Category: Monday Musings

Seeing Differently

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This morning, I was thinking about my photography and how I see things. Since I

‘ve taken up photography, I find myself looking at the world as if I were looking through the camera lens. I look for the things that catch my eye. Sometimes, it’s a spot of color or a shape or the light. It could be a facial expression or a gesture. Whenever I don’t have a camera, I try to remember what I saw. Right now, I’m noticing the changes in the trees, from the bare limbs and twigs to the golden green of the new spring leaves.

Pup’s grave

Sometimes, I take pictures of things that make me curious. I found this group of rocks while tramping through the woods behind the pond. The arrangement of the rocks suggested a grave. Something compelling about the arrangement of the broken tree limbs around the rocks reinforced the idea. I knew that my son had buried his beloved dog, Pup, in those woods. I sent him the picture and asked if this was Pup’s grave. He confirmed it. I look at this image now and recognize something sacred or holy about the place. My son was an adult when Pup died. He had had Pup for nearly thirteen years. The young man who buried his beloved pet was a heartbroken little boy that day.

Photography invites storytelling. Or perhaps it’s the other way around—that storytelling invites photography. Last fall I began a practice of taking weekly pictures of the cherry tree from the back door of my house. I continued that practice throughout the winter, even when I couldn’t see any changes. Still, the photos tell the story of the changing seasons. I think I may create a photo collage of images, one from each month of the year, to tell the story of the changing seasons, weather, and moods of the place where I live.

Collage “From the Back Door March 2024”

These images in the collage are actually rather ordinary. However, they tell a story of how the world changes over time. I am sure some of those trees will someday die and fall or be cut down. The weather changes. I want to be aware of those changes and let the photos tell the story.

I want to explore other ways photography helps us see differently. I will be exploring the idea of perspective in the future.

The Simple Things

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It’s the smallest things

the petals of the apple and cherry blossoms littering the ground like so many snowflakes;

tiny purple flowers like stars that have fallen between the blades of grass;

jasmine trumpets hanging in the tree branches.

It’s simple things

the sweet burn of the hot cinnamon spiced tea at breakfast.

It’s as simple as

the turtles sunning themselves on the water-soaked logs in the lake;

pollen-swollen pinecones in the making;

the rumble of thunder before the rain.

It’s the simple smell of bread baking and the taste of butter melting over hot-cross buns during the Lenten season.

It’s the glitter of sunlight on the water and the shadow of trees on the pavement.

It’s the sound–or rather the silence–of my steps along the straw-covered path through the woods.

Monday Musing–One Little Word

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Do you choose a word for the year instead of making resolutions?

I’ve tried New Year’s Resolutions, and I keep them precisely twenty-four hours before I forget them, or just plan ignore them. More than ten years ago, I learned about choosing a word that would set intentions for the year instead of resolutions. Intentions are plans. Sometimes, we can turn our intentions into actions; other times, we have to let the intentions go. Intentions can be goals, and we turn those goals into something concrete. I like this idea of setting intentions. If I abandon an intention, I am not failing. I simply let it go.

This year, I joined Ali Edwards’s One Little World project. It’s been several years since I followed her project with the monthly prompts. I’m going to work on that this year; it’s one of my intentions to be more mindful of my chosen word. This year, I chose the word “MANIFEST.” For the last week or so, I have been hearing the hymn “Songs of Thankfulness and Praise” by Christopher Wordsworth running through my head. The refrain of that Epiphany hymn goes “God in man made manifest.” I am a life-long Lutheran, and my Lutheran heritage is generational, going back to my German ancestors who settled in what is known as the Dutch Fork region of South Carolina. My maternal grandmother’s ancestors were Austrian Lutherans from Salzburg who settled along the Savannah River in Georgia. Lutheranism runs deep. So, the spiritual idea of “manifest” is the first thing that comes to mind.

As I began to explore the word, I thought about other ways “manifest” might appear in my life. To “manifest” can mean to reveal, to make apparent or evident or obvious for everyone/anyone to see. To manifest something might be to imagine it or create it. When something manifests itself, others can see it.

I know the word has some more “New Age-y” connotations and has been linked to the notion of the Law of Attraction–the idea that if we visualize or imagine something in our lives, that thing (wealth, fame, popularity, success) will be attracted to us. I don’t even want to go there. I want to explore ideas and see what appears. In the spiritual sense of the word, I want to see how God manifests Himself in the world around me. I want to see how I can manifest Jesus to others as well. I want to look for these ideas.

This month, I am going to follow along with Ali’s One Little Word prompts and see what ideas “manifest” themselves. In the meantime, though it is “the bleak midwinter,” I will look for God in the natural world and in other people.

Beauty–Monday Musings

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Today’s prompt from Liz in the Five Things class is to list five things that are “beautiful” today. We’ve all heard the saying, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” What is beautiful to me may not be beautiful to you.

As I think about what is beautiful to me, the first thing I think about is visual beauty–what I see. Today, my list includes the clear blue sky. I don’t know why, but the sky is bluer in autumn than in winter or summer. Everything seems sharper and more delineated in the autumn air.

There are the changing leaves as well. Years ago, I bought some cherries from the grocery store, and we planted some of the pits in the backyard. A tree grew; it’s definitely a cherry, but we have not had any fruit from it. However, every year, though–late February–it blooms. It is gorgeous. It reminds me of the A. E. Housman poem:

Loveliest of Trees

A. E. Housman

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

This poem is in the public domain.

Today, the tree is not dressed in white, but rather in a deep red as the seasons change. The tree is as beautiful in its autumn dress as in its “Easter” dress.

Yesterday was Sunday, and that is “church day.” There haven’t been many Sundays in my 65 years that did not find me in the family pews in my home church of Mt. Hermon Lutheran in Peak or Macedonia Lutheran in Prosperity. The beauty of the Lutheran liturgy draws me in to corporate worship with other believers–from the corporate confession and forgiveness of sins, to the readings from the Bible, the pastor’s sermon that reminds me of the Good News of the gift of salvation to the breaking of the eucharistic bread during communion. Worship is a beautiful thing.

Last week, my husband and I went to the Great Smoky Mountains for several days and invited my mother to go with us. It was beautiful in the mountains. The fall color was peaking. There were crowds, especially on the Cades Cove Scenic Loop. The towns were commercialized (if that’s even a word), but it was a beautiful time.

I learned some interesting things about my family history from Mama. I didn’t know I had a United States Senator in my family tree! I knew I had several Confederate soldiers–three or four times great-uncles, three of whom died at Gettysburg. I also knew that my Summer ancestor was an officer in the American Revolutionary War. (I qualify to join the Daughters of the American Revolution as well as the United Daughters of the Confederacy!) That ties into what I was watching last night on ETV–the show “Finding Your Roots.” As I listened to the stories of Angela Davis and Mr. Jay (I forgot his whole name already), I understood even more how the past influences our lives. There is beauty in knowing where we come from and who our people are.

Mama and I are planning a “cemetery tour” to trace our ancestors together. That will be a beautiful thing as well–that sharing of stories and history.

I’m not sure I’ve listed my five things, but I’ve certainly “mused.”

Monday Musings–Currently in October

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A monthly update of what’s happening in my life

Reading–I discovered the Book Retreat series by Ellery Adams, who happens to be a North Carolina writer. These books are set in an English manor house that was dismantled and relocated to the Virginia Blue Ridge Mountains. Storyton Hall houses a secret library of “lost,” rare, and controversial books and other items kept from the world by Guardians in the Steward family. Jane Steward, mother, manager of the Storyton Hall Resort, is the current Guardian. She is also the solver of murder mysteries. So far, I’ve read three of the books (though no in order). I give them 4.9 stars.

Watching–I’m pretty much in a rut when it comes to TV watching. I have been watching The Muskateers on PBS/SCETV for a while. While the palace of Louis the whatever is as luxurious as one expects, the streets of Paris are not the streets for the tourists. The casting of the Muskateers is interesting. The character of Porthos, I think, is biracial. I’ve been reading another series of Regency novels with biracial, Anglo-African, and Caribean characters, and I’m discovering that there were far more of those people in Europe than I thought. I admit I love “period pieces.”

Listening–I haven’t gotten into audio books, though I’ve tried. The problem is, my mind drifts while listening. The narratives become “background noise.” But I do listen to music, even when it is in the background. Music calms me. I haven’t discovered too many new artists over the last few weeks; however, I am listening to Loreena McKennitt. I love the way she takes poems such as Alfred Noyes’s “The Highwayman” and Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shallott” and sets them to music.

Planning–Nothing new. I have to get serious about the itinery for the trip to Gatlinburg for Grady’s piece of mind.

Dreaming–no white Christmas’s for me! I’m dreaming up a plot for my next novel, now that the first one is “finished.” I’m planning the revisions to Letters from a Traveling Soldier and researching ways to publish it. I’m dreaming of seeing that book in print.

Creating–I’m creating a new plot for my second novel, knitting and crocheting, and learning to make jewelry. I need to catch up on creating some essential oil blends from my kits as well.

Learning–I’m learning to be more present in my everyday life. I’m learning more about editing photographs in Lightroom, especially. I’m learning about writing.

Loving–I’m loving the sound of the bird choirs in the mornings as I drink my morning tea. I’m loving the cinnamon “burn” in my Hot Cinnamon Tea blend. I’m loving Liz Lamareuc’s Here: Five Things Fall 2023 session. It’s making me more observant. I love the poems and songs she lists with each day’s prompt. (And I’m loving that I’m keeping up with the class this time around!)