Just do it!

Imagine it's a beautiful spring day and you spot a fresh water pool glinting in the sunlight? Imagine wanting to dive right in and feel the water splashing around you, clearing your head and lightening the load? 

Then just do it!! 

Contemplative photography

Everything is in flux. Isn't it the basis of physics? 

The small birds flit and watch. They hardly stop for a moment, always listening and alert. Those rare times when they settle are all the more delicious. Their stillness can catch me holding my breath in the moment.

While I observe them, I am wondering about the kind of photography I am aspiring to? 

It's not easy to explain in words but I am exploring again what it means to be a contemplative photographer.  The world is just there, outside the back door. The pictures come from any given day and then these words come from that. 

One of my favourite quotes "knowing the simple wisdom of what's around you and playing that" from Martin Hayes, the County Clare born fiddler sums it up. Every day I am knowing the simple wisdom a little bit more. 

Contemplative photography slows down the heart rate because it is a kind of meditation. Through the lens, everyday stuff is captured and some kind of alchemy is infused into that image. Some part of a moment that never happens exactly that way again. Today the lens rests on this Robin, singing in the coldest morning; it's colour and spirit, it's moments of intense aliveness.

And then that aliveness feeds mine. And my hope? That sharing these moments with you feeds your aliveness too.


And there are more Irish birds here in the Bird Gallery

Photography as meditation

He is bursting with confidence.

I am probably standing too close to his territory so there is an air show going on from the top of a pile of rubble to the rose tree in the farm yard. At one point he lands on the post in front of my nose. His face says.....YIKES and he takes off instantly.

Robins are tiny but unstoppable.

Sometimes here in my neighbours farm yard I perch the camera on the white washed wall and wait. She has just emptied a bucket of orange and banana peels on top of the compost heap. This is one of the local birds' favourite lunch spots.

Standing there slows the ticking brain. Puts things in perspective. Opens the heart to priorities. It's a kind of meditation. Another voice takes over, calming, soothing, slowing.

It's coming to the end of the year. What are the important questions now? What are the next steps?

As the Robin comes closer and I stand beneath his soft breath, those old hat questions fade away into the cold morning air.....




See more winter morning images here in the gallery

Sentinel ~ the first midweek image feature

You can BUY this image here

I sometimes stand in the farmyard at the lake waiting for the Robin. Truth is she prefers a dung heap to a bird table so this is where I will always encounter her. Early in the morning, later in the evening it doesn't matter, she will always appear.  Chipping and ducking in that bolshy way, or maybe singing in the crook of a branch.

As long as I wait she comes. It's her space not mine. This she makes clear. 

In spite of each other, we are used to sharing it now....... 




(Welcome to this first mid-week image feature where I am going to highlight a favourite photo from the Archives every week, I hope you enjoy it)

Fodder for the soul

Are we sharing similar thoughts as we watch the cattle being fed? Fodder. Winter. Action.

The structure of everything is revealed by winter, so I am aware of this Robin following me. It's a territorial thing with Robins, they own the place. Making my way along the lane, he continually swoops on ahead always landing in full view on some perch or branch.

Letting me know who's cock of the walk.

As soon as I get closer, he's gone. Then, around the next bend, he twitches and chirps from the top of an improvised gate post brilliantly hewn from an old telegraph pole, the top of a clay jar , a piece of wire.

He's not the only one standing by agog. Other birds are gathering as the tractor arrives with this years silage. I know I say nothing much happens around here, but hey look at this, everything is going on today!

~Tending to a nest amongst the pinkest fritillaries~

While meditating on dewy daffodils and the pinkest fritillaries underfoot, I see her swooping in. Even with a dozen or so humans chatting beneath her nest, she carries on incessantly. Over and back, a short stop on the fence post and one final dive under a window ledge.

Carrying more than she can easily manage (enthusiasm and necessity) she keeps going until there is more than enough material. She will have to select and hone later.

The writers with me scribble notes and I crawl through the wet grass doting on spring flowers. Still in the distance I see her labouring on. Those precision flights with the sharpest focus on her destination.

Today uploading these photos, sifting and selecting from spring treasures, tending my own nest with all the deft skill and patience it takes, she still fills me with inspiration.

They say she never bakes.....

Liking and friending. Linking and posting. Scraping the barrel. Tidying and preening, until every box is ticked.

The laptop to the flickering screen. The keyboard to the twitter machine. Perfectly formed in 140 characters or less. With pink highlights and lipstick to match. Colour synched, paypal'd and photoshopped.

With tips, lots of tips. Open-hearted advice and 10 top ways to blog or 25 best sky photos ever. Get this app, this add-on, this give-away.....or maybe a plug-in?

And back again and over to that other space in the brain. The one that makes eggy bread and likes a squeeze of lemon on it, or maple syrup and a cup of tea.....(maybe just a quick Instagram of it?)

And back again to the inbox and the the to-do-list and the skype calls, and now VINE!! (Don't even ask!) Editing, cropping, highlighting and downplaying.

And then they wonder why there is no fruit in the bowl, why the house plants are parched for the want of a drink, why the dust is thick on the table? And while they are wondering there is another report to finish, a crisis to solve, someone to call.....

And just when they were hoping for a friendly chat or a piece of cake or whatever else visitors live and breathe for, she is running out the door, because a small bird is exploring a nesting box (the one with the camera inside) and she has to get that shot.....

And they could say, for it would be true, that she works too hard at times, while she connects globally from a soggy spot on the edge of Europe. That she taps and types and never bakes, grabbing every small moment of happiness (in between making it all pay).......That she foolishly stays up half the night to watch an emergency session of the Dail (parliament) to watch them liquidate another bank? That she is a mine of useless information such as who is head of the International Monetary Fund and why a certain Promissory Note to the European Central Bank isn't worth the paper it's written on.

When from the muddled, frantic desk, she spies a small robin opening his throat in song, and a whole nation of bankrupt citizens throw back their heads and raise their voices to join in........



Also posted on Vision and Verb a global gathering of creative women........

Ireland is a greyish greenish mauve in winter

It's another greyish greenish mauvey morning. Ireland in the winter is challenging for a light loving snapper. Everything today is the texture and colour of tweed. From dawn to dusk it has been drizzling with a soft, wet rain. (Persisting all day, it made my photos a bit more tweedy than intended! )

As it is still quite cold the Tits, Robins and assorted Finches are really enjoying the feeders and while it is impossible to do much outside I observe their antics from the window.

As usual the Robin stole the show and I have started to notice just how territorial he can be, even pipping at me when I strayed too close to re-stock. A small bird in the scheme of things I get a great kick out of his upstart poses and cleverness.

The Tits are like exotic little budgies and always seem to move in groups creating flashes of colour in the willows. They will nest soon in the nearby gorse. The Chaffinches usually come in pairs and while he strikes a proud pose on the birdbath she pecks around on the ground a softer toned but equal partner in the setting up of their new home.

Like me the birds are waking up and getting busy for the new season, I can hear the enthusiasm in their happy tweets........