Gorgeous and disturbing. I think you can see one ant. Or maybe three. On our driveway.
Imagine, there will be a day when there are no driveways, when people don’t own cars. Maybe no garages, either. But where would you keep the trash barrels, the lawn and gardening stuff, the overflow of things you should sort or dispose of, the large tools…all the things that would go into a basement if you had one?
But then, there may not be lawns. Gardens? Hard to say. Basements? Well, you need them where there are frosts. But not here in SoCal.
I thought I’d seen it, but not really. That’s as good as it gets. No horizon. No waves. No beach. Just the subtlest hint of water and sky. I like subtle. I like soft and blurry. Couldn’t see La Jolla, couldn’t see Oceanside. Couldn’t see much of anything. And it was so cool. And the air so gentle.
How would you possibly paint the very slight gradations in color, the depth of the close-in and the ethereal sky?
I love this plant. It has those long, cylindrical, fluffy flower heads. And these terrific burgundy blades. I couldn’t find out what it is. Some kind of ornamental grass that gets planted around the sidewalks here. A joy to look at, and the long, soft, fuzzy flowers are nice to the touch.
It’s such a strange mix of vegetation here: sub-tropical and desert and not.
I took this photo because of the big lush palm that dominates and just realized that there are also those two background iconic lollipop palms [my term for them] and the fir or pine or whatever plus the eucalyptus variety. Sure is typical of the mish-mash around here. And amazing to me that it’s so green despite the continuing drought. I can’t remember the last time it rained. Really. It would be a refreshing relief.
They always seem a bit other-worldly and alien to me. That surface is terrific. And these are just in the sidewalk plantings in front of our house. Strange fractured maps on strange bulbous forms.
But more harvest-y looking, less desolate. Not just because of the poke of green up there, but somehow because of the lacy structure, don’t you think?
It looks as though it should be cut and bundled, to appear in dried floral arrangements, rather sparse and simple. But alas, it’s on the campground cliffs and I don’t have access, nor, probably, the right. It does make me realize I do miss a true autumn; in northern New England, the leaves are starting to change. They change here, too, but it’s not the same…
I don’t know why I love these soft blurry vistas so much. It must be missing the fog, missing the serenity of a gentle rain, missing something the Japanese capture so well in their elegant brush paintings and screens.
When we turn at our street corner to face the water for our walk, I practically skip with pleasure when this edge-less panorama greets me. It’s as if the ocean is sighing delicately, from a long way off, from great depths of space and time, and inviting me to its seemingly eternal presence of never-ending movement and rhythm and freshness .
Now it’s a challenge! More rust and brown and tan and gray.
Peace sign? One pine cone, a nice symbol of renewal and continuity. Much needed. Two months from now the election will be decided. Very important to vote. Show up. Be there. The pine cone did…
At any rate, I love the golden light that comes through and warms the gray. This was a gnarled shrub, or its remains, very common along the cliffs at the beach. The light was a surprise; I thought it would be about texture alone. When I am taking photos in the evening, facing the sun, I can barely see what I’m focusing on, so this is quite satisfying.
A good number of ambiguous shapes in there, plus the pink in the center foreground that I wouldn’t have predicted. Looking *after* taking the photo certainly rewards looking *before,* in ways I’d never have suspected.
And everything in between. These white flowers grow on a deep green waxy-leafed shrub, perhaps star jasmine? No, probably not; they have no scent and are rather sparse on the plant. Some sort of privet? Dunno.
But they fall among their fellows, making quite a pattern; the oldest are the deepest rusty orange, the recently felled are pale yellow. A veritable graveyard of blooms.
I’m a fiber artist these days, so here’s some natural fiber, on the trunk of a palm tree. Tangles and stalks. Fine and coarse, thick and thin, delicate and sturdy, curled and straight. Golden, tan, bleached white, tinted pale orange, and everything in between: Nature as composer and colorist.
So, why am I showing you this blurry image of — well, it’s palm fronds, I think. They form the roof of the (teeth gritted) “Shave Ice” concession at the campground.
We walk by it nearly every time we walk there. And I do grit my teeth every time I see the sign. “Shave Ice” and “Ice Tea.” I have to work hard to resist my very prescriptive linguistic impulses. I guess I feel the blurry image matches the blurry grammatical lines that are constantly being erased. The past participle, folks! Even if you don’t know the term, you know the verb form when used as an adjective. “Shaved” and “Iced.” Sigh.
It goes along with “10 items or less” in the grocery line. (“Less what?” I constantly ask myself. The island of Gibraltar has a Safeway that cautions “10 items or fewer.” It’s British! Which is a whole nother issue…)
And also the “quotation marks” around things that shouldn’t have them. And the sentences like “She gave it to her and I!” It goes on and on. Oh well, I’m hopeless. Ain’t I?!
And salt air. On concrete. On the barrier for the sidewalk on the train track overpass. Makes you wonder what’s happening to the concrete you can’t see.
It’s beautiful and scary. Aging. Stress. Elements. Elemental. Rust, but no diamonds.
Also, when you first look at it, you can’t tell what the scale is. For that matter, unless I told you that this is about 18″ tall by 12″ wide, you probably still wouldn’t know. It’s huge and it’s tiny, in the scheme of things. Some scheme.
The clouds made another level of land (sea?) scape, looking almost solid, rising from the horizon as if molded from the sand and foam.
The geometry of the thing, the reverse symmetry, appeals to me as well. And I don’t think I was consciously aware of that as I took the photo. Surprise!
They were just too good. So these are some from the section that was “warm” colors. I like the speckled ones. Such great and varied glazes. I forgot to note the artist’s name, which makes me feel sad. One of these brilliant ideas that only seems simple, and its realization is rich.
The next time I’m there, I’ll note his name. I think his first name was David. Thank you, David!
These were along a low retaining wall in Little Italy. Or Little Little Lee, as we sometimes call it. My sister and I went downtown to the San Diego Quilt Show, and on our way to supper tonight, walking from the Coaster stop, we came across a perhaps 20-foot length of decorated retaining wall. This was part of the blue-green section. One of the blue-green sections. It was so pretty. These forms are about 4-6″ long, 2-3″ tall. They overlap, they vary, they are pretty. I said that. “Pretty” isn’t a word I use a lot. But it works here.
So: are they leaves or casts of tire tracks or casts of something else or wholly invented? I like the varieties of the glazes, of the patterns, of the sizes, and even the irregularities of the forms. Things to enjoy walking along big-city streets.
