To find posts on any particular aspects of beauty, service, or courage, just click on the categories or tags that interest you on the right.
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Enjoy! There is so much beauty and courage in the world!
Tolmie State Park in Washington is nearby and I’m improving my skills with the XT2 and Lightroom. These are some of my favorites from yesterday. Let me know which ones you like!
Amidst the sadness, loss, pain, sorrow and anger in this world, there is also so much beauty. Beauty that reminds me we are all part of something much bigger, and more beautiful, and good. I took this photo on a walk with lovely Louie this morning. Stop, take time to see the beauty, and rest in that beauty. Have a great day.
So much symmetry, a bright flower, petals silky white, stretching in all directions, yellow center unfolding in yellow, mathematical spendor.
There are so many beautiful Daisies along the path this time of year along the Jubilee trail. I wanted to make this daisy stand out.
The scientific name for the daisy is Bellis perennis. Bellis is Latin for pretty, and perennis for everlasting. Everlasting Pretty!
According to Wikipedia, “the whole head closes at night and opens in the morning. Chaucer called it “eye of the day”. And, “The English Daisy is also considered to be a flower of children and innocence.”
Irregardless, I love this flower, its magical mathematical symmetry, its shining in the sunshine.
Below is the reading by the author, Dan Windisch, of his science fiction story Alpha Martin and Omega. This is from his book of the same name that is available as a paperback book and a Kindle book on the Amazon website. Many people prefer listening to a book rather than reading it. This is for those people! I hope you enjoy it. The story reflects much of my philosophy of living and dying and beauty and magic.
Alpha Martin and Omega Steed, Part 1.Alpha Martin and Omega Steed, Part 2.Alpha Martin and Omega Steed, Part 3.Alpha Martin and Omega Steed, Part 4.Alpha Martin and Omega Steed, Part 5.
Paradox and Choosing article reading from Dan Windisch’s Alpha Martin and Omega Steed book that is available on Amazon and hopefully soon to available as an Audible book.
Reading of the article Paradox and Choosing by the author, Dan Windisch.
Photograph and poem and reading by Dan Windisch January 2, 2019
Click the play button above to hear the poem as read by the author Dan Windisch. You can follow along as you listen with the photos and poem below! This is part of my book “Alpha Martin and Omega Steed” available as an 8 1/2×11″ full color book on Amazon.com. Search for Dan Windisch on Amazon if you are interested in the book.
Photo for Mastectomy Poem.
Paradox and pain Who am I without my breasts? A woman? Not? Me? Not? Who am I now?
Life or death, keep my Breast?
The easy smiling soft colored blondish woman in the lightly red green and white faded loose cotton top, Smiled gently and moved with ease In our meditation workshop at Hollyhock.
She stood out in her quiet gentle beauty. ———— Evening in the hot tub.
Naked we sat as the golden sun set over shining blue waters.
Naked she enters our waters.
Flat chested with a scar on one side, and a tattoo of a pink carnation, blooming, on the other side.
She shines with beauty.
She talks of her pain of surgery, confusion. Who was she? Was she a she? Without her breasts.
She talked of her new blooming And of the flowering tattoo That was her new me. More than breasts.
Poem and and reading and photographs By Dan Windisch 2018
Click the play button above to hear the poem as read by the author Dan Windisch. You can follow along as you listen with the photos and poem below! This is part of my book “Alpha Martin and Omega Steed” available as an 8 1/2×11″ full color book on Amazon.com. Search for Dan Windisch on Amazon if you are interested in the book.
For 69 years I grew up in, lived in, perceived in, And will, in the not too distant future, die in, a land of mist, reflections, shades of rain, and fog.
I grew up in lands of tall evergreen trees; Spruce, Douglas fir, and Cedar. Trees formed, from fog, and rain, and days of occasional sunshine.
I grew up surrounded by Mountains that exist only in days of glorious sunshine. Even huge, magnificent, 14,408 foot, snow-covered, even in August, Mount Rainier. She often disappears, stops existing, between the mists and clouds that covers us all, Then, surprising us all, bursts out glorious, and brightly snow covered, in sunshine; for a few days, then disappears, again, As if, never having existed, back into the mist. Was she always there? Are we always here?
I live in lands of rolling hills, covered by thick tall green trees, and dense underbrush, and wet dripping leaves,
and those marvelous Madrona (Mad Rona’s) trees with their shining when wet, bright red skins, and red berries, and regally red peeling bark (do you see her face in the bark? I do).
I live in Western Washington; Puyallup, Olympia, Lacey, Dupont, Tacoma. Don’t ask me for exact descriptions of people, places, and things. All adjectives and nouns slide into, and out of the fog, the mist, the varying shades of gray.
The joys of living in a land of mist, reflections, shades of rain, and fog? No sharp stabbing reality.
The best aspect? Sliding, mystical shape shifting Beauty, and a reality, that slides from sunshine, to mist, to rain. I hold, cherish, then let go, of everything, even me, back into the mist.
Yet, part of the my most beautiful, my most connected, are the people, and moments of beauty and gratitude, that I so love, They always remain in my soul, even when I forget. Even when they are hidden from memory by the fog, and the rain, and the mist. Like a dream, forgotten, but still there, Until I too slide back into the mist.
Currently, in this short moment in the long history of this land, Currently in 2018, ours is a haunted land, full of Walmarts, Costcos, strip malls, streets, freeways full of cars and frustrated, frightened, angry, confused, lonely people, glued to iphones, in hurried goings and doings, to buy, and store, and throw away, and hoard, more and more.
Fearful people. Yet also many kind, and good, and caring people.
Yet many of those that have more than their ancestors could ever have imagined, Are so full of fear of losing it all. People unconsciously fearing Homelessness, which, realistically, For most of them, is just a job loss, and a few months away. Scary thoughts, not thought about, but constantly there.
I live in a land of homeless people, with cats and dogs, And too many clothes on hot days, and needles on the ground, and murmurings, and shoutings,
The pain? No deep anything. Everything passes into, and out of, the mist.
Mist often leads me to, the Mystical.
Homeless Please Help
and those with signs on too many street corners, ignored.
Veterans, beggars, Moms, down on their luck, or lazy? “I need Help. Anything will do.” “Why aren’t they working? Will they steal from me?” Anger that they do nothing, while I work hard. But do they need help? I’m sure some do. What do I do?
I’m both lucky and damned. If I lost my job I would not lose it all. I’m retired, have Social Security. Yet I suffer from back pain, am blind in one eye, and hurt most of the time.
Yet I am so grateful.
I still have a time, Just a little, (we die too soon) before I die, To cherish the mist, reflections, occasional sunshine, and the mystical.
I will dance (if only in my soul) in the rain, and sun, Reflect, Stomp in the mud puddles, Slide into and out of the mist, and shades of rain, And cherish our grandbabies, as they marvel in the growing glory of it all.
Photo Audio and Poem from Dan Windisch’s “Alpha Martin and Omega Steed” available on Amazon.
Sacred Moments read by the author Dan Windisch
I saw her in prayer.
And, sensing, in an instant, that sacred light, and posture, and place, and time, I respectfully, and slowly, and quietly, raised my camera to my eye, and gently pressed the shutter release, allowing the light to reflect onto my camera’s sensors, this mystical moment, of Her and God’s beauty, blending, melding, meeting, co-mingling, communing, in prayer, in a moment, sacred.
I love The dazzling white light pouring through the three (Father, Son and Holy Ghost) windows, That brilliant light reflecting on the altar, the tiled floor, her white Wimpled Coifed head cover.
I love That brilliant Light resting, on Her shoulder leaning slightly-to-the-left, bent-in-prayer.
I love That subtle light and shadow on her puddled, circled robe, on the floor, like rings of a pond wave, moving inward.
I love that holy light gently touching the red and white tiled floor, and softly reflecting on Those thoughtfully shaped, centuries old, columns, upholding it all.
I love The tilt of her head In contemplation and prayer.
I love The red lit candle on the altar.
I love That she is solitary, in prayer, With her God.
I love The carefree, and gorgeous flow, and shape, of her headdress, As it wanders from her head, to her neck, and down her back.
I love The flowing to the right Of her white Robe.
I love How she kneels on that hard floor Lost to everything, but God.
I love, How in this moment, She, I, God, that red candle, that light, that place, all of us, are One, in contemplation and communion.