Blogging and the things that make us more alive

No artist is pleased… There is only a queer divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive.......

Martha Graham

Photoblogging has brought me deep into the world of light and mystery, ordinary everyday beauty, friendship across the world and back on a path to writing. It's been every week now for almost 5 years.    

This year was my fourth to be in the final of the annual Irish Blog Awards. Each time it has sent me on a bit of a wobble, something that I don't enjoy. Don't get me wrong, I love sharing what I create with you. But judging and competing? It reminds me too much of waiting outside the door of the Oral Irish Exam in the Leaving Cert; sets my poor nerves on edge!

Building a space to be creative is why I blog. I get to own and nurture my own artistic apprenticeship. I can share with you out of love and vocation, and still be the one who benefits most of all from the whole process. I gain the satisfaction, connection, learning, progression and pleasure from the work I do. I can barely even call what I do here work, it's actually a lot more like play.....

So I did in fact win the Silver Award for photography in the Blog Awards. Thank you to all of you who supported and voted for me through the early stages and those who judged and organised the event. 

And a special shout out to all the finalists, nominees, and bloggers everywhere who are part of this creative Irish Blogging Community doing what "keeps us marching and makes us more alive".

If you love the veils of early morning fog visit the Mist Gallery 

Inklings

What if you followed every inkling, hunch or hint at a possible good idea? If you stretched your legs out beyond your comfort zone? If you trusted that these inklings would become their own story?

On the misty drive through South Kilkenny, nothing to see, hidden landscapes. Favourite fields and places blanketed in fog. In the distance the great house invisible today. But up close, the trees loom out of the background. Their huge branches hugging the dim light.

The silence of life on this road. The twists and bends of rural life. The car door slams and the soft shoe shuffle of this wayfaring photographer saves the day. The vaguest hint of shape and shadow. 

Following an inkling that it's not all about light and certainty......

On having an inkling about 2015

The haze was low this morning, wafting across the fields like an amber blanket. The combination of dawn and lingering mist is one to savour for any photographer. So even though it's still a bit foggy, my word for 2015 is "inkling"

Inkling - a vague idea or notion, a slight understanding, hint, hunch, intimation....... 

Where to start? Not a clue. Maybe it means following hunches and hints? Listening to whispers, both intriguing and unsettling? 

So inkling it is. Add a T and you get tinkling, the sound of the distant bells that are starting to ring, the promise of miles and miles of dry land ahoy, a hint of celebration.

And this morning look! It was as misty and foggy as any New Year's Day could possibly be. The winds are picking up now, the rain is battering down but the two feet are dry.... 

So Happy New Year dear friends. Let's love life in 2015 and here's to the freedom to explore vague inklings, hunches, hints and intimations. There is another kind of opening to possibility in that....

In the foggy dew........#Pilgrimage ~ February

My Pilgrimage into 2014 goes deeper and the question has become how to visualise this path through photography? How to observe the world through a mist, keep all the options open and embrace the greyness.  There's a promise now of rebirth and spring after the long winter. Walking in the steamy wet fields, in the muck underfoot, there's an ethereal wispiness in the air.

The conditions this morning are perfect. Early sun, warming the land. Moisture from the cold night rising in the first light. Dew drop lanterns glowing on every branch and stem.

The colours are golden. I shoot into the most easterly field. Nothing to be seen but light, shrouded in vapour. And there's no goal here, it's enough just to stand and feel the sun on my face, the foggy dew is a bonus.....




The growing Pilgrimage gallery is HERE

Where there's muck there's money

There's an Irish expression that where there's muck there's money.

The last week has seen the return of muck to these parts but we are still waiting to see the money. Crops have been harvested, grass growth is slowing, the clocks went back last night, rain is falling heavily and the local pot holes are filling up to the brim with water. But still, no money!!

These photos were taken at the very crack of dawn through a hazy light. The heat was rising off the cattle and the promise of a glowing October day lifted our spirits. There have been tougher times I know, but we are yearning for a bit of respite from doom and gloom, and we are all dreaming up schemes to help us keep the show on the road........

There's no shortage of muck, but how can we turn it to gold!!!

Guzzling Bees and Woundwort flowers

So the rain continued to bucket down all through July and alongside the accompanying sea mist, a kind of fog settled on my brain. The days melt into one and soon afternoons blend into night. It can all get a bit grey and vague without sky, and sunsets and the changing light I crave......

One evening I found myself sitting for a while with a swathe of damp Woundwort flowers and discovered that the bees were very much alive and kicking. Their buzzing was infectious and soon I was lost in their world of flitting and guzzling.

Woundwort is another of those beautiful wildflowers considered a "weed" and banned from gardens. So today I am showing off it's delicate beauty and welcoming a big invasion of it in Foxglove Lane.



More photos of guzzling bees and Woundwort here in the gallery

Out of an Irish mist

The mist has been down for a few days now. It pours in from the sea when summer conditions dis-improve. It gets into your brain, slows down your thinking and creates a cotton wool world outside the window. 


Feeling more lost than usual, it was impossible to get out. Work commitments mounted, weeds grew out of control, everything drooped under the weight of moisture. A big well of sadness seemed to pervade this mist. My first summer without my Dad in the background, wearing his summer shirt and his bright yellow sun glasses that he got from the National Council for the Blind .

And me, keeping busy to avoid at all costs the slow misty days of the wettest June on record. Avoiding  the desperation that comes with the shortness of life and the quickening of age.

When out of the dark Irish mist a Blackbird female, a mucky brown bird, taking an unusual length of time to get her bearings, caught my attention and brought me back to earth, just in time to snap her before she flew away.




Out of the mist prints and downloads available here