monochrome photography

where is Badfish?

badfishweb

Nikon D750   f7.1   1/60   135 mm  100 ISO

LDG Luciledegoday has sent out a request to help her find Badfish, her blogger friend who runs the Badfish & Chips Cafe.  The last time he posted a blog was in April and she “dearly” misses his enticing and inspiring writings

In response to WordPress’s photo challenge, pedestrians, she has officially launched a Badfish search mission: “Where is Badfish?”   So if you are out and about in search of a super image to post in response to WordPress’ challenge, will you look around and try to find Badfish, wherever you are, because he loves traveling all over the world.

I’m thinking that Badfish (left hand corner) was spotted last month at the Tour de Fat celebration in Colorado, USA.

tuesday photo challenge: stones

stoneweb

Stone:  Symbol of being, of cohesion, of harmonious reconciliation with one’s self. The stone when whole tells of unity and strength; when shattered it symbolizes psychic disintegration.

Seven Stones:

  • The first stone: become acquainted with the intrinsic power within generosity, gratitude, compassion, loving-kindness, equanimity, and sympathetic joy. Use their inherent strength to abandon detrimental mental qualities and experience the subsequent easing of suffering.
  • The second stone: familiarize yourself with the inherent strength within intention; that is, each morning define for yourself a small goal to strive for that day with the knowledge that the characteristics of each daily intention accumulates and formulates the meaning and purpose of your life.
  • The third stone: introduce yourself to the innate vitality of acquaintance with the knowledge of and experience with a presence that transcends your ego and nourishes your divine “I”-in-self.
  • The fourth stone: feel the influence within the natural aspect of prayer that releases the consequential merit of your actions, speech, and thoughts to the benefit all living beings.
  • The fifth stone: know the innate authority of remorse that directs you to acknowledge when specific action, speech, and thought are incongruent with personal moral and guiding principles, to set forth the intention to not repeat the offense, and to release detrimental thoughts, including regret, shame, guilt, resentment, justifications, rationalizations.  Feel the release of being freed from an abusive ego and to a self-centered attitude that has the inclination to neglect others.
  • The sixth stone: gift yourself the eloquence within simple acts of kindness absent of expectation: release your merit; share your talent, expertise, or knowledge; surrender your wants for another’s need; greet each person with a half smile.
  • The seventh stone: be attentive to the influence present within a daily mindfulness practice that acquaints you to a state of tranquil single-pointed concentration.

(cited: Meditative Journey with Saldage, B Catherine Koeford)

a label

 

labelsweb

a label transforms a “unknown” person into a preconceived concept

People want to identify and label you so they can place you somewhere they already have set in their mind. …

We have these labels in little piles in our mind and we take them out and stick them on things. That’s our habit. We like to be able to say, “This is an American. That is a Dutch person. This is a Mexican person.” We put the label on as if we know what we mean by Mexican, American, or Dutch. This is a Communist, this is a Republican, this is a capitalist. In fact, the label has no meaning. “This is a person I love, this is a person I hate.” When we put a label on, we can’t see the person. If someone labels you as a “terrorist,” he may shoot you. But if he sees that you are a human being who has his own suffering, who has children and a wife to look after, he won’t be able to shoot you. It’s only when he gives you a label that he can say, “You’re a terrorist; your presence isn’t needed in this world; if you weren’t in the world, it would be a more beautiful place.” It’s all a matter of putting a label on a person. And when you see the real human being, you can’t assign a label anymore. We give labels only in order to praise or to destroy. We have a great bagful of labels–we don’t even know where they came from. And when we stick them onto people, we cut ourselves off from those people, and we can no longer know who they really are.

~Thich Nhat Hanh, Zen Battles

wpc: corner

wpc_corner2web

The above image, “My Corner of of the World” submitted in response to Ben’s weekly photo challenge is a sharp contrast to the various reports that are coming out of Yemen, “The World’s Worst Humanitarian Crisis.”

The New York Times, reports:

“It’s a slow death…We’re just waiting for doom or a breakthrough from heaven…

“Repeated bombings have crippled bridges, hospitals and factories. Many doctors and civil servants have gone unpaid for more than a year. Malnutrition and poor sanitation have made the Middle Eastern country vulnerable to diseases that most of the world has confined to the history books.

“In just three months, cholera has killed nearly 2,000 people and infected more than a half million, one of the world’s largest outbreaks in the past 50 years

“The [coalition airstrikes have] killed and wounded civilians…bombings have also heavily damaged Yemen’s infrastructure, including a crucial seaport and important bridges as well as hospitals, sewage facilities and civilian factories. …[making] it harder for humanitarian organizations to bring in and distribute aid.

“The United States is also a major donor [of humanitarian aid], as well as a primary supplier of arms to the members of the Saudi-led coalition. Although the United States is not directly involved in the conflict, it has provided military support to the Saudi-led coalition, and Yemenis have often found the remnants of American-made munitions in the ruins left by deadly airstrikes.”

Al Jazeera, August 23, 2017 notes:

The military intervention in Yemen led by the Saudi Arabia’s military has proven to be a “strategic failure” that has killed more than 10,000 people and injure more than 40,000 to date. Yet, a full and official withdrawal is unlikely, “A retreat means defeat…”

All of this leaves me questioning the distractions of the never-ending, on-going political drama from the White House that blinds and deafens me to the unimaginable in Yemen, as well as to the emotional, physical, and relational injury to members of the American military, their families, and Afghanistan civilians in what has become a fading, if not forgotten war, in my corner of the world.