oh the high hopes...!

Those that till the soil and plant the seed, till the souls too of all who share in the bounty of the garden. 

Oh my, I sure have had a full dose of humanity this week...and tomorrow, it only gets better.

Our first farmers market begins Thursday in Princeton Maine.  Trouble is...not many crops to speak of.  Sure, they're all mostly in the ground, but the ground is boggy, cold and the sun hasn't shined much since...geez, I can't even remember!

I do have a fine crop of fresh photo greeting cards though.  Nothing like waiting until the last minute to get all those finished, but- I was feeling vulnerable.  My heart and soul in those pics, deep and quirky as it may be- will others follow along, see the logic in a tiny frog sitting on a leek?  Or the small spider on a fallen leaf floating down a spring fed brook, brown on brown and yet the light just hitting all the high marks- an arachnid sailor with eight legs and countless eyes; a tiny spectacular bug in all it's brilliance- will that compute?
Whether or not the thought that I put into it leaps off the surface I suppose isn't really important, but the story of why or how or when- that would be plenty to take in and then tell- although I do hope folks will be willing to share some of their Hallmark dollars with me too.

Ahhh, the wondering of it all consumes me- happily I might add.  Well, maybe there is one exception- I have to deal with an insidious sort...all the patience I must bear.  All the tolerance I can stand...  To a point and then, well- that's another vulnerability popping up.  A few people around here are under the impression that I don't get angry, or impatient or wobbling mad.  I'm a champion wobbler, let me tell you!  I get just as balled up as anyone I suppose, though I seldom strike out as it seems to serve no purpose other than my own...and what's the sense in that?   Usually I gather up my camera- mad, glad happy or sad- off I go and find expression in all sorts of landscape and fauna.  I get those pictures downloaded and see just why I took a certain shot.  Only then do I fully understand my motivation- in the light and the dark, the shadows and the shine; always I see that life is composed of opposites.  Pictures tell the story that I could not- in all my humanness, comprehend until the shot was fully exposed.  

So there you have it, a telling of the days and weeks leading up to a tomorrow that so many are looking forward to.  What started with a tiny dream comes to full fruit tomorrow as we give this community something that gathers all the opposites together in what seems to me, a sacred place of opportunity.  Story telling, art, hand crafted Maine-made creations, food- (this our commonest bond) will somehow I hope, blend us all together for a time.  When that first car comes rolling in the parking lot- oh the high hopes we'll all have!
I will have the camera, I will take the pictures, I will historically depict this great day for our little community.  I know it's not Washington crossing the Potomac- but it is a moment in my life I don't want to forget because of it's tiny triumphant message.

"He who digs a well, constructs a stone fountain, plants a grove of trees by the roadside, plants an orchard, builds a durable house, reclaims a swamp, or so much as puts a stone seat by the wayside, makes the land so far lovely and desirable, makes a fortune which he cannot carry away with him, but which is useful to his country long afterwards." 

Ralph Waldo Emerson

worth wading for

One week has passed, and what have I done with it?

Planted.

Weeded.

Wandered at will with my camera.

Fished.  Caught nothing.  Even spit on my worm a time or two...the fish were not interested.  All was not lost though, the scenery- breathtaking.  My camera, ever at my side- utilized considerably.

Dug for treasures in an aged garbage pit...found an awesome rusty Ford hubcap, took it home, added paint and tone and wa-la...made it a landscape ornament.  Also among the ruins found after the tide went out- old medicine bottles, a stoneware cottage, rusty bucket, enamel pot and my favorite piece worth wading for- an old "Men's Room" sign .

I am a picker from way back when...poverty proves that anything is possible and just about anything is redeemable if a bit of creativity, elbow grease and sincere questioning of merit of said garbage is asked and honestly answered.  Following me here?  I dig for junk.  I dig junk.  Not all in a pile like a hoarder, but in a garden, on a shed side, or maybe in a little shadowed corner of a bathroom that needs something else to speak of it's central character.  I figured out way back when, that even though I preferred the drumstick of the chicken, I had brothers who'd stick a fork in the back of my hand should I reach for one.  I learned then- to love the wings.

 I knew from a very young age that my hand me downs were not only from a contributor two sizes bigger than me but who also had no sense of style...ugly and big clothing was not my cup of tea so I learned to turn the cuff and remove one button from here and replace it there.  And probably to most eyes, I still appeared a bit shabby...but to me, by doing so- by making these things to my liking, I became a real making-sunshine-out-of-rain-kind of person.  I yearned for things that others had, but for some reason- I would eventually re-direct my energy towards wanting what I got, with a few adaptations.  Why am I telling you this?  As often happens on this blog- I reveal to the reader which I am only recently discovering of myself.  I have often pursued in my life the improbable, sometimes the seemingly impossible...and here as of late, I have had more time to reflect on why I do the things I do and why I did the things I've done.

 Have I answered all the questions?  Heck no...but I am scratching the surface, peeling the layers, finding the grain- I'm awful big on that stripping stuff.  Which leads me back to the original thought of junk.  I dig junk because in it's time and even now- it serves a purpose, evolving from it's shiny new day to it's old rusty present decay and yet still- to my eyes, it's function, it's original concept, character...may I say it's grain?! is a thing of beauty when it serves a purpose.   It's almost as if I am in-tuned to this stuff- the nature of things.  I gravitate towards the shine and shadow.  That shiny in it's day Ford hubcap would have probably left very little imprint on me...but to see it's original form affected by shadow- it's surroundings, use and nature's way- a masterpiece is revealed.   In a landscape of towering trees and rotting wood below, there that shine and shadow again is revealed in the undergrowth and I wonder, would the flowers there have been as lovely had it not been for the rot that fed their roots?

Just in a pondering mood these days... if you please, what do you think makes up for your personal views?  Are you shaped in part by a significant event in your life or by a place- even some kind of object that holds a deeper meaning to you?

take care-