Today my search for beauty took me to Lithia Park where I found a lot but when I stumbled upon this Stellar’s Jay I knew I had my subject for the day. Though I could wish I had had a longer lens with me. Love the way he or she is checking me out.
Again from John O’Donohue
Beauty is mysterious, a slow presence who waits for the ready, expectant heart.
Still feeling a little under the weather today I decided to head in to the tiny studio and drag out my seashells to play with. I think this one would look good printed large and hanging on the wall of a modern beach hotel.
And once more John O’Donahue hits the nail on the head:
When we devote some calm time to the heart and come off the treadmill of stress and distraction, we can enter into the beauty within.
I hate to keep posting blossoms but that is what Mother Nature is giving me to work with right not. I got so caught up in researching my ancestors I almost forgot to post something and then I ate something that didn’t agree with me so I just went for the first good image I could find. But this one certainly fills the beauty bill.
Another one from John O’Donohue:
When the soul is alive to beauty, we begin to see life in a fresh and vital way.
I did find a couple of tulips in bloom yesterday but the background was an ugly concrete driveway. So I went to town on this one to try to get some color in the top and then decided to go all out artsy with a pretty background frame.
From Stephen David Ross:
But beauty interrupts restrictions in every place and thing.
Two or three years ago I had a color bowl of large and small pansies sitting on my front porch. Every since these little guys, only about and inch and a half in diameter, have been jumping up in my lawn in the spring. This one looks like it might have been nipped by the frost we had the other night but I still think its pretty.
From Frederick Turner:
A beautiful thing, though simple in its immediate presence, always gives us a sense of depth below depth, almost an innocent wild vertigo as one falls through its levels.
After a rough day with Turbo Tax I’m falling back on the archives again. This Golden Crowed sparrow was kind enough to pose in a tree. Most of them were on the ground. From North Mountain Park last week.
Another one from John O’Donohue:
Beauty is mysterious, a slow presence who waits for the ready, expectant heart.
I’ve been saving this one for a rainy day. Well, it’s not exactly rainy but kind of grey and ugly and I have been up to my ears in genealogy all day so here are some beautiful pink blossoms from an ornamental tree down the street.
And from the Navajo tradition:
May you walk in beauty.
I don’t even know what kind of flower this is but I found it blooming in one of my neighbors beds next to the street. The raindrops just added a little extra something.
Today’s quote is from Blaise Pascal:
In difficult times you should always carry something beautiful in your mind.
In case you wondered most of the quotes I’m posting come from a book by John O’Donohue simply titled Beauty. It has been languishing on my to read shelf for some time and I thought this would be as good a time as any to get ‘er done.
It’s raining today in Southern Oregon so I just popped out the back door to see how my Camelia bush was doing. Everything from new buds like this one to full flowers laying on the ground.
from Confucious:
Everything has beauty but not everyone sees it.
Today’s quest for beauty took me to the bird feeders at North Mountain Park where I found the Nuthatches putting on quite a show.
From Rumi:
Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.