The highest of all places, and every corner then I see, reaching to the ground, is full of glory.
Over here we have endured the coldest, and the wettest June in memory. The sun has now returned, at last. I spent the hot afternoon beneath our trees in shady comfort – just happy to be outdoors again. This is the second collection of pics I took in May, part three will follow soon.
Before I go, I wish again, to thank you all who stop to read this blog. I would spend more time here, if I only could. May your ways be strong and sure, and your heart life’s praises sing.
Beyond my tree, the heat, it never faded.
How cool it was today, where I was shaded.
But if I thanked the tree, you know, a pagan I would be. And so
Michael reflects on years spent behind the lens – and I, like Michael, feel that my best photos were taken when I was younger. Back then I had plenty mobility, plus time, and a heartfelt desire to take great pics. All around the world, in our private collections, we keep our personal favourites: those old photographs that flood our hearts with fondest feelings, and gentle blessings conveyed in memories reopened of good times gone by.
But never mind. After reading The Zen of Photography, I felt it was time for me to post my humble handful, starting with the above pic – a personal favourite. It was taken back in September 1981, from the balcony of my hotel room during a spectacular thunderstorm one night in Torquay, England. If memory serves, I used a 60 second exposure, with Kodachrome 25/ASA, while covering the lens intermittently to avoid over exposure.
Click on Pic for expanded view.
When I was a schoolboy, and from then all the way up to the digital age, I used SLR cameras to take transparencies, (or slides if you prefer.) Very sadly, I haven’t been able to digitalise more than a small handful from the thousands of slides that survive. And even sadder, the quality doesn’t hold up a torch to the colour, and depth of the originals. Nevertheless, I will be posting the best of the remaining handful of digitalised slides every now and then.
It was during the deceptive calm before that fast approaching storm that the next pic was taken. What the picture doesn’t show you, is the storm damage that was to be visited that night upon all the boats in the harbour seen here. Unfortunately, none of my pics of the aftermath have been digitalised.
The Harbour.
With that, and my sincerest thanks to Michael at Retireediary, https://retireediary.wordpress.com, I will wind this post up, and wish for you and everyone, happiness, and peace at all times. Amras out.
It has no fabric, only understanding.
It has no membership, save those who know they belong.
It has no rivals, because it is non-competitive.
It has no ambition for it seeks only to serve.
It knows no boundaries for nationalism’s are unloving.
It is not of itself because it seeks to enrich all groups and religions.
It acknowledges all great Teachers of all the ages who have shown the truth of Love.
Those who participate, practise the Truth of Love in all their beings.
There is no walk of life or nationality that is a barrier. Those who are, know.
It seeks not to teach but to be, and by being, enrich.
It recognises that the way we are may be the way of those around us because we are that way.
It recognises the whole planet as a Being of which we are a part.
It recognises that the time has come for the supreme transmutation, the ultimate alchemical act of conscious change of the ego into a voluntary return to the whole.
It does not proclaim itself with a loud voice but in the subtle realms of loving.
It salutes all those in the past who have blazoned the path but have paid the price.
It admits no hierarchy or structure, for no one is greater than another.
Each one will dedicate their life to the silent loving of their neighbour and environment and the planet, whilst carrying out their task however exalted or humble.
Its members shall know each other by their deeds, and being, and by their eyes, and by no other outward sign save the fraternal embrace.
It recognises the supremacy of the great idea which may only be accomplished if the human race practises the supremacy of Love.
It has no reward to offer either here or in the hereafter save that of the ineffable joy of being and loving.
Each shall seek to advance the cause of understanding, doing good by stealth and teaching only by example.
They shall heal their neighbour, their community and our Planet.
They shall know no fear and feel no shame and their witness shall prevail over all odds.
It has no secret, no arcanum, no initiation save that of true understanding of the power of Love and that, if we want it to be so, the world will change – but only if we change ourselves first.
All those who belong, belong. They belong to the church of Love.
[THE CATHAR PROPHECY OF 1244 AD concerning the RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INNER CHURCH OF LOVE].
Greetings. I have been a bit more poorly than usual for a while, so please do bear with me if this post seems brief. All of our lives are in transition, and nothing exists but all that is becoming. Only the giver of grace is eternally motionless, yet waits far ahead of all that moves, in the silences of forever.
One of the nicest things I find about our community is the respect we share, and I wish for the happiest of futures to find their way fast to all our doorsteps.
These pics were taken today, at Kingsbury Water Park in the West Midlands, UK. Please enjoy.
Until next time, and may it be soon. Peace from Amras.
“When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be ……I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”
One night, while walking with my martial arts teacher, we saw a man stop to watch ballet dancers through a studio window. He stayed for just a moment before disappearing into the night. “For a moment in time,” my teacher said, “He found beauty in the dark.” And, ‘moments in time’ are all that we have. I liked that, especially as I understand that moments in time are all that we may share; and, I felt it advisable to create the sort of moments for others that I would like others to create for me.
Generally speaking, the man who is misunderstood, who is frequently criticized,
is likely to be doing something worthwhile. It is the person with whom everyone agrees
that is lost in the mass of mediocrity. The head that lifts itself above the others has
the rock thrown at it, so we need not be concerned when people criticize us.
Of course it is normal to want people to like us, and a good thing to say to ourselves
when people criticize us is: “If people knew me better they would like me.”
This is literally true, for if we could know every man in the right way
we would certainly find something in him to admire.
~ Ernest Holmes.
With thanks, and best wishes to all our readers, and followers. In case poor health prevents me from posting again before Christmas, I will take this opportunity now to wish you all the very best, and happiest Yuletide, ever.
The soul longs, with its deepest intensity, for self-preservation. It is the spiritual conviction in that deep cryptic being of ours that we are born of eternal day and made in the image of God to traverse a heavenly way. It is the strongest emotion we have. Why is this true unless way back there, in the beginnings of creation, there was incarnated in us that deathless Principle of Life which of Itself knows no defeat? We may analyze ourselves all we want to, and get a certain satisfaction out of so doing, but there can never come lasting peace and happiness without spiritual conviction, the reason being that Spirit is Reality. ~ Ernest Holmes.
To all friends, followers, and fellow bloggers, (I am too ill to write more for now) – Blessings, and Namaste from Amras.
“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle,
Amras888 