Focusing on Life, Week 20: Looking Up

The timing of this week's prompt couldn't have been more apropos in regards to not only how I'd like things to be going, but also the poke to maybe look at things differently.   

Here's what she wrote:

We tend to always be looking forward to the future.

We set our sites on the world in front of us and sometimes rely on "tunnel vision" to get to our goals.  Don't get me wrong, looking forward is a great way to achieve your goals, but sometimes looking at your world one way can lead to creative gridlock and if we just change our perspective a tiny bit a whole new avenue of ideas may open up!

This week let's change our perspective and look up! 

There is a whole world above us that we sometimes miss seeing because we simply forget to look up.

Why is it not until a "real" problem arises that you really realize how smooth things were going.  I'm willing to look up, down, under, over, every which way but loose!

The weatherman called for thunderstorms this week, but most days they did not materialize.  Instead we had some spectacular clouds pass overhead.  So I did what I love to do when I see those big poofy clouds:  went out with my camera.

skull?

As I'm writing this I realize it was like a meditation of sorts.  My mind wasn't thinking of any family issues or projects to be completed.  I just focused on scanning the clouds for images.  It gave my body and mind some time to relax and then be open to new thoughts.

Elephant in background
baby or frog swimming to left

Looking up, much like staring out at the ocean, reminds one not only of how small and seemingly insignificant our problems are to the universe, but also how beautiful the universe is in its organized vastness and how the part we play is so very significant.

Rhinoceros dancing on a cloud

With the support and love of my amazing brothers and their families we'll all get through this complicated and sad time in the best way we each know how.  With a shared past there's understanding.

I linked up with the Studio Sublime's photography challenge.  Check out how others are looking up by clicking on the button below.

Tired and Wishing Life was Simpler

Home maintenance issues including a need to save and upgrade our landscaping has taken up a lot of my time the last couple of weeks.  It's surprising how wiped I feel after the numerous appointments that seemed to have piled up.

Meanwhile I get a strange phone call from back East that is promising to churn things up in my extended family life for awhile.  Not sure I'll be able to share what that's about for awhile, but it will affect my time and mood for some time to come.

I really need a week without phones and dogs and maybe even a husband to get some sleep and figure out what to do about everything.  I hate having a problem that doesn't have a clear or good solution.  My mind doesn't seem to want to let me focus on it either.  Protecting my hard earned peace?  No one has walked in my shoes or at least not in the same color of shoes.  So I know it's something I have to figure out.  My husband wants to help and simplify it, but I think he knows it's not that easy.  My siblings have their own baggage, but hopefully we'll agree to take the same trip.

A lack of sleep due to Moose, our Springer, waking up and howling at 2 am and then often enough after that just as you start to fall asleep again, is not helping my emotions either.  He's 1.5 weeks in to a new medication, phenobarbitol, for his grand mal seizures.  It's a very strong drug and for more than a week it made him weak and loopy.  I am finally seeing some improvement though so hopefully this will work out.

~taken on a sunnier day

This is all sounding a bit maudlin and really my life is blessed.  But we all have those times when you feel overwhelmed, right?  On the bright side I am warm and safe in my home while looking out at stormy skies, waves, and swaying trees.  I hear our eagle calling.  It's time for his breakfast and mine.

Focusing on Life, Week 19: Hope

This week in the Focusing on Life photography challenge Sally gives us the prompt:

“If you feel you know how to get what you want out of life, and you have that desire to make that happen, then you have hope,”

                                                                           ~Jennifer Cheavens

Note To Self:  Put the self doubt and worry on the shelf for this week and capture what represents hope in my life!!

It seems to me that I often feel these days that all we have is hope.  I am a hopeful person.  If I am down I am back up quickly.  It's my ability to find hope in even the darkest moments combined with gratitude for what's good in the world that keeps me on a pretty even keel.

I need quiet time to stop the noise and find that hope and gratitude some times.  New life always gives me hope.

This new family is on its evening swim into the sunset.

Click on photo to see it larger and read quote.

This post is part of a photography challenge blog hop.  To see more shots about Hope, click on button below.

Wordless Wednesday: a little Bee Butt

Today I linked up with:

Focusing on Life, Week 18: Abstract

Let's see what Sally has come up with this week:

Abstract: the use of a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.

All things have form, color, and lines we just need to step back and step away from the literal image you see through the lens.

Take into account the lines, color or form and look for a more figurative composition. A blurred reflection in a puddle, the photo above I took of brightly colored petals of a flower slightly blurred and cropped close.

I had some fun with PhotoShop with a photo I took in Amador County last year.

The rich color and shapes are what attracted me to take photos of these in the first place.  It was fun cropping out sections and trying the different filters available.

Above I played up the colors and distorted the shape.  It has a real painterly feel to it, doesn't it?  Below I played up the lines and it became more pop art, a far cry from their original time and place.  

I want to go see what the others did in this photography challenge!  Don't you?