THE SOFT UNFOLDING OF WAVES

We have returned from three glorious weeks at the Wild Coast, feeling replenished and at peace with the world. 

 Most days were soft and meditative, filled with winter sunshine and the hushed unfolding of waves on the sand.

I learned a new word from Mo yesterday.
Apricity: The word apricity represents a simple and familiar yet a very specific phenomenon - the sun's warmth on a cold winter's day. (Click on the word to read further)

It seems appropriate to introduce the word here since, the world and his wife..... dog.....goat and cow, within a kilometer's radius, seemed to wander down to the beach to stand in the sun, .....relishing apricity on a winter's day.

I walked around this bull several times, clicking my camera and he remained  unperturbed. Just a twitch of tail and ear.

I can't imagine our holidays without the resident dogs. They add much joy and tail wagging to our days. 

The sea poems of Pablo Neruda also seem appropriate here. Follow the link if you wish to read a few more.

The Sea by Pablo Neruda

I need the sea because it teaches me.
I don't know if I learn music or awareness,
if it's a single wave or it's existence,
or only it's harsh voice or it's shining
suggestion of fishes and ships.
The fact is that until I fall asleep,
in some magnetic way I move in
the university of the waves.

It's not simply the shells crunched
as if some shivering planet
were giving signs of it's gradual death;
no, I reconstruct the day out of a fragment,
the stalactite from the silver of salt,
and the great god out of a spoonful.

What it taught me before, I keep. It's air
ceaseless wind, water and sand.

It seems a small thing for a young man,
to have come here to live with his own fire,
nevertheless, the pulse that rose
and fell in it's abyss,
the crackling of the blue cold,
the gradual wearing away of the star,
the soft unfolding of the wave
squandering snow with it's foam,
the quiet power out there, sure
as a stone shrine in the depths,
replaced my world in which were growing
stubborn sorrow, gathering oblivion,
and my life changed suddenly:
as I became part of it's movement.

Need I say, this weathered plank and broken shell returned home with me

"Among the things the sea throws up,
let us hunt for the most petrified,
violet claws of crabs,
little skulls of dead fish,
smooth syllables of wood,
small countries of mother-of-pearl;
let us look for what the sea undid
insistently, carelessly,
what it broke up and abandoned,
and left behind us."

- Forget about Me by Pablo Neruda

More chiton shells to add to my collection

Limpets doing what limpets do.

 An ox drawn sled (made out of branches) carries fire wood home

Cows in the mist

 Fish for supper.

A misty end to the day

The  SILVER SUMMER show begins tomorrow at FILLINGDON FINE ART in PIDDINGTON, UK. Details here.  I have a few pieces on the show, including the tall story panel below.

"Stop measuring days by degree of productivity and start experiencing them by degrees of presence." - Alan Watts