Tag Archives: black & white photography

If Every Journey…

Posted on by Standard 10
Bridge over Bear Creek: Photo by Noelle

Bridge over Bear Creek: Photo by Noelle

If every journey started with a bridge we would know the moment we crossed over into something new. We’d know when we’d left the familiar and wandered into an unknown land. If every journey began with a bridge, midway across we could ponder which of the two sides looked better and which we would prefer. We could stand over the chasm or the river or the valley and consider calmly our progress and feel the distance we’d come. If every journey started with a bridge, there’d be that moment, before we stepped upon the first planks, where we could decide if we even wanted to cross. If every journey started with a bridge it is likely there are many paths we would never have taken and many journeys we would have missed. If every journey started with a bridge our cautious, logical mind very likely would have stayed home, more often then hiked onward.

Sometimes tripping off a blind ridge or down a dank rabbit hole is the best thing that can happen to us. No time to ponder or decide. No chance to consider all of the ramifications. We might discover that we are not these prescribed lives with planned goals and agendas. Going in through the out door or slipping on a banana peel, might open our eyes that we are so much more than habits and due dates. That we are magic and light and a creative tour de force that would’ve left Da Vinci weeping.

Falling into the unknown is what we were meant for. Not to organize it all, but to just live. Right now, with nothing but our wits.

Dying Grace: Photo Poem 45

Posted on by Standard 16
Last years art, waiting on new spring: Photo by Noelle

Last years art, waiting on new spring: Photo by Noelle

For my fortieth birthday my colleagues at work gave me a party with black balloons and a wheelchair. I’m normally a person with a sense of humor, but I had watched this parade with colleagues before me. I work with mostly women. We have a habit of telling each other stories of how our time is past as we age. The best years behind us. We’re used up and lost our sex appeal. Men don’t do this to us and they don’t do it to each other. We do it to ourselves. I smiled and thanked everyone, but I knew in that moment, that I would live differently. That I would not see aging as a cross to bear, but an immense opportunity.

I look at this leaf dead, fragile, used up and am filled with its beauty and grace. Even dead, passed its season and it’s still showing the world what it can do. What it has to give. Aging isn’t about years, it’s about perspective. It’s seeing beauty where no one else would think to look. That isn’t weakness, that’s power. In that power is the possibility to transform. To embrace death when it comes and know you are about to pull out your best work yet.

Squatter’s House: Photo Poem 43

Posted on by Standard Reply
Abandoned Factory in Hearldsberg, CA. This is the view from a squatter's bed: Photo by Noelle

Abandoned Factory in Healdsberg, CA. This is the view from a someone’s make-shift bed on the factory dock: Photo by Noelle

I sat next to the bed of a someone who is living in this abandoned factory, to take this photo. It is curious to see what another sees as they come to rest at the end of their day. In every life there is beauty and drifts of light. We each see the world from our own perspective and sometimes even in dire corners are unexpected views.

Prickly Pear Ponders Prairie: Photo Poem 42

Posted on by Standard 9
Prickly Pear at Bear Creek Lake: Photo by Noelle

Prickly Pear at Bear Creek Lake: Photo by Noelle

Forgive the alliteration it was just too easy. Still, lying in the dirt for this shot, it seemed even I had become part of the scenery, the view. Amazing how much more beautiful the Earth is when you are lying close enough to smell her beauty. To see, up close, how curious and graceful her surface truly is.

Missed Adventure

Posted on by Standard 4
The reading room: Photo by Noelle

The reading room: Photo by Noelle

The sliver of window holds the field and the wood beyond. My eye catches the green as I peruse the book. In the cold and rain I shall not venture further, yet I feel muddy grass beneath my feet. In the quiet of the house, there lacks the tapping of rain drops swapping leaves, as they roll ever downward to the earth. Pages turning and ticking clock are a paltry company by comparison to the flooding ravines. Fiddlehead ferns breaking mulch dance about my mind interrupting this tale of woes and dragons, forgotten in my lap. For the confinement of dry and warm blankets I gave up the wind rushing my face and rattling my jacket sleeves. Such adventures of wet crows and dark fox burrows have I missed in this warm and dry corner of my house.

Leaping

Posted on by Standard 6
Walking bridge at Clement Park: Photo by Noelle

Walking bridge at Clement Park: Photo by Noelle

Not everyone at the edge is leaping towards death. They aren’t all desperately escaping grief and depression. Some of us come to the edge to see who we are in the air. Then the water. The chance to leap, a joy hungered for. For surely, there is exhilaration in risking everything to become who you truly are. In the quiet corners of our lives we daydream of how water transforms.

Goo: Photo Poem 39

Posted on by Standard 5
Oozing Goo under an overpass: Photo by Noelle

Oozing Goo under an overpass: Photo by Noelle

This post was inspired by Harry Nijland’s blog. http://harrienijland.wordpress.com

His beautiful work with graffiti and cement finally broke me free of fearing to post my fascination with the weirdly, beautiful stuff you find in tunnels, sidewalks and sewage drains. This lovely, creepy goo was found under an overpass. I love the texture and the subtle colors. Thanks, Harry.

Seed to Mulch

Posted on by Standard Reply
Dead Tree at Chatfield Reservoir: photo by Noelle

Dead Tree at Chatfield Reservoir: photo by Noelle

In grain an old storyteller’s life twists and turns. Withered like drift wood that never left home. Each adventure a ring and a knot. An audience of millipeds and the rolly polly beetle that roam the planks and hone the staff. Sun demands payment in chlorophyll and sap, while wind licks it’s length a child on a lollipop. There is no rest from seed to mulch, for even in death the performance plays on, a tale told in wood.