Posts in Category: Sunday
The Song of the Great Blue Heron! Happy Sunday.
Great Blue Heron, Back Creek Marsh, Kennebunk ME.
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light.” Jesus
Of course, Great Blue Herons are not song-birds. They do not sing. They rarely make and sound at all, and when they do it is a guttural grunt, not only un-song like, but un-bird like. But they have a song. It is in the way they move, they way they hunt, they way they are. It is the silent stalking, the slow march across the marsh. Majestic, written and arranged for strings and orchestra. By Vivaldi perhaps. As much dance as song. Even silent, you can see as you watch the Heron hunt in the shallow waters of the marsh that it is hearing the music in its mind…that it moves to a song all its own. And then with a swell of strings, it spreads its great wings and lifts off…keeping time even as it flies. It is the song of the Great Blue Heron. And if you have watched one closely, with generous eyes, you will know what I mean, and hear it, at least in your dreams.
All creation sings the glory of the creator God…the God who creates in love. That is the light we are filled with…the generous eyed ones…the ones who hear the Heron song with the ears of the spirit…and who celebrate such beauty. Happy Sunday!
Swamp Sparrow Beauty. Happy Sunday!
Swamp Sparrow. Higbee Beach, Cape May NJ
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light…” Jesus
This is a very early post as we have Sunday morning plans. We are New Jersey, Cape May, for the Fall Birding Festival, and on Sunday morning we are at Uncle Bill’s Pancake House on Beach Avenue when it opens at 6:30, and then do a lap at the Meadows before the show opens at 10. If you have done the autumn thing in Cape May, you know exactly what I mean. Pancakes and birds! That is already enough to make this a good Sunday…with at least two forms of worship. 🙂
But seriously, take a look at this sparrow. I nominate the Swamp Sparrow, despite its muddy name, as the most beautiful sparrow in North America. I love the rusty tones and the sharply contrasting pure grays, the black accents, and the highly patterned nature of this little creature. Those who lump all sparrows into “little brown jobs” are missing the subtle beauty of the family. I posted a panel of “how we normally see Swamp Sparrow” yesterday…4 shots buried deep in reeds and brush, with only bits of sparrow showing…but every once in a while even a skulker like the Swamp has to get up and sit up and be counted in the early morning sun, as it did here at Higbee Beach Wildlife Management Area yesterday early. Then you see the sparrow for what it is…and it is an eyeful…a generous eyeful!
Now, what Jesus said about the generous eye was not a conditional statement, though it is often taken that way. It is a declarative statement. It is not “if” your eye is generous, “then” your whole being “will be” filled with light. It is “if you eye is generous, your whole being is full of light.” In such a statement the two phrases do not depend on each other…each phrase is simply testimony to the truth of the other. Fact. Those who are full of light have generous eyes. Fact. Those who have generous eyes are full of light. I point this out on behalf of the sparrow. There are those who can see the beauty of the Swamp Sparrow…many such…and those are the folks who are full of light…those are the folks with generous eyes. You want to get to know them…in fact…if you are a person of generous eye, you already know them as such, pretty much instantly, on meeting. There are a lot of generous eyed birders! Which is why a birding festival is so much fun for me. They don’t all know they are filled with light…but even so they are…and it is such fun to watch them watching the birds they love. Even the Swamp Sparrows. Especially the Swamp Sparrows. Happy Sunday!
Working Iron. Happy Sunday!
Blacksmith working iron, Common Ground Fair, Unity ME
When I see a wrought iron fence or baluster, still standing from the 18th and early 19th century, I don’t really think that each twist and curve, each leaf shape, had to be hand forged from iron in fire, with a hammer on an anvil…but, of course, it was so. I suppose today they are machine twisted and laser cut, laid out and sheet welded…done in a matter of moments, but traditional wrought iron was an art embedded in a craft, and each individual piece of the pattern took time and care to form. A four foot section of railing would have taken one craftsman blacksmith a full day to forge.
These shots are from the blacksmithing demonstration at the Common Ground Fair in Unity Maine. As I mentioned yesterday, The Common Ground Fair features demonstrations of a variety of folk and primitive arts and crafts. The Blacksmith shed is one of the most popular. In a small rough wood-shingled building, about 16×12, two blacksmiths, two anvils, and 2 furnaces work continuously all day long. One side of the building is open from head height on a 10 year old to just above my eye-level, and the crowd is 5 people deep on the 16 foot side all the time. The Blacksmiths keep up a running commentary on what they are doing as they work, and layer in a good dose of history and blacksmithing theory as they go. It is fascinating. I could have stood there all day…and I suspect there were some 10 year old boys who did.
This is another effort to fulfill my commitment to you and to myself to look for the beauty and inspiration…the spirit…in humans and the human condition as well as in nature. The Generous Eye has to see the spirit in our fellows or it is not generous at all. It is not hard to see the beauty and the creative spirit at work in a traditional craftsman or woman…in an artist or an artisan who shapes raw materials into something both beautiful and useful…beautiful in its usefulness…or useful in its beauty. Our trouble today is that we are, too often, separated from the process that makes the things we use, and the things we enjoy. We forget too easily the human labor…the beautiful work…the creative energy…the spirit of creation…the living breathing souls…that are behind every little thing we surround ourselves with…from cars to cameras to tea kettles and toilet paper. Some of us buy a few “hand made” things to remind ourselves, or go once a year to the Common Ground Fair, and some of us maintain a hobby that allows us to work with our own hands. We do try to keep the Eye Generous so that we can see the spirit in all we are and all we do.
Personally I am thankful for events like The Common Ground Fair, or the PunkinFiddle festival yesterday at Laudholm Farms, for the reminder of the dignity and beauty of human labor. No one participates more directly in the creative action of God than the human artist and artisan. It is good that we remember that! It is even better when that spirit informs our own labor. Happy Sunday.
Sony HX90V in Hand-held Twilight Mode.
Coco Loco. Happy Sunday!
The Mariachi Band at Coco Loco in Bay City MI
While at the Midwest Birding Symposium we searched Yelp for a good Mexican Restaurant. Coco Loco had a good rating and the reviews sounded promising…the name was certainly intriguing…it was not far from our hotel…so, why not? Quite a place! The decor was over the top, the atmosphere was fun fun fun…and they had an old style four piece Mariachi Band roaming the floor. The food was not bad either. I, of course, had my Sony HX90V in my pocket, so (uncharacteristically for me in that setting) I took quite a few pics…trying to catch a bit of the fun while remaining as unobtrusive as possible. I am not that much of a tourist yet 🙂
This couple had a request for the band…something slow and old and romantic…and they were clearly moved by the experience. As was I. I felt a bit like an intruder zooming in this close, but that is why I carry a real camera and not just a phone…even into restaurants. I don’t think they knew I was there. No flash…just Hand-held Twilight Mode.
As I say, this is not a typical image for me…I am more into nature, landscapes, birds and wildlife, etc…but I know I need to take more pics of people, and I am trying to remind myself of that at every opportunity. The creator of all who shares a spirit with us is evident in nature, of course, but there is no expression of the creator’s love more complete than what we see in each other…the children of God…as we live out the spirit of creation. A generous eye certainly must see, and respond to, the light that is in each of us…and I am called to celebrate that love as much in humanity as in nature. I want to do that. It does not come natural yet, but I intend to make it so…to begin to photograph my fellows with as much joy as I photograph a dawn or sunset…or a bird. We will see what success I have…
Let this be a beginning, and a commitment. Happy Sunday!
Funny story (about a spider). Happy Sunday!
Garden Spider, Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, Kennbunk ME
Funny story! The other day I was out at Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Wildlife Management Area, taking pics and enjoying the day. When I got back to the parking, a gentleman who I often see exercising his dog there was coming back to his car, and we discussed our recent wildlife sightings at the pond for a few moments. He drove off, and I got in the car and headed out on the dirt track toward the main road. The windows were wide open and I was enjoying our first day with a hint of fall in the air. I felt something on my bare leg, and glanced down, still driving, and saw a huge yellow and black spider climbing rapidly up my leg. It was big, with a body the size of a quarter and a leg-span 4 times that. My mind went: “WooO!!! Spider!! Big spider! Bright yellow and black! Garden Spider. Harmless.” in the fraction of a second it took me to scoop it into my palm and attempt to toss it out the window. I will admit there was a micro-second of caught breath panic at the “WooO” but “Harmless” pretty much coincided with its reaching the open window. The car was still moving forward of course, and the wind was blowing in the open window and through the car, so I immediately suspected that the spider had not really gotten out the window. I stopped and looked out, but the dirt track was empty. Yes, well, even though I knew it was harmless, I did not want to drive out on to the highway with it in the car. A startle at 50 mph is different than a startle at 10, and I knew I would be distracted just thinking about that spider somewhere in the car. Besides, by this time I wanted a picture of it. I remembered it, from my glimpse, as being particularly bright even of its kind. I opened both front and back doors, and began a search of the interior. It was there, under the front seat, attempting, without much success, to climb the smooth plastic of the center console. I snapped a couple of pics before thinking about how to get it out. I was able, eventually, to use a folded dollar bill from the toll stash to maneuver the spider onto a red plastic ice scraper I found under seat. It did not stay on the scraper of course, but it hung from a tread of web silk long enough for me to transfer it to a birch sapling by the side of track. I even thought ahead and crossed to the far side of the track to hang it in better light for photography 🙂 Of course, it immediately sought the shade of the back side of the leaves. I figured for sure it would be well hidden by the time I got my camera from the car, but it was still there, perhaps still recovering from its trauma, when I got back. It took some doing, and an angled LCD to get an angle in behind the leaves, but I did manage a few good shots of the spider. It was indeed, one of the brightest, and one of the biggest, Garden Spiders I have ever seen.
The Garden Spider (Argiope aurantia) should really have a more exotic name. It is certainly exotic looking. Big. Bright. Boldly patterned. With orange legs! If it were not so common, and if it did not live, generally, right in our gardens and yards, it probably would have a more fitting name. It certainly would if it were not pretty much harmless to humans. It will, under extreme provocation, bite, and it does use toxins to kill its prey, but we do not react to its poison. It is a good thing to remember when you find one climbing your leg while you are driving the car. 🙂 I can not really figure out how it got in the car. The windows were closed while the car was parked, and I certainly did not feel it on me while talking the gentleman with the dog. He certainly did not comment on it. Seems like he would have said something if he had seen it crawling on me. I might have brushed it off a bush with my camera bag, or it could have been hanging off my hat. I am not sure. Despite my micro-second of panic when I first saw it, I am delighted to have had the encounter…it makes a good story…and blessed to have had the opportunity to photograph this beautiful spider. I am especially happy that no harm came to the spider through the adventure.
I know, there are some of you who do not like spiders, and I respect and understand your fear. I am sure just looking at the pic gives you shivers, and reading the story, if you got this far, probably sets your heart racing. Not your fault. While I will admit to having a healthy respect for spiders, and an awareness of the harm some of them might do, I don’t have the impulse to smash them, and I can appreciate their beauty. Especially a magnificent specimen like this one. On the other hand, I am certainly not going to provoke it into biting me. 🙂
“If your eye is generous, then your whole being is filled with light.” Jesus said it, and it is the key. Open eyes, and a spirit that sees the light in all that lives, in very shape of the landscape, in everything that the light touches. The light within shines out of open eyes to illuminate a beautiful world, full of meaning, full of grace…worthy of love. Just as the creator loves it into being. Seeing it so, generously, makes it so. Even one spider at a time. And I thank you, Jesus, for relighting the light in me! Happy Sunday!
Ruddy Turnstone in passing. Happy Sunday!
Ruddy Turnstone, Kennebunk ME
On one of our after-dinner walks on the beach this week, we found a group of Ruddy Turnstones feeding among the more common Semi-palmated Plovers. The next evening, both were gone from the beach, replaced by hundreds of Sanderlings. It is already fall migration along our coast, and the birds passing through change day to day. I suspect I have seen a Ruddy Turnstone in Maine before, but it was years ago, when birding friends used to encourage me further afield to chase birds, especially during migration. I seem to remember seeing them on Hill’s Beach on the Saco Bay side of Biddeford Pool.The Ruddy Turnstone nests on the coast of Alaska and on the Islands of the Canadian Arctic Shield. They winter as close to us as the shores of Connecticut. I see them in New Jersey in October, and Florida in January…I might even see them in Panama in October, depending on how fast they move south. Finding them on our local beach was a real treat.
It has been a long time since we humans were migrants, as we certainly were, whether we lived by hunting or herding or trading. Even in the early days of agriculture, we moved with seasons. It is in our blood, perhaps in our genes (certainly in our spirits)…and we feel the tug, spring and fall…the urge to follow the sun south (or north), or, at the very least, the slope of land down to the shore in spring, or up to the forests in winter. I find myself, at this stage of my life, repeating the pattern at least in part. New Jersey and Panama in October, the Rio Grande Valley of Texas in November, Florida and Honduras in January and early February, Southern California in March, and back to Florida in April just in time to catch the north bound migration, which will take me to Ohio in May and then home to Maine for the summer. I don’t know whether that makes me feel the tug more or less…but I certainly can not deny feeling it. I can identify with the Ruddy Turnestone.
Not that I can keep this up forever, season after season, but while it lasts I will certainly enjoy it…taking each season at its best…following fall south and spring north…being at home wherever I am in my yearly journey…giving thanks to the Creator God, who is always with me. Happy Sunday.
A Praise of Blazing Star! Happy Sunday.
Northern Blazing Star. Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, ME
You might remember that back in late July and early August I was tracking the bloom of the Northern Blazing Star on the Kennebunk Plains and predicting one of the best years for the flower in recent memory. On August 5th I left for 2 weeks of travel and it rained for a few days when I got home…so it was yesterday before I got out to the Plains to see how the Blazing Star was doing. And it was certainly doing! I have not, in my more than 20 years of living in Southern Maine, seen the Blazing Star so dense or so extensive. To say that the Plains are purple with it is an understatement. This might be full bloom. I saw no unopened buds, and the oldest, topmost buds on each plant are fading…but, oh my, what a bloom!
Sony HX90V, in-camera HDR at 67mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Lightroom.
I sometimes think that mankind is unique among all God’s creation in the ability to praise the creator. We have the privilege, not only of being created, but of knowing that we are. And we know, if we know God at all, that we are created with love…lovingly created…and loved all life long. We respond to the greatness of that love with praise…thankfulness, awe, joy…we make a joyful noise before God…lifting hands and faces…bold in the awful presence of the Creator of all.
But then I see the Kennebunk Plains ablaze with the purple of Northern Blazing Star, and I am not so sure we are alone in our ability to praise. A plain full of Blazing Star in bloom looks a lot like praise to me…as though the earth itself lifted its face and hands and broke out in exalted song.
A praise of Blazing Star!
When we praise the creator of all, how can we not believe that all creation praises with us. And I, for one, can not look on the Plains ablaze with Blazing Star without praising… Â Happy Sunday!
Handsome is as handsome does. Happy Sunday!
Gambel’s Quail, Sweetwater Wetlands, Tucson AZ
We spent the early morning yesterday at Sweetwater Wetlands in Tucson AZ. Sweetwater Wetlands was one of the first municipal water treatment plants developed with native vegetation and trails specifically for birding. The size of its parking lot testifies to its popularity with Tucson area birders, and with visitors from around the world. In the winter it draws a wide variety of wetland species that would otherwise be hard to see in Tucson’s desert environment, and even in August there are birds aplenty.
This covey of 8-10 Gambel’s Quail were along the edge of one of the berm paths, feeding. I have attempted to photograph Gambel’s Quail in both New Mexico and Arizona, never with much success. They are easily spooked, hard to approach, and fast when they decide to disappear. At Bosque del Apache in New Mexico, even with a sheet of glass between you and the birds (at the feeder blinds in the Visitor Center), it is hard to get them to sit long enough for a portrait. This is the “guard” quail…generally a male…who has the job of standing watch while the rest of the covey feeds. For some reason, instead of leading his covey off into the brush when I came around the corner of the trail close to them, he took the challenge head on, and approached me…strutting his best…his head plume raised…ready to fight me if I insisted! Of course, his covey obediently followed a yard behind…so they all clattered down the edge of the path toward me. He repeatedly struck his best pose on the brow of the trail and dared me to do my worst. My worst was to take a lot of pictures 🙂 The light, behind him and still warm with rising sun, along with his attitude, made him irresistible.
Nikon P900 at about 1600mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Lightroom.
An encounter like this is always wonderful…in the literal sense of the word. It fills me with wonder…with a sense of the greatness of the creator God. And, of course, with an appreciation of God’s love in all creatures. How can I not feel blessed? It is way more than good luck. I can not believe there is not a loving intention behind an unlikely encounter like this, and it gives me great joy to share it with you. That is what the Generous Eye is all about. Happy Sunday!
NM Sunflower! Happy Sunday.
Sunflower, just over the NM border from OK.
There is a substantial stone sign to mark the border crossing between Oklahoma and New Mexico on Route 56, and a more subtle shift in the landscape from high plains to volcanic plateau, but the real difference, at least this year, is sunflowers. Evidently New Mexico distributed tons of sunflower seeds this spring, and sprayed them along roadsides all over what I have seen of the state so far this trip. And it has been a wet (by NM standards) summer…with enough rain so that the sunflowers, watered by runoff from the roads, have prospered. Big, bold, beautiful sunflowers provide a foreground for the volcanic uplands and mountains of this section of New Mexico. It is great! It is wonderful. It is an act, intentional or otherwise, of worship and praise…guaranteed to lift the spirits of everyone who lives in, or visits the state.
We had to stop a few miles into New Mexico at a little roadside rest to take in the view, and I was compelled to photograph a few of sunflowers. The glancing, high altitude light of late morning, with in-camera HDR to keep the shadows and highlights in range, contribute to image that makes me smile…and I hope it does you too. It is just so cheerful. And yet it is authentic. This is not a pampered garden sunflower. You can see the wear and tear of life on the roadside all over the plant…and the great green hairy fist of the new bud adds a contrasting element and another dose of reality. This is cheerfulness in the face of adversity. This is a great big simile despite the challenges. This is praise for the good life even when that life is not easy. It says to me: God is great. God is good. And nothing life can throw at me will change my mind.
All that from a sunflower on the roadside? Certainly! Happy Sunday! And may it be a sunflower day for you!
Day Lily Illustration Effect. Happy Sunday!
Day Lily, Kennebunk Light and Power, Factory Pasture Road, Kennebunk ME
Yesterday my wife asked me to take the electric payment to the office (we have a municipal power company that serves the town) on my way to the store. I was reluctant to do it, but she shamed me into it :). While I was dropping it off, I saw the mixed stand of Day Lilies at the corner of the parking lot. The Day Lilies all over town this year are spectacular. There must have been a town “beautification” project sponsored by someone that featured Day Lilies at a bargain, and these yellow lilies in particular…because there are plantings of them along the brick sidewalks, in the median of streets, around banks and other businesses…everywhere! I have been meaning to stop and photograph some of the more impressive spreads, and here was one right at hand in the electric company parking lot. And, of course, I had my Sony HX90V with me. Life is good.
This is not quite a photograph…or maybe rather, it is slightly more than a photograph. The HX90V has a range of Picture Effects built in. I have never been one for such “features”…I like my photography straight-up mostly…but I have been experimenting with a few of the HX90V’s effects. This is the Illustration effect…it attempts to turn the photo into a drawing…simplifying colors, emphasizing edges, etc so that the image looks like something drawn, perhaps with markers and bright inks, rather than a photograph. This is all done in-camera, before the image is saved to the card, so that when you first open it, it already looks like this. It can be very interesting with the right subject. As I say, not a photograph exactly, but an interesting image.
It worked particularly well here. The simplification of the yellow petals is striking, and the background has an artfully rendered look. I like it a lot. I think it is actually beautiful.
And there is a lot to work with in the image and the situation for The Generous Eye and the Sunday Thought. If I had remained stubbornly stingy when my wife asked me to run the errand, well…I never would have seen this Lily. The Generous Eye begins with a generosity of spirit that leaves you open to the needs of others…and to any and every adventure. Then there is the generosity of the town and their lily planting program that inspired me to look at lilies more closely this year. I equate The Generous Eye, at least in part, with “having vision”…in the sense of being able to visualize a better tomorrow and do something about it. Someone, or some group, in the town had to have “seen” with a generous eye what the town would look like this summer patterned with yellow lilies. And then there is the generosity of the Sony engineering team, who worked to include this effect in the camera’s software. I always wondered why they bothered. I am sure not many people use the Picture Effects at all…most who buy the camera will never discover that they are there…and yet a lot of time and energy must have gone into creating them, and refining them to work as well as they do. That was generous of Sony in both senses I have already highlighted. Finally there is an element of “willingness to try new things” in the Generous Eye. As I already suggested, an adventurous spirit is necessary for a generous eye. If I had stuck to my prejudices (stingy prejudices) then I would not have tried the Illustration effect…and missed this image.
Finally, I have to believe in The Generous Eye of the creator of all, who embodies generosity in all its forms and who loved every circumstance that lead to this image into existence. I am not who I am because I see God…I am who I am because God sees me…and God’s eye is always and all ways generous. Happy Sunday!