October Sweetness

Lord, it is time. The summer was very big. Lay thy shadow on the sundials, and on the meadows let the winds go loose. Command the last fruits that they shall be full; give them another two more southerly days, press them on to fulfillment and drive the last sweetness into the heavenly wine.

Rainer Maria Rilke

View from inside a small cave in Missouri at Meramec State Park

October

Old the year grows,

Casting aside her green cloak,

Twirling in lingering twilight -

Offering her final fruits.

Blustering winds bend her limbs,

Enervating darkness calls her to sleep-

Rocking her bones into winter deep.

Hundreds of white pelicans and cormorants traveling together in Oklahoma

A broken tree cradles the moon at Sequoyah State Park in Oklahoma

Wheat tips bending toward the sun in Texas

Ariadne, the banded garden spider, basking in the light of the rising sun in Azle, Texas

The hunter’s moon descends beneath the trees in Texas

Leaves and twig reflecting in a still pond in Pier Cove, Michigan

Milkweed letting go of her feathery offspring 

Autumn Glory of Ox-Bow and lake Michigan beyond from the Crow’s Nest Trail in Saugatuck

A few feathers wave good-bye to the sun and October on the Lake Michigan Shore in Fennville

What I really want from Music: That it be cheerful and profound like an afternoon in October.

Friedrich Nietzsche

October is a month for classical music. For running into a gale force wind. For flying kites and watching scary movies and eating popcorn by the fire. It is one of my favorite months for the colors and the smells and the winds of change.

This October turned into a beautiful but busy month of travel and events and my intention of blogging twice turned into not even once; well as I write it’s still October, Halloween, in fact, but you won’t receive this until November 1st.

I hope your October was as amazing as mine. The unusually warm weather made it possible to be outdoors so much more than usual, and I got to visit my family in Texas which always makes me happy.

Thank you so much for being here! I will see you in two weeks. Really!! 😊

A Halloween treat for the squirrels - carved heirloom pumpkin 

Framing

The magic possibility of framing a certain space and time is what brought me to photography. This process of recording elements of 3 dimensions in the flow of time, and fixing them in a 2 dimensional image, creates a new context for the elements of the photograph.

Laszlo Moholy-Nagy

(See his photos)

What seems to hold you

Only frames you fleetingly

You were always free.

I have been thinking about and playing with frames in photographs.

How they can change an ordinary scene into something special.

How they can focus the eye, capture light, create intimacy with the vast.

You have escaped the cage. Your wings are stretched out. Now fly.

Rumi

Maybe this is something you can try yourself, if you’re interested. Go for a walk with your smartphone or camera and look for objects, doorways, fences, holes in walls, forks in trees - anything that you can look through to emphasize your subject beyond, within, or possibly even perched on your chosen frame. I would love to see what you come up with! You can either send it to me directly or just post it and tag me if you’re on Instagram @randomrho.

Thank you so much for being here! I am going to be traveling for the next couple weeks with unknown connectivity- so I might be posting on a slightly wonky schedule - but I’ll see you next week-ish 😊.

Potential frames are everywhere. Green Heron on the ropes at the Miami Beach Marina.

Waking up to the Moon

The night walked down the sky with the moon in her hand.

Frederic Lawrence Knowles

02/23/24 Friday morning - the moon by itself

02/23/24 Friday Morning - the moon, in context, in the western sky

02/24/24 Saturday morning - golden light on her face

02/25/2024 Sunday morning, falling into the field

02/26/24 - Monday, between the branches of a tree

The earth, in fair and grateful exchange, pays back to the moon an illumination similar to that which it receives from her throughout nearly all the darkest gloom of the night.

Galileo Galilei

In a field in Texas,

in the early morning light -

I watch the moon descending.

Old friend of earth,

she bonds me to

all who see,

or have ever seen

her radiant face -

in our lineage

of wonder.

Visiting family in Texas this week. I woke up every morning to see the moon, to have a little quiet time outside to myself. I realized while I was standing out there in the field watching the moon descend in the west, and the sun rise in the east - that people have been doing this for thousands of years. It made me feel connected to a long line of dreamers…including you.

Thank you so much for being here. Love y’all.

…and while the moon was setting in the west - all week - the sun rose on the opposite side of the field.