There are children playing in the street who could solve some of my top problems in physics, because they have modes of sensory perception that I lost long ago.
~ J. Robert Oppenheimer
(Pearls of Wisdom)
perceptions of children
Tag: perception
embrace all living creatures
by Margret Hofheinz-Döring
A human being is a part of the whole, called by us “Universe;” a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts, and feelings as something separated from the rest – a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.
~ Albert Einstein
(Mathematical Circles: Mathematical Circles Adieu & Return to Mathematical Circles)
load of sadness
I should not dare to be so sad
So many Years again —
A Load is first impossible
When we have put it down —
The Superhuman then withdraws
And we who never saw
The Giant at the other side
Begin to perish now.
~ Emily Dickinson
(The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #1233)
unique connections
I’ve meant to write this blog since March 23, when Elizabeth Taylor died. Other things kept happening, though, including Tim spending five days in the hospital, and I wavered as time went by. However I have treated myself to a late afternoon cup of coffee and feel a little more inspired now…
My perception of my mom while I was growing up was that she was a very reserved and private person, even with her daughters. It frustrated me that she never seemed to want to share her deepest thoughts with me. Most of my understanding of her inner life came to me in different ways after she died, and I have felt more connected to her since her death.
But I do have to admit that some things she said and did flew right by me as I was so focused on what I imagined she would share that I missed many little things she did share. One of these things was a connection she felt with Elizabeth Taylor.
I’m guessing it might have been around 1966, when I was nine years old and when Taylor’s movie, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? came out. There must have been a lot of buzz about it because I remember asking my mother, who is Elizabeth Taylor?
Mom explained that Elizabeth Taylor was a very famous movie star who was only four months younger that she was and that she “grew up” with her. She said National Velvet was her favorite movie and that she first saw it when she was 12 years old.
My own comparisons go a little further. My mother (as a child at right) was also named Elisabeth, but she spelled it with an “s.” Her coloring was similar, jet black hair and full dark eyebrows. Mom’s eyes were brown, though, but she was just as beautiful. As grownups, they could not have been more different, Taylor leading a glamorous lifestyle and Mom a down-to-earth nature and animal lover.
Somehow I have never gotten around to watching National Velvet. Taylor’s death jogged my memory and so I added the film at the top of my Netflix list, but I guess there’s a bit of a wait because other movies keep coming ahead of it. When it finally arrives I will enjoy watching it and imagining what it meant to my mother sixty-seven long years ago.
Image source: People
creative spirit
No man has the right to dictate what other men should perceive, create or produce, but all should be encouraged to reveal themselves, their perceptions and emotions, and to build confidence in the creative spirit.
~ Ansel Adams
(Screenwriting with a Conscience: Ethics for Screenwriters)
an amazing puzzle
The universe is a more amazing puzzle than ever, as you glance along this bewildering series of animated forms, – the hazy butterflies, the carved shells, the birds, beasts, fishes, snakes, and the upheaving principle of life everywhere incipient, in the very rock aping organized forms. Not a form so grotesque, so savage, nor so beautiful but is an expression of some property inherent in man the observer, — an occult relation between the very scorpions and man. I feel the centipede in me, — cayman, carp, eagle, and fox. I am moved by strange sympathies; I say continually, “I will be a naturalist.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
(Journals)
a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam
My next post was supposed to be about furniture arrangements and home decorating, but I’ve stalled big time. I’m hoping this week will be more productive as many things are sliding here on the home-front. Had a very annoyingly busy week and then when the time finally came to get back to finish moving the furniture I became glued to the TV, trying to comprehend all that was and still is happening in Japan. Sometimes the mundane things in life start to feel pointless. But then I guess that’s the horror of it, so many people with their lives interrupted or cut short – it’s overwhelming to try to take in… I don’t know anyone there, but I know that each life lost was the most important person in the world to somebody, and for them my heart breaks.
“Japan’s recent massive earthquake, one of the largest ever recorded, appears to have moved the island by about eight feet (2.4 meters), the US Geological Survey said.”
“The quake probably shifted the position of Earth’s axis about 6.5 inches, said Richard Gross, a geophysicist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada Flintridge.”
These numbers boggle my mind. In one sense we’re safely spinning through space on our relatively little blue spaceship, but when the planet starts readjusting itself it abruptly reminds us of how precious this life is, and how precarious in the grand scheme of things, whatever that scheme ultimately proves to be.
I feel something like a Who on the speck of dust in Dr. Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who! “A person’s a person, no matter how small.” We feel so very small in the face of this. Such a pale little blue dot, our earth. But such a cataclysmic upheaval of our big beautiful and often frightening planet.
Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every ‘superstar,’ every ‘supreme leader,’ every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
~ Carl Sagan
(Pale Blue Dot)
As I’m writing this some of the lyrics of Pig, one of Dave Matthews’ older songs, one of my favorites, come back to me with added poignancy:
Isn’t it strange
How we move our lives for another day
Like skipping a beat
What if a great wave should
Wash us all away
Just thinking out loud
Don’t mean to dwell on this dying thing
But looking at blood
It’s alive right now
Deep and sweet within
Pouring through our veins
Intoxicate moving wine to tears
Drinking it deep
Then an evening spent dancing
It’s you and me
This love will open our world
From the dark side we can see a glow of something bright
There’s much more than we see here
Don’t burn the day away
~ Dave Matthews
♫ (Pig) ♫
All we have is this moment. Let us not burn our days away…
do the funky duck
Val Erde, an artist who plays with words and images at Art By Val Erde, gave her readers, including me, a lovely gift yesterday! Permission to use one of her paintings on our blogs or computers. I love the colors! And I think I see two water birds and a woman swimming in a wondrous dream…
Yesterday I spent most of the day rearranging furniture in the living room. Spring fever and inspiration from the book Living With Light: Decorating the Scandinavian Way by Gail Abbott & Mark Scott were the motivating factors. Too many books and bookcases! My muscles ache and I’ve got a migraine brewing (too many triggers) but I hope to finish the project today. Paring down… Fewer books, more open space…
Scrabble is down for maintenance on Facebook…
So, I’m off to visit a couple more blogs, pop a Zomig, roll up my sleeves, and begin again!
winter winds
Last week I had the fun and wonderful privilege of writing a guest blog at my friend Kathy’s blog, Lake Superior Spirit. I’m still “recovering” from all the excitement! Thank you, Kathy!
From time to time in my life I’ve been called upon to write an autobiographical sketch and as I wrote this one for Kathy it occurred to me that every time I write one it comes out a little differently. Probably because I’m always growing and changing, and each time I look back over my life my perspective has changed and some events take on new and deeper meanings. And other events are left out entirely because even though at one time they seemed so important, they no longer seem worth mentioning.
Within our whole universe the story only has the authority to answer that cry of heart of its characters, that one cry of heart of each of them: “Who am I?”
~ Isak Dinesen
(Last Tales)
A couple of weeks ago I figured out how to write a blog and not just save it, but actually schedule a publication day and time for it! Great! Now I can combine quotes with art and schedule them to go out on Saturday and Sunday mornings. Still, I was surprised Saturday morning when I saw the quote for that day published already and realized that I hadn’t written a regular post here all week.
Yikes! Oh no, I thought, my readers will think I’m doing nothing but posting quotes from now on… However, I’ve noticed these quote/painting combos are collecting more comments than I thought they would! It’s been so interesting, for me anyway, seeing so many varied kinds of responses to the same words and images.
This morning Tim and I went out for breakfast – it’s been a while because he has worked at home a lot on recent weekends – and it felt very good to get out of the house together. It snowed a little last night… After breakfast we headed to Starbucks for a coffee treat and saw a Mumford & Sons CD there, Sigh No More, which we eagerly purchased. We first heard them perform at the Grammys a couple of weeks ago and both of us like them a lot.
Then we drove down to Eastern Point and Avery Point and found a new sculpture on the Sculpture Path by the Sea. It’s named “Pig Iron” by Timothy Kussow. Looked for the sculptor online and he doesn’t seem to have a website of his own, but he lives on the same road in the same town where Tim’s family used to live. Small world and a bit of synchronicity as well! A little music and a little art – a very nice morning date!
But if your strife strikes at your sleep
Remember spring swaps snow for leaves
You’ll be happy and wholesome again
When the city clears and sun ascends
~ Mumford & Sons
♫ (Winter Winds) ♫