The art of seeing closer: the magnifying glass
The art of seeing closer: the magnifying glass and the imagination of the ant Photo by Tim Girvin SEEING CLOSER ..... When I was little, I put my head on the ground, in the grass, pretending I was an ant. I'd drag my head along, moving through the close earth. I carved tunnels and underground kingdoms, thinking that I could see into other worlds, with wooden matches, or birthday candles, these chambers would be lit, firelight. One imagining, another. I have a collection of magnifying glasses...
THE TOAST THAT CHEERS
When you hold a glass upwards and clink with another, the point would be -- "what, exactly, are you doing?" I've thought about that -- being someone that doesn't drink -- what really is the point of that effort, the convivial "clinking?" I wonder, does it relate to the celebration of living, of "having water" to drink - survival? What could toast be, to the nature of the word? I think of Douglas Harper -- ask him, his take: "a call to drink to someone's health," 1700 (but said by Steele, 1709,...
TO BE, AND TO BEING
SIGNING, AND FINDING A WAY. Photo by Tim Girvin HEADING back to my car, buried in the most dismal garage (that still has great windows) I was struck by this piece of advice. I took it, and kept on going. My point, to the learning - just keep going, thinking about what emerges, and what could be found, if you were just a little more open than you are. Look back, but don't stare. Look forward, but don't fixate. B. 2B. 2B: more -- now. I'll try to be. More of that. T | PIKE PLACE...
THE LATEST TIME
Photo by Tim Girvin In the distance of the night, and the earliest morning, some time in the crossing from one day to another. I was just up. I thought to look at the eclipse, but there were clouds and the raining movements covered the shadowed line. I was thinking about what could be seen, and what not -- and I imagined the cusping shadow, passing by, blacking the moon, then reappearing. Getting up, during that time, I stayed up, working through the movement of the morn, the shifting stars,...
THE STORM BREACH
NOW, out there, the winds rip and ring the shore like cold waves, rippling. There is a sound in the trees, the waterline that is a rushing fury, I can hear it close, and I can hear it far -- out there, up above, across the sounding body of water. The air is scoured and spiced with salt -- infused with oxygen. And how I savor the storm, the splashing and roaring wonder of it all. Storms, cast aside, let the being sense aliveness, you are there in the middle of it, and in the vitality, there's...
THE BALANCE OF CHANGE
Photo by Dawn Clark Being in New Mexico, climbing mesa, reaching out to the tall sky, looking out to the distance horizon, I stacked the measurement of the moment. That idea of creating something -- a memento of the moment, stacking stones in the hand, they are the semblance of change. Standing in the wind, they might be there for a moment -- that cairn of the idea -- or they might last for years. I'd laid stones that have done both -- moments, literally, like this arrangement (fallen in...
Cosmic Architecture
Photo by Tim Girvin The world mantel and the heaven tent: the canopy of the sky When I was in college, I'd written a paper on the idea of cosmography in architecture -- (kosmos + graphos, from the Greek) the idea that architecture is something -- a design process -- that symbolically presents a mapping of the metaphorical world, the cartography of the universe. There are theories -- ancient myths -- of the world tree (axis mundus,) the tent of heaven (Himmelszelt,) the square of earth (templum...
THE LADDER
THE LADDER Photo by Tim Girvin As I study the old adobe structures, that look like boulders and slumped stone, polished in the winds and sun of the ranges of New Mexico, the plains that bake in the clearest, azure skies -- there's a contrast to the brilliant blue and the heavy sands of the desert. The potency is shocking. There, the movement -- reaching up, between one, the sanded stone and the other, the wildly shimmering sky -- there is a ladder. It's hand-made, polished in the use of many...
The Leap
The leap -- any jump, the reach, the leap out into the blue -- it's that moment when all unfolds in risk and adventure -- but in the burst of imagination, it all must be placed there. Jump into the breach. New Mexico It would seem that the real meditation is whether you are doing what you want to be doing. Being in your doing. Doing: being. When I think about the heart of this exploration -- meetings, a break, connecting with clients, friends, relationships -- and traveling with my girlfriend,...
The Meditation
The Meditation Photos by Tim Girvin When you are standing, looking out into the sky -- westward, the sun, a cauldron, the clouds swirl -- every moment is a new revelation; everything is in flux, the flow of the skyward mists. And sometimes, it's good to simply stand. In wonder. In meditation. In study. In reflection. For perhaps you too are swirling in the mists of the sun. That's what I was thinking about, watching the movement of the grasses -- and the flame of the sun, above. warmest | all...