Passing-Between-Place
Digital Photograph
Site For Dialogue
Digitally Manipulated Digital Photographs
Swimming With Sea Turtles - Call From Hawaii
Digital Photograph
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Origin of the above thought:
I was standing tightly under the lee side of a hemlock, out of the wind and rain. I stood for a long time and drifted off, daydreaming, half-looking, semi-conscious. I was reminded of deer that I’ve observed in the past – I thought about how I was like a deer standing under a tree in the rain. I wondered how similar their perception of this kind of moment would be to my own – a kind of alert quietness, shifting weight, aware of the moisture in the air and the temperature, thinking about food and water, but content to just stand for the moment.
My breath, a cloud of moisture.
And that led me to consider that what I should probably do is to stay put like a deer does. To act like a deer. To stay dry by staying put.
This was contrary to what my habits told me, which was to get down off this hill and get back into an area of human habitation.
Conclusion:
Deer taught me something – to listen to the weather, to act according to what it tells you.
Waiting out the Rain - Deer Teaching
Digital Photographs
Unititled
Digital Video
Light is Falling Batteries are Dying
Still From Digital Video
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There
is a fascinating negotiation between species happening here. I’m
sleeping in a large undeveloped lot, big cedar and ferns, in between
houses. I can hear dogs barking all around. There’s sign that some
large animal has been through here – the ferns are trampled rather
than walked-around. A lot of animals having been sleeping under the
cedars here – the ground is smoothed into hollows – and there are
more trails than I think dogs would make. There’s
chewed-up-and-shat out cardboard on the other side of the tree I’m
camped under – I can’t tell if it’s bear shit or what, there’s
deer shit, and there’s also the dogs in peoples’ yards. So I’m
thinking about what the dogs are barking at, whether the dogs are
doing to hear me, and whether the dogs keep away the bears. I have to
cook, so I have to consider whether bears or dogs will smell it, and
how I have to ‘bear bag’ my food now.
Whereas
most of my conscious decisions were based on visual sensations in the
city and suburbs, now I’m consciously negotiating on visual,
olfactory and auditory levels.
The
sun is setting now, the light is changing and a police siren is going
off in the far distance. I don’t know if it’s the howl of the
siren or the falling light that started it, but the coyotes just
started howling (their sound is in tune with the police siren) and
the dogs in backyards are barking in response. Now I realize that the
trails and hollowed-out areas under logs are from coyotes. They
obviously sleep in this lot. It’s going to be an interesting night.
...
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Coming back is really fuckin’ hard, I tell ya.
Standing here, waiting for a bus and being completely inactive and passive and waiting for something else to transport me, something beyond the actions of my own self.
I haven’t done that in the last four days.
Time is completely different as well.
It’s all one big time.
Now I’m whipping by in one of these same vehicles that have been battering me with their sound and movement for the past four days.
Time is no longer subjective.
I’m back in this big illusion of a ticking clock that’s subject to nothing but itself.
No weather, no sunrise, no sunset, no tired feet, no wind.
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