L O V E F L A G
Photos by Tim Girvin WRITING ABOUT LOVE TODAY'S the day. But I'm less concerned about that, and better -- the perpetuity of it. KEEP THAT GOING. The love thing: petal, heart, butterflies: sharing -- friending and the finding of it; what could be, and what you could make of it. There was love -- "and I made something of it." I WAS READING ABOUT some people, older people -- like, 75 and another 80. And talking about falling in love again. And she said that "she was seeing in her eyes, all the...
DISTINCTION
I was thinking about the character of distinction. Like the word references, it is about the sting. It's an old Latin word -- distinguere "to separate between, separate by pricking," It is aligned to other forms of the sting, to extinguish -- the Latin, instinguere "to incite, impel." Working in the place that I do, I'm looking for the sting -- the pointing distinguishment of difference making -- that, to the mission of my relationships, the promise, the craft of design, and creative effort....
THE REMOTE LOVE, SENSING MARKS AND MEMORY, FROM AFAR
Photo by Tim Girvin In a bitterly cold subway channel, during a time when the ice was hanging stalactitic from the ceiling girders of the NYC Metro -- and wind whipped so cold up the railed canyons of the running lines that eyes teared in the sheer intensity of the frost -- I saw this tiny heart. It was so diminutive, placed there on the rail line, that it was quiet as litter. But surely there was a heart. And I was thinking of that -- the remote and distant love, being on the road, far from...
THE DISCOVERY OF A SURPRISED BEAUTY
Sometimes, walking, you find things that are left by others -- discrete gestures to beauty. They are not intended for all, but for the few -- that might be looking. I leave things out -- a stack of bones, a scrap of old paper with a mapping stroke on it; words, in worlds, left somewhere to be discovered. A talisman, for someone to discover. Little discretions of beauty, I'd call them. Walking, out there, the windbound way, I found this -- just there, hidden, tucked into the edged bark, some...
PASSIONATE LOVE
It's something, love -- that's passionate. Passion, love -- the twain of exhilaration and magic, the enchantment of fascination. Spell on you. I contemplate that in the way of people that are magnetically connected to each other. You can see that, the rightful sparks that leap out, cross the table, across the reconnection of those that are being missed, now returned. Fire, warms. Sizzle. Smack. Lightning ranges - strikes the line. But working in the south, with friends and family -- there are...
WOWNESS | THE CONDITION OF WOW
Photo by Tim Girvin: a streetside wow, cast iron, the Pike Place Market, Seattle. I was writing a proposal and overview for a client yesterday. And I used the opening: Wow! That was the first word. I contemplated that, an opening -- wow! What is that? I was thinking about the sound of that word -- the wow, how it makes your face, mouth, pop and contort. Saying wow is a wowness. It made me contemplate the concept of wow. What is the meaning, the history -- wherefrom, wow? There isn't much...
WRITING THE HEART
Photo by Tim Girvin Or righting, the heart -- well written. A decade ago, when my youngest brother was killed, the idea of working in, working round and walking into the grief was done with writing. That time, every day, the journal working into the impressions of my feeling -- and those around me. Today, walking I found this piece of old, handmade paper -- made and hung in a tree as a reminding of the practice that I hold dear. Write. As I move into decades of writing, I find myself...
COURAGE AND THE HEART
COURAGE AND THE HEART Thinking about the heart, talking to my mother -- we were talking about the idea of courage. There are people that seem to have extraordinary courage in facing the challenges that cloud around them -- yet somehow, they go ahead, step by step, striding forward. A friend of mine lost her husband of many years -- last week. Contemplating her, and others, it's the time of being alone -- still gathered round the ring of friends and family. Still, the buoyant strength will lie...
THE SIGN TO THE CENTER OF THE WORLD
Photo by Tim Girvin THE SIGN TO THE CENTER OF THE WORLD I know this way, walking in a certain path, down a certain street -- following a line that's been scribed for 50 years -- that at just the right time, I will find a sign that reaches to the center of the world. It is just that point, a moment when the light aligns, and the mystery opens. Standing there, watching others, I notice that some see it. And others do not. Some are right there, getting ready to see that opening, while others --...
THE BOOK OF THE ANGLES
I found a book, turning the pages there was a guide, and that was the collection of all the angles in the universe. As I turn the pages, the book opens out, and even in the dimensionality of the turning, the book becomes a sphere -- and the circle of the angles spreads out like a opening dandelion of the universe -- stellar, opening out into the space in front of me. Looking into the book, I think about the letter that lies in the center of the universe, the first stroke of everything. That...