Different Perspectives, One Humanity

Featured Photo - February 2012

2012-02-09T15:41:00.000-08:00

" Even if love is full of thorns, I'd still embrace it for I know that in between those thorns, there is a rose that's worth all the pain." ~Unknown

Layers of Beauty

Featured Photo - January 2012

2012-01-04T21:58:00.001-08:00

“Another fresh new year is here . . . Another year to live! To banish worry, doubt, and fear, To love and laugh and give! This bright new year is given me To live each day with zest . . . To daily grow and try to be My highest and my best! I have the opportunity Once more to right some wrongs, To pray for peace, to plant a tree, And sing more joyful songs!” ~ William Arthur Ward

Path to Enlightenment

Featured Photo - October

2011-11-06T14:53:00.000-08:00

“Remember to be gentle with yourself and others. We are all children of chance and none can say why some fields will blossom while others lay brown beneath the August sun. Care for those around you. Look past your differences. Their dreams are no less than yours, their choices no more easily made. And give, give in any way you can, of whatever you possess. To give is to love. To withhold is to wither. Care less for your harvest than for how it is shared and your life will have meaning and your heart will have peace.” ~Kent Nerburn

Abundant Harvest

Featured Photo - September

2011-10-04T16:41:00.000-07:00

“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.” ~ Albert Camus

Autumn Has Begun

Featured Photo - August

2011-09-04T18:57:00.000-07:00

"The most fortunate are those who have a wonderful capacity to appreciate again and again, freshly and naively, the basic goods of life, with awe, pleasure, wonder, and even ecstasy." ~ Abraham Maslow

Anticipation

Featured Photo - July

2011-08-03T21:02:00.000-07:00

"Be like the flower, turn your face to the sun." ~Kahlil Gibran

Delicate Daisy

Featured Photo - June

2011-07-01T18:01:00.000-07:00

"Summer set lip to earth's bosom bare,
And left the flushed print in a poppy there."
~ Francis Thompson

Two Toned Poppy

Featured Photo - May

2011-06-04T10:54:00.000-07:00

"Abstraction allows man to see with his mind what he cannot physically see with his eyes... Abstract art enables the artist to perceive beyond the tangible, to extract the infinite out of the finite. It is the emancipation of the mind. It is an explosion into unknown areas." ~ Arshile Gorky

Caught in Chaos

Featured Photo - April

2011-05-04T12:56:00.000-07:00

"When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn." ~ Harriet Stowe

Head First

Featured Photo - March

2011-04-08T19:27:00.000-07:00

"Ocean treasures left on the shore, Nature's gift to adore" ~Author unknown

Ocean Bouquet 3

Zimbabwean Sculpture Video

2011-03-06T17:00:00.000-08:00

I am a huge fan of Zimbabwean sculpture and would like to share with you my photos from an exhibit at Van Dusen Botanical Garden, Vancouver, BC during the Summer of 2010. The sculptors are incredibly talented and their original sculptures can be viewed and purchased at the Zimsculpt virtual gallery.

I am also very grateful to Escape Into Life, who chose to feature this video on their fabulous art blog. Check out their post: Zimbabwean Sculpture by Wenata Babkowski.

Hope you enjoy it!

Featured Photo - February

2011-02-27T14:46:00.000-08:00

The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace. ~Kate Chopin

Graceful

Featured Photo - January

2011-02-01T18:20:00.000-08:00

Let us learn to appreciate there will be times when the trees will be bare, and look forward to the time when we may pick the fruit. ~Anton Chekhov

Lonely Hydrangea

Featured Photo - December

2010-12-31T09:14:00.000-08:00

A new year is unfolding – like a blossom with petals curled tightly concealing the beauty within. ~Annonymous

New Beginnings

Featured Photo - November

2010-12-01T18:38:00.000-08:00

Kindness is like snow - it beautifies everything it covers. ~Annonymous

Alone in the Snow

Featured Photo - October

2010-10-31T13:07:00.000-07:00

Everyone must take time to sit and watch the leaves turn. ~Elizabeth Lawrence

Foresaken Seat

Featured Photo - September

2010-09-30T08:00:00.000-07:00

Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns. ~George Eliot

Golden Maple

Featured Photo - August

2010-08-31T09:00:00.000-07:00

There will be times when you will be in the field without a camera. And, you will see the most glorious sunset or the most beautiful scene that you have ever witnessed. Don't be bitter because you can't record it. Sit down, drink it in, and enjoy it for what it is! ~DeGriff

Fleeting Path

Featured Photo - July

2010-07-31T10:00:00.000-07:00

You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.~Buddha

Serenity

Featured Photo - June

2010-06-30T15:29:00.000-07:00

The flower is the poetry of reproduction. It is an example of the eternal seductiveness of life. ~Jean Giraudoux

Luscious Kaleidoscope

Featured Photo - May

2010-05-30T20:20:00.000-07:00

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. ~Anais Nin

Vintage Beauty

Featured Photo - April

2010-04-30T14:35:00.000-07:00

Have compassion for all beings, rich and poor alike; each has their suffering. Some suffer too much, others too little. ~Buddha

Red Cup of Hope

Earth Day: Celebrate Everyday

2010-04-20T21:50:00.000-07:00

15 Positive Actions for Change

The 40th anniversary of Earth Day is on April 22, 2010. While this is a perfect time to raise environmental awareness and inspire everyone to take positive action, I believe Earth Day should be celebrated everyday. I have a great love for Earth - the only home we all share - and I feel great sorrow each time I think of the environmental state of our planet. Carl Sagan said it best when he related his thoughts on a Pale Blue Dot, a photo of Earth taken by Voyager1:

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

-- Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, 1994

Our actions, however small or large, have an impact on a global scale, not just within our own immediate environment. Although each of us cannot solve the tremendous environmental issues facing our planet, we can all play a role in making a difference.

So in honor of Earth Day, here are my 15 suggestions for positive actions we can all undertake to help our planet everyday:

1. Reconnect with nature by getting outside - walk barefoot in the grass or on the beach – remind yourself what you are trying to preserve and protect.

2. Plant a tree in honor of someone special - make sure it’s indigenous to your area.

3. Clean up litter when you see it - especially on beaches and riverbanks.

4. Reduce, recycle, reuse - donate clothes, games, books to the goodwill.

5. Use eBilling for credit card statements and utility bills; don't print emails - save a tree.

6. Set your computer and printer to energy saving mode, and turn off equipment and lights when not needed.

7. Turn off your monitor when not in use: 75% of energy used by your computer goes to the monitor.

8. Unplug chargers for laptops and phones when not being used.

9. Cook using locally produced, sustainable foods with minimal environmental impact - use organic ingredients whenever possible.

10. Reduce your consumption of meat to lessen carbon emissions from the livestock industry.

11. Don't use plastic bags or disposable items - switch to reusable totes, reusable coffee mugs, reusable water bottles, dishtowels.

12. Use rechargeable batteries.

13. Turn off the water while doing the dishes or brushing your teeth.

14. Walk, bike or carpool whenever possible.

15. Spread the word and share your Earth Day tips with others - I'd love to hear your ideas!

So pick one, pick them all or share your actions for change. Each step we take, no matter how small, has an impact if we all participate - everyday.

Featured Photo - March

2010-03-31T16:56:00.000-07:00

Life is like a rainbow. You need both the sun and the rain to make its colors appear. ~Annonymous

Laughter in the Rain

Spring: A Time for New Beginnings

2010-03-19T12:43:00.000-07:00

Although each season brings a unique perspective to the world, spring is one of my favorites. I love the freshness in the air, the smell of the warming soil, the buzzing of the bees, and the blooms of crocuses, daffodils, cherry blossoms and tulips. Spring brings the promise of rebirth and new beginnings. A time to start fresh, to begin anew and open yourself to all the opportunities the world has to offer.

Spring officially arrives on March 20th, but I thought I would share a sneak peak with those of you longing to shed the clothing layers and throw away the snow shovels.