Darkroom without Shadows / Joseph Dunphy's Adobe Playground

Painting the Lily

abstract_photos — Fri, 03 May 2013 03:24:23 GMT

Writer's Block: Cornucopia of colors

abstract_photos — Fri, 03 May 2013 02:46:20 GMT

See: http://writersblock.livejournal.com/2011/10/17/

Q:"What do you love about autumn?"

A: Relatively little, other than the fact that it isn't winter, and toward the end, it doesn't even really have that going for it. Ever been in the Midwest in November? The thermometer might say that it is warmer then than in January, but your body will beg to differ. One will dance with the wind, trying to keep one's nearly useless umbrella from being shredded during rainstorms that come, with even greater uselessness, after the crops have done all of the growing that they are going to do, and more water will do nothing but rot the harvest.

Going into Chicago, matters scarcely improve. The wind has begun to howl, starting an almost ceaseless shrieking that will continue for months. Nothing peaceful about that sound, one which will rouse even the natives out of badly needed sleep, sending them through prematurely darkened streets to seek warmth, light and relative peace and quiet in somewhere closer to street level. The quiet is illusory, but the illusion will have to do - soft music and softer, later night conversation drowning out the low, faint haunting sound outside.

One might think that the company so gained would compensate for the sleep so lost, but such is not the case. As the weather drives people indoors, and the walls close in around them, they close in on themselves. That relative openness that was growing through the brief summer is lost completely as the days darken and the last few leaves shrivel on the trees. There is nothing to distinguish those days but solitude, decay and discomfort, and the celebration of holidays that are scarcely remembered or noticed. What is Halloween to children in a city where the neighbors will almost never open their doors? What is it to adults in a town where there are no parties, because nobody has a place in which to hold them? It's a spot on the calendar, an unneeded reminder of yet another thing one can not do.

There's not much to love in that.

Writer's Block: Between a rock and a hard place

abstract_photos — Thu, 02 May 2013 17:38:54 GMT

See: http://writersblock.livejournal.com/2011/10/12/

Q: "What's worse: a pit of snakes or a pit of spiders?"

A: A pit of snakes, by far. I'm rather fond of spiders, actually. Snakes, on the other hand, have been known to bite. Even the supposedly natural danger free Midwest (cough, cough, tornadoes, cough, cough) has at least one native venomous species called a massagua. I suppose there is the brown recluse spider, but those hide in corners, they don't hang out in pits.

A pit of fruit flies, on the other hand - way worse than the snakes, and spiders eat them. Every try ridding your apartment of those little creatures, without the spiders' help? Ever see what they can do to a perfectly good bag of tomatoes in less time than it takes to go out for coffee? Or any other sort of produce? Try dealing with that when you want to ripen a piece of fruit. Darned annoying, it is.

We need more spiders.

Writer's Block: Freewill vs. Fate

abstract_photos — Thu, 02 May 2013 17:08:25 GMT

See: http://writersblock.livejournal.com/2011/10/08/

Q: "Is love destined or is it a choice?"

A: Neither. The author of the question is presenting us with a false set of alternatives. One can't choose to love somebody. One can't choose not to love somebody. But one can choose whether to act on those feelings, whether to express them, and more importantly as a point against the "it's fate" believe, one can choose not to go to the place where one would have met somebody with whom one would have fallen in love. Down every path one never trod, behind every door one walked past, there are a multitude of encounters and possibilities that we'll never begin to imagine, and will never have a chance to know, because their time has passed.

Best not to dwell on that one for too long.