 

Growing between blades of grass this tiny flower reaches for the Light.

Goldenrod

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Some Humor: 

   No post next week as we will on Campobello Island.

   Peace,  Bill Lagerstrom

August 22, 2013

August 22, 2013

(All photos are mine unless otherwise noted. Click on any photo to enlarge full screen.)

    It's quite possible that this week's post could be considered to be a form of mindless abuse to all who view it. My apologies in advance as I woke up this morning feeling somewhat idiodic, but smiling to myself at my thoughts. You are most gracious in your kind understanding of this diversion from my usual posts of more serious content. 

   I have been ruminating on cows this morning and have come to the conclusion that they are part of the wildlife here in Maine, along with all our moose and squirrels, both red and gray. What has impressed me is the 100 year study of the evolution of a small group of cows that have occupied a field some five miles from where we live. The photographic record below clearly shows forward movement on the evolutionary track that cows as a local species have been following, as change, both physicial and social have occurred. 

   I offer the following first:

From the Merriam Webster Unabridged Dictionary

evo·lu·tion 

noun  \ˌevəˈlüshən also ˌēv- or -vəlˈyü-\

plural -s

1 a :  a series of related changes in a certain direction :  process of change :  organic development : unfolding, movement, transformation <it should be remembered that even in the biological world, evolution is not always in the direction of progress — A.B.Novikoff>

 >b (1) :  a process of continuous change from a lower, simpler, or worse condition to a higher, more complex, or better state :  progressive development :  growth, progress

5 ……..

a   ….  the process by which through a series of changes or steps any living organism or group of organisms has acquired the morphological and physiological characters which distinguish it :  the theory that the various types of animals and plants have their origin in other preexisting types, the distinguishable differences being due to modifications in successive generations — (AKA phylogeny)

 :compare darwinism, heredity, mutation, natural                  selection, variation, weismannism

Related to EVOLUTION

Synonyms:

elaboration, development, expansion, growth, progress, progression

Antonyms: regress, regression, retrogression, reversion

                                      -----------------------------------------------------

Photo from 1885:

Photo taken June 29, 2013

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Cows On Parade

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Here are two video clips - the first has cows telling their own take on evolution, the second has all barnyard animals in agreement with the cows:

                            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_EsxukdNXM

                            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfmxx_72Coc 

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"That's enough Bill! Your killing us!"

"Okay, as soon as I take a left into A Little Humor,

our weekly diversion."

Cows Evolving (These photos are from the Web)

Humans evolve also

Peace,

   Bill Lagerstrom