Peeled Away Bark

Stripping outer layers for inner growth...

The Rains Came

Pouring in unscripted and unpublished...

The rains came,
fast and furious,
hitting hard on my soul.
Flattened by events,
unawares, unexpected, unprepared...

The drops drilled down
boring stony and drunken,
clobbering surface of my psyche.
Flatlanded unwitting from behind,
awakening, changing, deepening...

Cloudburst flooded across,
washing rapid and hypersonic,
forging a drain to my essence.
In no time flat infilled a reservoir,
postponed, stockpiled, forthcoming...

The Wonder and Advantage

Of being that man of a certain age...

Wherein I openly reflect out loud not caring what others may think.

Here I am at that point in life where it is too obvious to ignore that I've become "a man of a certain age." Fortunately it doesn't concern me much since it only jars me into recognition for rare brief periods such as the past few weeks where for the first time in five years I've had some minor physical problems. Although the anatomical disruption is still not completely resolved for the most part it has already passed. Although not definitively diagnosed it's fairly certain that it is the variety that comes with approaching the sixth decade of living and nothing serious or long term. My sense is that due to taking generally pretty good care of myself my entire life things will occur that can be coped with. It's a simple welcome to advancing in life when body parts occasionally annoyingly twist mildly while wonderfully most mental stress and worries uncurl into a lack of concern over them.

Somehow I seem to have escaped a lot of the psychological and mental matters that plague a lot of boomers hitting this mark in life. Frankly I think a lot of those are a result of decisions people consciously and fully made among our panoply of choices and some of them have brought consequences. My hope is younger people observe this and avoid the pitfalls and choose the better options among those of us still around. One great advantage of arriving at this point relatively intact is not really caring too much what others think. A lot of things I once worried about in the social realm no longer cross my mind and I have a definite comfort with myself that didn't arrive until over a decade or so ago. There is also the wonder of wisdom and the sense of being at certain places before and knowing how to deal with them.

This photograph of a wizened tree stump among broken rocks and boulders of ages surrounded by wild flowers reminds me of how grand aging can be. It is not hollow but still full of space to be filled with all sorts of knowledge, emotion and enlightenment. It symbolizes being surrounded by both the known friends who are solid as rocks, as well as the beauty of new blooms of young people and ideas among dead thistles that will revive in season to keep the years full as they go by.

Days Are Not Lost

Merely notebooks postponed...

There are days that arrive
Unannounced and unexpected
When the spirit of being alive
Is for some reason rejected

Starting with the reptilian brain
Force motion enacted to kick start
Synapses that fire only to drain
Requiring a switch to soul and heart

Then visualize the ground
Where those cells
That seemingly drowned
As thoughts in wells...

Later to be drawn from
and collected.

How With No Fixed Focus

I zoomed in on my own forms of photo art...

In the past five years my creative endeavors have taken off in ways I never imagined at first. The teaching for me has been to start something that at first I may have no clear idea what I want to do but have one or two themes or ideas. With a minimal of equipment and as many free programs available now on the internet anyone can be a creator of content and take their ideas in new directions. It is a matter of what mode of expression intrigues you and how you want to create what is your own. You will find your own style and swath your own groove by using what thoughts or images in your head fire off your imagination. In my case I'm discovering that I have multiple currents running through me molding into an artistry of my own.

It has taken me quite awhile to stretch and play around in ways I see others don't and it was a result of some rather simple things. What I read and saw around me that was supposed to be the standard for good form in writing, videos or photography seemed technically proficient but fatigued to me. How many ways can you write about social problems, economics and politics without repeating yourself? I took a fiction creative writing class where I found people learning to mock stories that have been written before. What is the point in that? With video editing I learned from a good teacher but through my own inertia didn't stretch myself the way she has and one day I will pick that up again. The electrical impulse that really singed my mind is most photography I see is dry digital reproduction that follows the rules and really how many ways can you photograph the Grand Canyon? For some reason photography struck my visionary synapses as something I wanted to remake for myself.

The availability of a good camera on my smartphone allows me to easily take photos without lugging a separate camera around and suits my sense of minimalism twofold. I don't like to carry a lot of stuff around no matter where I go and I'm not enamored of complex equipment in anything. It also enables me to shoot a photo quickly and easily without much fuss or attention from others. I discovered a respected free photo editing program and learned the basics. It didn't take long to get bored with editing pictures that might earn "oohs" and "ahs" but looked like everything else in photo streams.

With no fixed focus in my lens I quit making pictures and started creating photo art. I started playing with a few features on my Android phone camera adding a few apps with the idea that a good photograph still must originate "in the camera" with solid composition. I upload each shot right after I take it over the air and when I get home save them to an external drive and then in current parlance process it. I tend to start with an image and a theme and usually end up with something I hadn't quite envisioned but somehow knew the navigational path. Along my way I have uncovered that I am able to integrate two currents that I've always worked with, the desert and American southwestern colors using processing techniques that bring them together into art that is recognizable as my own creations.

Under Construction

Taking stock and continuous  learning...

New Years has never been a time for resolutions for me. Somewhere around the end of September or beginning of October when the weather turns from blistering hot to a cooler warm my mind automatically starts taking stock thinking how I'd like to proceed the next year. It's a work in progress since for me life is a series of steps forward through continuous learning and being under construction. In December I start house cleaning thoroughly since it has been shut tight during the summer. While going through my entire home I am also clearing out the unnecessary stuff accumulated throughout the year. I shred what little paperwork I still keep, toss or give away things, organize my digital life, getting things in order for the New Year. No resolutions for the upcoming year except a list of things I want to do or get better at doing, clearing the cache in my brain and starting anew.

It's curious to me why so many people fight aging and dislike getting older. My life has gotten steadily better and easier to understand myself and others as life's milestones go by. I no longer worry about things that I once did and I'm not striving to stay young since I've already been young once. Why repeat it? It was fun, I had a pretty good time but it was also stressful because I was unsure of myself lacking maturity and wisdom of age. As I get older the pieces of the puzzle collected through years of living start coming together and I can see the bigger picture. I've lived a full life and if I died tomorrow, although I'd like to live until I'm a hundred, I'd be alright with that. Whenever it happens I want people to say "he died from having lived."

Life does get better as you put the miles on if you travel with the right attitude. Resolutions are declarations of intent with a deadline whereas goals are destinations to arrive at in order to move on to the next one. Each New Year is an opportunity to keep growing and learning through discovery. Cleaning the physical house you live in is also a way of renewing your energy and your physical being that is the house where your spirit lives. Taking stock of where your mind and soul are also is a way of refreshing and renewing your sense of purpose and direction. Resolutions somehow never seem to be met and to me far better to list out items that keep you moving forward and always learning alongside a renewed commitment of gracefully moving from one passage to another.

Stop Motion Economy

Square dancing in a monetary blur...

We're weathering a time that not even the experts and historians who study these things understand what is really happening with our global economy. If they claim to they're either bluffing, deluding themselves or lying. We are in an historical upheaval of epic proportions that contains common threads with similar chronological events of the past yet is different because it is distinctly in the here and now.

It is disquieting to our daily lives and will not be truly understood until the future. Meanwhile we are stuck in the present square dancing with partners we may or may not know and doing our best to keep time with the fiddle at a hoedown we'd rather not participate in. We're romping in a blur of light and dark, clarity and reflection, in a utilitarian fashion to keep our balance.

On the continuum of personal finances it's fair to say that many people are not being truthful to themselves or others. An old ethic that one never talks about money has revived with a strong resurgence; probably because there isn't a lot left to brag about. Almost everyone has been affected in some way and if they act and say as if they're not, then they are either bluffing, deluding themselves or lying. No one will come out of this decade without some markings of having changed for better or worse.

Meanwhile all we can do is square dance in a haze making sure we keep time and keep our footing while we whirl around. It's "Places all. Bow to your corner, bow to your partner, three hands up and around you go. Promenade around the ring, big foot up and little foot down, make that big foot jar the ground, back you go and forward again. Allemande left with the old left hand, meet your partner with a great big smile, promenade across the floor and now your home, bow to your partner, bow to the gent across the hall. And that is all."

Remaining positive during a hazy tenuous new economic age that expands beyond our known boundaries goes a long way to calming the disquietude of the storm. Coming up clean, being honest and truthful will not explain the disorder of economic, social and political change of the big picture but will comfort us individually on the home front.

On Feeling Uninspired

A need to recharge my inner battery...

People in the Midwest and parts of the East Coast are experiencing the worst of a heat wave across the country. Many of them are feeling the lethargy that those of us who are prepared for uber hot desert summers, no matter how we battle it, get re-acquainted with every year. It's a reverse of winter cabin fever in cold climates. In the dead of summer we can feel a little dead inside.

It doesn't just strike thinkers and creative types but everyone at some point around the end of July. We've done all the cool tricks, we're over hopping from the cover of one palm tree to another, tired of seeking that one shady parking spot left. We're overheated and overdone and in my case I become bored and uninspired, which is my personal version of mini-tragedy. It's a step away from anxiety and depression I must actively avoid.

It doesn't help that this has been the summer that the rest of America has come to realize the economic slowdown is a long term matter accompanied by gridlock in DC. That also there has been drama at my part time employment and my sister has spent most of it in the hospital. When all the droopy dragging drudgery is finished being verbalized, the bottom line is there is a choice. Sleep the rest of the summer away or kick the brain by natural stimulation of some sort. I've been fiddling away minutes on the new Google+ as well as whittling away hours on the old YouTube and it has been a pleasant repast. Not to say that hasn't been helpful but now it is time to get more serious. I must force myself outdoors, the heat is only bad if you're unprepared for it, to walk the urban pavement and shoot some video. I have an idea for one and I need to execute it to get out of the doldrums.

Ultimately the only way to get rid of the dread of inner dead is to revive yourself on your own to come alive again after a respite. I'm finished resting in the shade, drunk on gallons of water, tired of being tired and the only way to counter it is to get active in a creative way. There comes a point when boredom and lack of inspiration becomes an unhealthy habit and the only good response is to seek a jump start to the soul.

Focus On What You Can Be

Not on what you never will be...

It is a process of self discovery.

The best thing we can do for our own development is to know ourselves well enough to realize where our strengths and weaknesses are. Doing that will lead us to is figuring out how to maximize our strengths and just as importantly figure out what our weaknesses are and determine which we can progress in and those that we cannot. There are some things we are never meant to be or have the skill to advance. Additionally we have some talents we are good at and should take the time to hone and develop to discover how far to take them. Attempting to foster what we have a knack for very often leads us to discover that is not our forte but along the way we uncover where our true abilities lie.

For instance I once was a mediocre singer. I developed the talent as much as I could, well enough to sing in public at gatherings and events. The result was I recognized that my vocal ability was limited to a certain range, type of music and that I could only advance so far. Eventually I gave it up not only for the reason that I was putting energy into something I wasn't all that great at doing but through the experience I realized I was good at public speaking. The conclusion is I determined where my real skill was and then maximized it. Another thing I learned from music is I grew up playing the piano and guitar but recognized I wasn't very good at either one and focused on writing lyrics instead. Taking from that experience I developed my other writing skills.

Through self discovery you won't spend time and energy trying to be something you are not and will never be. You then are able to direct your efforts figuring out what you do best and can improve upon. It is alright to try evolving certain abilities you may do somewhat well at to discover your limitations with them since through the experience you will likely discover a true aptitude worth improving. Decipher what you will never be very good at or don't want to improve upon. Then direct your focus on cultivating what you are already good at or have the capacity to develop no matter what it is. This can be artistic, academic, working with tools, people or any myriad of gifts worthy of being honed. It also doesn't mean if you'll never be a great painter that you shouldn't pursue it for your own pleasure, simply recognize that it is not one of your best skills and through it you may learn you are a great photographer.