I'm writing about your loss, Dan. A long time ago, when I was in college, and studying chinese painting, there was a teacher, a mentor -- and surely, spiritual advisor: Wing Leong, a student of the master, Chiang Yee. And he taught about the idea that when you paint, it's not about the realism, it's about the spirit of the rendering -- it's finding the ch'i, vital force, that enlivens the rendering. Chiang Yee talked about the ancient principles of painting. From Hsien Ho, a 6th century...

There was a day this past week that was the longest day; and it was for me. I started in NYC. (and this is about silence) And I awakened there, sometime around two forty five. This was the timing in Seattle. But I was in NYC. (and this is about being quiet) That day, I was to fly home. It took about an hour and fifteen minutes to get out of the city. (and this is about quiescence) Then it was about forty five minutes to get to the airport. And I got there late. (and this is about watching, in...

t h e v o l u t e Every year, when it comes time for my birth day, to day -- I think about the numbers, one to the other, and what added summation they might make, to mean. So now, in 54 turns around the sun, this forms 9, the volute, that drawing spinning outward, a vortex to what was begun, and what will be found, and what will be seen, along the coursing of that curve, spinning out. And this time, I contemplate that looking down to the water, I see the stars, yet in them, the sky, found...

From here, there, from there, here. Where does the earth begin, the sky fall, the horizon emerge? Quiet found, that moment newly discovered... quiescent \kwy-ES-uhnt; kwee-\, adjective: Being in a state of repose; at rest; still; inactive. Quiescent derives from the present participle of Latin quiescere, to rest, from quies, rest. Happy Monday. See you when I do. Be : in touch.

> First, you are found, then you are lost. Then you find your way again. > Find your heart, your home -- the way from one place to another. One, > found. Another path, another way, another mystery. > And you make your way. You make your way. You construct it all, the > weavings and tracery of it. One thread to another, another thread to > another, each of a color, each winding and binding you to another way > ward found. All good, in the end. Find your way to the house of...

multifarious \mul-tuh-FAIR-ee-us\ adjective : having or occurring in great variety : diverse : a variegated configuration Dictionary makers have dated the first appearance of "multifarious" in print as 1593 and rightly so but before that time another word similar in form and meaning was being used: "multifary," meaning "in many ways" and appearing (and disappearing) in the 15th century. Before either of the English words existed, there was the Medieval Latin word "multifarius" (same meaning as...

I was watching a fly -- a very large one, wasp-like in character, a derivative and surely protective solution -- it became trapped in the studio and buzzed against the window, trying to get out. Using I net, I tried to catch it, to release -- but I couldn't get it out. It finally disappeared -- and I've yet to find it. And, in the character of insects, the nature of their energy -- they will work repeatedly to an action, till they are exhausted. You've seen them like this. Bumblebees, sitting...

In the far Dawn looking down, moon off to the horizon -- watching her out there, settling a balance emerges in site, sighted in that time when the day begins to decide what is the nature of this day, quiet bound, or filtered with the sounds of sea surge that moon draw that long and full river that flows in you, found in the fullness of the cycle that affects us all, scene in the moments of the lunar turning now sensed as she balances herself, the instant before heading on, over the highline of...

There are characters in Japanese aesthetics that most people know to the concept of objects that are beautifully aged, the character implicit in use, authentic decay, honored "wearing out", rustic simplicity and things that are made better, richer, and filled with more character as they "wrinkle" in their time. I've written about this a little, in the work of those that reach to that space. But a friend pointed out the beauty that can be found -- with the right eye -- in the squalor of...

The LongPlayer | London | UK We've all thought about music, sound and experience. I was thinking about it in the context of insect sounds. Being in Cambodia, I can recall insects there that were unworldly, in the metallic character of their trill. And how, in their presence in the abandoned temple compounds, they totally changed the experience of those sacred spaces, long left lone. Or frogs in the heart of the swamp -- there's something more to the heated still of the Everglades -- in that...