For 7 years, from 2007 to 2014, I paddled 100 lakes on Vancouver Island seeking sabi in the ancient tradition of kanjaku. Kanjaku is a Japanese word that joins leisure or idleness (kan) with loneliness or stillness (jaku). Lonely idling, or leisurely stillness. This was the term that the renowned Japanese poet Basho declared shouldContinue reading “What I Learned From 100 Lakes”
Category Archives: Beauty
Truth and Beauty
“Truth and Beauty are fundamentally different. Whereas Truth is a property of statements, beauty reveals itself in the course of an experience with an object.” Howard Gardner Do you know what you value? I value beauty. I say in my profile that I value beauty and excellence, as well as truth and kindness. Beauty isContinue reading “Truth and Beauty”
The Quality of Light
My father was a master of illusion. Early in his career he was a photoengraver. He etched images in copper plates to run on mechanical presses. Later he worked the large camera in a newspaper’s composing room. He was an expert at creating half-tones, those images newspapers use that are made up of variously spacedContinue reading “The Quality of Light”
Comparing 2 Takumar 55mm Lenses
A comparison of two lenses in the Takumar line of 55mm lenses, shows minimal difference, with the newer SMC version having slightly more accurate, less pink tones.
A Year of Bokeh
It started when I looked at a photo by Eden Bromfield and thought, “woah, how did he get that shot?” I’d been looking at photos for months, deciding what I was most drawn to. What type of photos did I want to take? I liked both the ultra sharp landscapes that I would later comeContinue reading “A Year of Bokeh”
Beauty Will Save the World
“Too often, beauty that is thrust upon us is illusory and deceitful, superficial and blinding, leaving the onlooker dazed; instead of bringing him out of himself and opening him up to horizons of true freedom as it draws him aloft, it imprisons him within himself and further enslaves him, depriving him of hope and joy….Continue reading “Beauty Will Save the World”
Westholme Tea Farm
Westholme Tea Farm is dedicated to reflecting wabi sabi in their tea and tea utensils.
Coming Out as an Empath
The same sensitivity and awareness that causes increased pain, also empowers empaths to know deeper and richer levels of solitude, sabi, and mono no aware. They see all kinds of beauty and they tend to see it everywhere. They feel deep connections in nature, and with others. Their heart it touched every day. I intuitively knew that if I numbed my pain, I would also numb my joy.
The Stages of Beauty
Our ability to perceive quality in nature begins, as in art, with the pretty. It expands through successive stages of the beautiful to values as yet uncaptured by language. – Aldo Leopold, Sand County Almanac
A Long Missed Shift
There have been NO MUSHROOMS in Nanaimo so far this fall. With failing hope on my walk today I wandered from time to time off the trail, poking mournfully at the ground with my walking stick. Eventually I gave up and decided to just enjoy the walk. As I came around one curve in theContinue reading “A Long Missed Shift”
Still In The Stream 