My annual ritual- watching the New Year’s 1st sunrise. Sitting in the dark, waiting for the first rays of the sun to breach the horizon gives me a sense of renewal and hope. My own spiritual practice, not associate with any religions. Now, I also capture its image too. Here is January 1st, 2020 sunrise.
Another year just about to end, a new one to start and life will go on. Nothing keeps your perspective on life in check like gardening I believe. I can see the full cycle life, from beginning to end in one season. And, nothing keeps your perspective on society in check like beekeeping. As Marcus Aurelius stated in his Mediations “That which isn’t good for the beehive, can’t be good for the bees.” I witnessed one of our hives swarming repeatedly, until it was too weak to defend itself from being robbed. By the end of the season it had perished. Divide and conquer seems to work every time, in any group, any society. What else did it teach me? – what isn’t good for society as a whole, can’t be good for an individual.
I don’t mean to be pedantic. I just love to read philosophy and watch nature unfolding for fun…and I learn in the process.
I captured this summer snowflake (Queen Anne’s Lace) below and wanted to share it with you during this holiday season.
Wishing you very happy and healthy holiday season and a productive New Year, 2017. Hope your new year and new season will be even better than the last.
Thank you very much for reading this blog. I will try my best to be more consistent.
Hurricane ‘Sandy’ hit the northeast coast of the US last Monday, October 29. The eye of the storm made land fall on the New Jersey shore to be exact, but the effect of it is wide spread. In Lower Manhattan, from 34th street down, lost power that Monday night and most of the area just gained it back the following Saturday. Further in land where we live, there were many trees down and we lost power and cable on that Monday and didn’t get it restored until Saturday afternoon. The sky started to clear on Tuesday afternoon, but the clean up process will last much longer.
Luckily, all our trees are safe from high winds though our neighborhood was, and in many areas, still littered with fallen trees. I had prepared for the worst case scenario: taken all the birds feeders down, brought a lot of firewood in under the roof, took anything that could fly off with high wind inside and tied down the beehive to concrete blocks. Once ‘Sandy’ had gone, I did some surveying…
