Photo A Week: Fruits of Labour

Finding an outlet to express myself creatively (beyond writing) has been my biggest accomplishment this year.  Picking up a camera and a paint brush both happened simultaneously, as our adventures across country begged recording. Converting image to art, via watercolours, has become my passion, although to date, I’ve only had a few lessons, and each […]

Read More

What Do You See? Wings!

I used to think that the relentless ache between my shoulder blades was from missing wings. We are meant to be angels on earth, I believed. And then, I forgot, so caught up in the details of life, consumed with ambition, and then facing the daily struggle of chronic illness. Until  I saw this image. […]

Read More

Building a Foundation (with help from wikihow.com)

 Choose the type of foundation to build.  I want a foundation strong enough to carry me through hard times, yet flexible and able to adapt in the moment.  Something sustaining, and solid, but not rigid.   Set your footings 2 feet across.   Two feet on the ground, firmly planted, well balanced, not alone, but interdependent, both partaking […]

Read More

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #14: Foundation

“What about my marriage?”  a naive, much younger me once asked a psychic. “The foundation is firm,” the woman responded hesitantly, “but not without cracks.” Cracks?  It was more like gaping holes.  Easy to see now, in retrospect, but at the time, I was convinced we were rock solid.  The suggestion of anything less insulted […]

Read More

Continue to Question

Inquiry is a trait teachers hope to instil in students – the ability to not just take for granted that which they have been taught, but the curiosity to question evidence, and to research beyond what is given. Questions form the basis of a reflective life. This week’s challenge was to think about the questions […]

Read More

Photo a Week: Details

I’m drawn to the details – a knot hole in a tree – hoping my close-up will reveal a curiosity.                   The inside of Saguaro, ancient and grey – reveals the inner bones, speaks to a better day. A roadside encounter brought me face to tail with […]

Read More

The Questions That Follow Us

“Sometimes I just wish I could roll back the years and start over.” “Hard to imagine it.  Life would have been very different.” Our what if’s are wistful, laced with regrets.  Not that we had any power over what happened – we were only children when decisions that would affect us forever after were made. […]

Read More

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #13: Questions

What will come from all this suffering?  Why do I keep repeating old patterns?  Where is this journey taking me?  How can I be a better person?  When do things get better? A Question by Robert Frost A voice said, Look me in the stars And tell me truly, men of earth, If all the soul-and-body […]

Read More

Enough Personification!

This blog post almost eluded my attention – the trickster. We’ve had company this week, and are still in the midst of settling, so I lost track of the days, and here it is Sunday already.  To be honest, I am happy to done with this challenge and move on to the next.  Focusing on […]

Read More

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #12: Personification

I confess, I frequently personify objects, apologizing to walls that I bump into, asking my iPhone where it got to, and apologizing to the milk I left on the counter, as if they have the capability of feeling bumped, slighted or abandoned. Personification is the practice of imbuing inanimate objects with humane characteristics.  It is […]

Read More