Glorious

Mon-

Ah, the week of Fourth of July.  Fireworks, celebrations, kids out of school, students graduating, everyone preparing for vacation.  The summer weather finally fully arrived, waters warm enough to swim, the world is fine and relaxed and happy for another year.  At least around here.  At least if we ignore the distant rumbles of war, and the insistent drone of not so distant poverty, and the incessant reminder that our society and ecology poises on real or imagined brinks of disaster.  But, Hey! This has been an important time for a few hundred years now, and by golly we should enjoy it.

We really should.  Any wonderful day for any reason is worth celebrating.  The flowers are still blooming, the moon still rising, the tides still flowing, the birds still singing.  And through it all I am a year older, and all my family and friends continue to have their own trail of experiences.  Life, for all perceived problems, remains good for many of us.  We should be grateful for that every day, and pay respects to the universe, and do all we can to absorb the wonders that have been given to us.
Tue-

Whatever boats might be going out this season are pretty much prepped and ready.  This is one of the big weekends _ a kickoff when everyone is still excited about a summer stretching seemingly forever before them.   Many make the forty mile or so jaunt to New York to watch the fireworks from the water, more just go out and party on the water with friends.  The heat and warm bay are cooperating, so far, although storms are always a possibility.

Others have told me I would eventually want a boat.  I never did.  I like walking on firm ground, even if I enjoy watching happenings on sea.  That is not some admirable lack of envy of those who can afford such things, it is just a natural disposition.   Part of it, of course, is just that I’m old and set in my ways and any changes to my comfortable routine are usually more disturbing than exciting.
Wed-

Another common weed in a neglected patch of parkland.  Common is usually best applied from a distance, since close inspection of anything in our marvelously fractal world quickly reveals that nothing at all is common except our own insufficient categorization.  These flowers are just as magnificent as anything in a botanic garden, and in a way more admirable for surviving on their own where other species fail.

So our own lives, of course.  There is no “common” human.  We are all filled with glorious experiences and handle immense tragedy and go through the world thinking and judging and remembering and wishing and having an outlook on the universe that may even be superior to that of the gods themselves, condemned to know all and be consequently amazed at nothing.

Thu-

Children these days must apparently be kept busy all the time, or at least their busy parents must be freed to go about their multiply necessary duties.  So as soon as school ends, summer camp begins.  I don’t remember life being quite so frantic when I was young, but then my memory is not what it used to be.

I know for sure, however, that this group will find far less biodiversity and large interesting creatures with their searches than Joan and I did.  The waters may finally be recovering a little, but they were deeply destroyed by forty or more years of neglect.  I only hope the youngsters don’t get too discouraged about disappointing nature.

Fri-

Tree and bush fruits are maturing rapidly _ I even saw some blueberries newly planted on the roadside work at Halesite.  The early annual flowers are dying back a bit, and from here on it is fun to watch the different competing strategies of the various species.  Some find Darwin’s theories depressing and joyless, but I find that thinking of the life I see in terms of evolution makes it far deeper, richer, and more meaningful than simply believing that _ plop, magic _ something shows up here or there at the whim of the gods.

As for me _ well we all have our own peculiar thoughts about our deeper relation to the universe.  No use burdening you with mine, on this fine day.  Go work out your own destiny!

Sat-

Queen Anne’s Lace _ don’t know why her clothing was so much in vogue, but many common names are a folklore mystery to me.  These days, of course, you can look anything up quickly on line.  I’m not quite sure that is a gain _ sometimes ambiguous understanding is more full than when it is complete.

I always like these flat-headed white flowers just because they are so different.  Well, many flowers, of course, are if you in inspect them, but for me these pop out even when you are driving along a roadside.  Relative of the carrot, I hear.  Maybe.  I refuse to Google it.  I am too busy and interested in other things.

Sun-

This nicely encapsulates the ambience of the fourth.  The land of liberty and flags flying, as a chained link fence protects private property from unwanted visitors.  More confusingly, the beach is community property of the landowners, but the line below high tide is by law public (although nobody would ever know it around here) and the water is open to everyone.  Well, open and free as long as you abide by increasingly strict regulations of use.

In fact, for all our blather about following the wisdom of the founding fathers, we actually live in a society like any other that has evolved and adjusted to this exact time, place, and circumstance so that a society can continue and let people get along relatively smoothly.    I admire our culture greatly, but I do not mistake its patchwork of laws and customs for a designed logical edifice build on a foundation of inalienable anything.  At least, for the moment, the sun and air are still free, and the roadside available to all who walk along it.  Good enough for me.

 

Solstice Passed

Mon-

Much of the shoreline at the head of the harbor is quasi-industrial, related primarily to the recreational boat industry.  Some people would find that a tragic loss of wetlands and uglification of beautiful natural views.  I kind of like an occasional crane against the sky, docks and bulkheads providing reflections in the water.  Scenes like this evoke more stories and imaginings than yet another seagull soaring against the clouds.  At least sometimes.

In any case,  the area is much more visually appealing than it was a century ago, when this area was filled with gasification plants, coal dumps, oil depots, power generation facilities, and the rotting remnants of the extensive dockworks that were necessary for this to be a working port before the coming of the railroads.   Now the uses are somewhat more gentle visually, and probably even environmentally.  All modern change is not for the worse.
Tue

Sometimes I do not need to leave my front yard to be struck by wonder.  I try not to get overly into “I am an artist” now _ my photographs are purposely crude and without much artifice.  But my eyes _ well my eyes are able to see beauty everywhere.  The sun through our Japanese maple trees seemed fully as deserving of being poorly captured as any wide vista of sand and sea.

Life, of course, is a balance like that.  We are so constructed that there is a very fine line between being so entranced with our surroundings that we catatonically never budge very far, and being in an instant terminally bored by exactly the same thing.  What most advice misses is that not only are both states completely valid, even if contradictory, but both are essential components of human consciousness.  We are excited and bored (and many other things) at exactly the same place, with each change of train of thought.  The only real advice is to accept it and use the gift happily.
Wed-

This is a view from the beach at the Teddy Roosevelt park in Oyster Bay, looking back on the Lloyd Neck peninsula where Joan and I live.  The amazing thing is that the hills look almost uninhabited, even though we know that they are jammed with houses and crawling with cars and people in constant motion.  In some ways, it looks more virgin and primeval than it would have a century or two ago, when the hills were almost completely emptied of trees for crops and meadows.

I remain hopeful that, if our species can just survive another century or so, it will be able to fit into the environment more gracefully.  We have the seeds of optimistic greatness in us, for both ourselves and everything around us, if only we are not overwhelmed by mistakes carried on from the past.  In some ways, I suppose, I am lucky that I will never learn the outcome.

Thu-

The old boathouse at the Gold Coast Mansion continues to decay along with its dock _ the county has no money, and few have any use for it.  Reeds and honeysuckle add a romantic touch.  Summer is life, but also hastens decay of the unused and dead.

Probably the houses being constructed by the wealthy today will not last as long as these old ones, almost a hundred years along.  The climate is becoming more severe, the current materials are less permanent, and in this country at least we build for decades only.  Whatever comes along and is new will, we think, be much better.  For all the warnings, those that can reside near the oceans, and the oceans will soon claim this structure and all the more recent ones, leaving new expanses of shoreline for colonization.

Fri

It’s not Central Park, but Huntington’s own little Hecksher has well-maintained charm.  Totally artificial constructions _ like both those parks _ can be as beautiful, meaningful, and refreshing as wilderness.  They are, after all, expressions of human spirit working together.  They exist only because generations cooperated, and citizens contribute annually with taxes for upkeep and a few of the wealthier have dedicated some of their private money to the public good.

When it goes well, and people respect civilization, places like these are amazing.  All kinds of different humans, of different age, condition, status, and background manage to coexist not only peacefully, but joyfully.  Each in their own universe, yet each connected in beautiful relaxed happiness.  If there is a heaven, it must resemble such a park on a fine summer day, with flowers in full bloom and the sounds of children playing in the distance.  
Sat-

Common blue chicory now springing up everywhere.  Almost as common as ragweed, growing in much the same places, its large pale flowers are another of the common wonders we often ignore because they are not grand and overwhelming and mysterious.  Unless you actually look at them of course.

I marvel now at how many people seem not to see nor even look unless there is some mechanical contrivance involved.  People go about peering into cameras as if they were new eyes on the universe, suddenly aware of the beauty of dewdrops on the grass.  I suppose that is no different than artists sketching _ seeing as an artist does is an important gift to develop for oneself.  Even so, they tend to focus on what they consider appropriate for a unique vision, and manage to continue to be blind to the vast everyday beauty that surrounds us always.
Sun-

A quiet little bench in a grove along a pleasant shore, an old tree providing shade, a perfect place for meditation no matter the time and place.  You can almost imagine Socrates or Lao Tzu contemplating the universe.  Bodies of water, with their complex ever-changing fractal reflections and waves almost always evoke thoughts of the infinite.

Of course, a mere picture ignores the fact that right behind this lovely bench is a highway filled with smoking speeding SUV’s and the grinding gears of numerous yard crew rigs and boat haulers and an occasional diesel roar and shudder as a garbage or cesspool truck roars by.  Nor does it account for the roar of jets and the more annoying thwack of frequent helicopters on their way to the hospital.  And a good deal of the time there are constant child screams from the adjoining beach.  That’s the problem with any reduction of reality in an attempt to preserve it _ too much is always left out.

  

   

  

Quiet Expectations

Mon-

Simply staring and observing from one point for ten seconds or so can make the most mundane sight extraordinary.  These leaves for example, young and vibrant, backlit with the bright sunlight, sparkling in clear air.   Or the way that blue sky horizon shades from where it rides over the tree line to the darker hues overhead.  And that is only vision _ given a rest from constant motion and purpose the rest of the senses engage more fully as well.

That is really the great luxury of wealth of any kind:  that you can take the time necessary, whenever you want, to fully appreciate your life.  The poorer you are, the more you must constantly jerk around at someone else’s bidding to do whatever is required.  A wealthy person can enjoy a meal, or a sunset, or a long walk with no expectation of being paid.  Not many of them do perhaps, but at least they have the option.
Tue-

On Lloyd Neck near the beach, there is a Catholic Church seminary occupying the vast lands that used to be a jazz age estate.  The somewhat eccentric owners held festivals of stage and music in an amphitheater built high on a bluff in the woods overlooking the bay.  These ruins remain, unexpected, and appearing to a startled hiker as far older and more mysterious than they actually are.  Sometimes you wonder if many archeologists are not similarly fooled by their surprise encounters with old structures.

The church wants to sell the land, and multiple developers are slobbering to carve it into as many pieces as possible, each bulging with as huge a fake mansion as local zoning laws permit.  Then there will be no wandering, no ruins, and just more of the same paranoid wealthy owners protecting their sacred lands.  In this case I’m comforted by the fact that it will all be under the sea in another century, amphitheater and all.

Wed-

Two for one today _ as a point of observation.  A catalpa tree in flower high on a hill is magnificent in its own right, white blossoms against the green, huge and overwhelming.  But we glance at it and think _ oh, how nice, that tree is in bloom.  It takes an effort to get really close and view each individual flower as a perfect little fractal masterpiece.  What could be more rewarding?

Yet, if we were to tire of the purely visual study, we can be amazed at the vast biological web of time and space and connections around this single blossom, one of countless others, on countless trees.  There is a whole support system of roots and branches and trunks and leaves.  There are necessary soils and trace elements and carbon in the air and sunlight and water in the proper amounts, for years and years and years until the tree reaches maturity.  There are necessary insects and birds and pollen and winds for decades before, to assure fertilization of this tree’s parents and propagation of the plant itself.  Finally there are untold eons of time and simultaneous evolution of an ecology to arrive at this one particular moment.  Ah, you may say, only God could have done that _ but for God, time is simply another dimension, as easy to use as your walking over to be awed by the result.

Thu-

 

Cereals and grains are ripening now, some wild, some domestics left over from centuries of farming before the land was coated with suburbs and asphalt in the last fifty years.  There are no working farms here anymore, just a few preserved patches of open ground, most of which are quickly reverting to forest as they are no longer worked and head for a new climax ecology.   

I find grasses and their seeds almost as beautiful as flowers.  An entire meadow of waving, ripening tall wheat and weeds is magnificent.  On closer inspection the individual seed heads have their own aesthetics.  And all around them flit the insects and birds that can gorge on the feast from what local humans no longer need (since local humans get all their food from huge insecticide and herbicide drenched killing vistas far to the west, but that’s another thought for another day.)  You can only, sometimes, accept what you find.
Fri-

Another lie this morning.  I present this fine picture of honeysuckle blooming sweetly on the fence along the roadside.  You may think it is a true sharing representation of a moment of my walk.  But, of course, it is not.  You cannot smell the sweet fragrance, feel the moist cool breeze from the left, squint into the surprising luminosity of the air, hear the approaching pickup truck from the right and the faint roar of a jet overhead.  Not to mention all that I see that this particular framed view crops out and ignores.

But it is worse than that.  Even were you here beside me, experiencing all those things simultaneously, we would both still be in different universes.  My worries about the future are not yours.  Your remembrances of the past are not mine.  The logical trains of thoughts and body kinesthesia of each of us are impossible to know or communicate.  And so on.  This is a nice picture.  That may be far less than it seems.

Sat-

Solstice!  Longest day of the year!  From now on, we are slowly but surely marching closer and closer to another winter.  It has been so cold this spring that summer hardly seems to have arrived even now, we all have sweatshirts and long pants still, and the beaches are like refrigerators.  Of course, that hasn’t slowed people from wanting their boats _ this is the last one of the throng that were walled side by side here on the marina lot for months.

All of the midsummer annuals are reaching blooming stage, and another certainty is that the meadows will soon fill with seeds and drying pods.  For some reason, insects have seemed scarce _ of course that may just be my perception.  Lately, we are all primed to watch for portents of global disaster in each fall of any sparrow.
Sun-

A man, a boy, a dog wandering the shore and exploring what might be found.  Except for their clothes (and the trees, and the boats, and everything else) they might as well be native Americans before the overseas invasion.  It’s nice that some activities remain almost unchanged over the eons.  It is good to remember that we are pretty much identical in composition and consciousness to anyone ten or more thousand years ago.

“Futurologists” are excited about pouring the human spirit into eternal circuits, with senses enhanced fractally to infinite huge and unimaginable tiny.  They claim it will be a wonderful, better utopia for thinking beings.  I think they are wrong in mind, body, spirit, and hopes.  Regard these folks along the shore, look into yourself this very moment.  I rest my case.

  

 

  

Peace and Plenty

Mon-

Lately, it has become fashionable to lament the ills of the world and to moan and groan about coming catastrophes.  The climate will change, civilization will crumble, the present is rapidly decaying and the future is to be a savage howling wasteland.  If you park in front of a television, you must soon believe it all and be afraid to venture outside.  Armageddon is where the money is, and for many religions always has been.

But I trust my senses, and appreciate the present, and look at a world of blessings.  For this is a time of peace and plenty, at least in my own corner and in many others.  I do not worry about my next meal.  I do not expect barbarians to rush over the hills any day, raping and pillaging and destroying all I know.  The worst enemy for many of those I know is boredom, their greatest fear not making enough money to buy even more stuff to cache into their bloated lives.  For a simple person, the world winds on fat and beautiful and calm.
Tue-

This is one of those gloriously luminous misty days that is probably a (warmer) variation on the constant climate of Ireland.  Every green glows impossibly bright, and although there is no sun there is a whisper that sunglasses might be a good idea.  All the harsh edges of the world are blended into pastel harmony.

Although we can embrace all kinds of weather for it’s novelty, some is obviously more likeable than others.   A heavy downpour such as we had yesterday, or humid temperatures in the nineties, or a blizzard are more endurance struggles than cheerful experience.  As a childlike persona who hates monotony, however, I find the constant change a wonderful surprise each morning.

Microclimates again.  All around us it is ten degrees warmer, brighter, drier.  Here mist and fog and cold breeze off the chilled waters.  Visually superb, but not what we expect for summer except maybe in San Francisco.  The contrast of the glowing sky, dark silhouettes of foliage, radiant leaves and dissolving background is worth taking time to actually stare into.

Well, that’s always true, of course.  We live in a rush-rush world, and our eyes are always focused on the prize down the road rather than the splendor all around us.  As you get older, the prize down the road seems a lot less desirable.
Thu-

A quick glance would seem to reveal a pastoral land, scarcely populated except by local rustics, who will soon herd their sheep onto the meadow.  A hundred years or so ago that might even have been true.  But here it is all a false picture _ Long Island is as heavily populated per square mile as Bangladesh.  There’s a little more room per actual living space, but only because we don’t grow any of our own food.

The land looks healthy, and sounds fine with birds.  Yet snakes and most other reptiles have been banished, insects are thin, the bats have died off.  People _ ah, people are everywhere.  I worry that this may be what the whole planet has come to be _ looking fine on the surface, but with an ecosystem made extremely shallow and in deep distress.  Ah, well, this morning looks beautiful, anyway.
Fri-

An unexpected weed with beautiful flower can be a delight, showing that all our asphalt and concrete and weed-killing chemicals have not yet prevailed everywhere.  How long this state of affairs can continue I don’t know _ possibly in the future the only weeds and non OGM crops will be found in botanic gardens and greenhouses.  More or less fortunately, I won’t be around to find out.

Older people think they have become wise and have learned a perspective on the world.  But that perspective is not as flawless as they like to think, and it is flavored by what they knew and came to expect as normal.  Human experience has been rapidly changing everywhere for millennia, and will continue to do so.  If there are ever any old people anywhere, they will be telling the young how the modern world is going to hell.
Sat-

Sometimes, Coindre Hall looks like a real chateau.  Of course, in France itself, many of the chateaus are less than real _ built in the twentieth century, reconstructed from absolute flattened ruin, restored in the last ten years _ so the whole notion of “real” is slippery.  Anyway, here we have an out of place “grand maison” on the Gold Coast of Long Island, pretty much languishing away because the county is not sure what to do with it. But on a misty day like this, with the Korean dogwoods in bloom, it is a vision of a wider world.

Now, some would have us tear down as much as we can, return this all to “native” status.  We have people marching around here with petitions all the time.  I find that natural state (which is never returned to prehistoric status, filled with invasive species of plants and animals) is far less useful to me than buildings, lawns, ornamental trees, and roadways.   I continue to believe a mature civilization should concentrate on a balance of nature and human, mixed, not inseparable, doing justice somehow to each.
Sun-

Old ways remain useful.  This clammer in a dinghy might as well be paddling on the Yangtze river in the Song dynasty.  He’s bringing in a few bushels of freshly hand-dredged clams in plastic mesh bags.  Hopefully, they all came from unpolluted waters, for enforcement around here is haphazard.  Soon enough they will be available in markets all over.

No, he is modern enough.  This is simply the ferry from the motorboat to the shore.  Like me, he uses muscles in the old ways to do traditional things, but within a framework of modernity _ electricity, internal combustion engines, plastic.  We should not really give up one or the other completely, simply find a way to make them compatible and symbiotic.   Like this scene.

  

 

 

 

 

  

Afield

Mon-

It’s the season for carnivals and shows.  This is the annual Long Island Art League sale in Hecksher park _ all kinds of high end crafts with a few painters and photographers thrown in.  A perfect day, as so many are this time of year, when all you can do is give thanks for being alive and aware.

For a few hours, the cares of the older world dissolve into the laughter of children and the happy enchantments of their elders.  The trees are never lovelier.  If we walk just a little beyond the crowd, the new swan family is taking  a swim together, while the father actively chases off the annoying geese.

Tue-

In spite of the warnings of global warming and sea rise, the tide can still go out a lot and leave the water level extremely low.  With pilings stretching far overhead, it is hard to believe anything is changing.  That may be why it is becoming too late so fast.

In the meantime, here on the deck of the Titanic, the sky is blue as can be, the air clean, the leaves crisp and new, the birds sing and squawk all around, and children play on the beach down the way.  In short, another day in paradise.  As much of our existence, I think, should try to be.

Wed-

  

Horseshoe crabs are swimming about mysteriously, digging shallow depressions in the sand to lay eggs on some primitive rhythm with the tides.  Sometimes, they misjudge the water or other misfortune intervenes and one is left like this, high, dry, and available for the gulls.  A tragedy, perhaps, from the crab perspective, but that is nature, not always quite so benign as some would have us believe.

Humidity is picking up a bit, already I hear complaints about how sticky it has become, how hot the sun.  Air conditioners are whining about the neighborhood.  I guess it’s just me, but these modern folk seem awfully wimpy.  Why, when I was a boy ….  But I guess there’s no need to go there.  I think, as always, everything is just perfect and dandy.

Thu-

Northport harbor is about two miles away, along the old Indian trail that turned into 25A curving up and down along the bay indentations of the coastline.  It can be a very crowded place, but just outside the village proper is this nice, almost forgotten, beach and picnic area, with a fine outdoor pavilion with tables and chairs for writing.  When I get tired of that, there is a long beach, a deserted dune area, and this lovely scene from a bench under the cedar tree.

Seeking out the obscure within the familiar is a kind of game for me.  To find the loneliest spot in Manhattan, or tranquility here in the midst of population and bustle that rivals that of India or Bangladesh.  We all must make do with what we have, I am fortunate in having more options than most.

Fri-

 

Summer truly arriving except, perhaps, for swimmers in the frigid water.  Surprisingly, this afternoon follows a morning of relatively heavy rain.  Perhaps that is why the world feels fresh and washed clean.  Anyway, it’s hard for the sight of roses outdoors in profusion to be depressing.

My fickle human heart will, no doubt, soon tire of all this green and heat and humidity as well, as it begins to long for the cool winds of early autumn and changes to the monotonous foliage.  Expecting and enjoying change is one of the privileges of living in a temperate climate.  My problem seems to be that I expect to compress the cycles of a year to a few months, instead of the infinite days it actually requires.
Sat-

Back to boring pictures, ho hum.  At some point, I suppose, we would like to have the gift of good writers to capture a scene in words, or the eye of a good artist to convey the experience in other media.  Yet all of those wonderful efforts, for all their fine qualities, are only dim echoes of actually being there.  A simple photo like this is just a memento to bring back memories, nothing more.

Each of us is so much more than what our eyes see, each moment an infinite and eternal mystery.  We can play around seeking to describe our consciousness, but that is always futile.  Our main fault, in a scientific and technological world, is to ever believe we can truly reduce it to some conventional physical representation.
Sun-

You can almost imagine colonial New England here.  The town has been continuously inhabited for almost four hundred years now, and even when there were sailing ships in this harbor the coast here next to the landing docks had buildings on it.  The slope of the ground here, and the normally prevailing winds, kept the lowland mosquitoes at bay.

Those who do not bother with history do not hurt their chances to make money, but I think they live impoverished lives.  Connections to the past are far more substantial than those to imagined futures.  I never walk this road without thinking of pioneers, and wooden wagons, and sailing ships, all overlaid on the beauty I see.  A spectacular enhancement, more profound than any IMAX treatment.