About Seeing..

The wise old owl doesn't write his blogs right on this site.. but that is what I did.. and am doing again as I don't have a word processor on this computer.  Let's hope this one doesn't disappear.

One minute it's there, and the next it's not!  Life is sort of like that.. my month in Canada is over in just a week.  Arrggh!  And what have I done?  Well.. nothing!  And if you ask me, that is the sign of a pretty good holiday.

I haven't taken many pictures either.. I left my camera in Australia, and so have had to rely on mom's camera.  It isn't the same.  It is smaller, and way too unfamiliar.  It's just not the same when you are looking through someone else's lens.

Dad knows what I'm talking about.  He is pretty much totally blind now.  He has to rely on other eyes to get through the day.. to see things.

Dad was working down the shop this morning, sanding one of Jackie's big owls.  He sits in his motorised wheel chair, bathing in the sunshine, using his hands to see what he is doing.  It works.  It isn't what he is used to, but it is how things are now.

I like to see using a camera.  Photography is fun.. for one thing, it is a good excuse to go for a walk.  I went out a few evenings without one, but felt a little lost.  I could look at the beavers, but.. then what?

I used to see things through the eyes of my children.. they were my excuse to go places and do things.  But things changed and they are off.. so I was happy when I got my first good camera.  I could look at things through a view finder.. click.. keep the shot.. share it, or not.   I'm sure glad mom let me borrow hers!

I mean look at these ducks I found.  Three of them.. sitting on a log in the cool of the setting sun.  It is still light at nine o'clock these days.. and there is lots of life in the pond behind our place.

There is a baby beaver in here someplace too.. at least that is what people say.  I will keep looking...  But I did take shots of two larger ones.  They aren't camera shy.. just hungry.

Beavers know about change.  They are always changing their environment.. they have cut down trees all along the edge of the pond..

Dad knows what beavers look like.  He has certainly seen a few in his day.  I just have to tell him what I see on my walks and he is happy.   But wooden owls?  This is different.  I am not sure he can imagine the creativity that Jackie puts into her carvings..  Every piece of wood is different.  Each owl has a personality.. a knot.. a grain that is just a little different than anything we have ever seen before.  

Even Jackie, carver extrodinair,  isn't sure what an owl will look like before it is 'born' out of the wood.  Even after it is finally revealed, she takes time and care to add the details.. feathers, dots, eyes, claws.. It's the combination of the wood, the shape and these details that really bring it to life.. making each of her pieces a work of art.

And it is just those sorts of details that are hard to describe to a blind man.  I watch as dad looks at an owl, using his fingers, and his mind: memories and ability to think abstractly.

He is lucky that he is able to remember what an owl looks like. He knows colour, texture, shape. He knows wood almost as well as he knows rocks.  And because he is so sharp, it is fascinating to see how he can still see, without his eyes.

We are always growing and changing.. even if we don't want to.  And we are always seeing things differently.  

Going out on the water provides another perspective.  It is quiet out in a kayak.  I have watched the deer swim out and settle for the night on the safety of the island.  I can smell the sea air.. feel the moisture.. listen to the sounds of the water.. the birds.  Monte and I watched a racoon gathering and eating shell fish.  We get to see the big expensive motor boats, small and large sailboats and the old fishing boats up close.  Some of the older ones, boats that I took photos of just last summer, have gone from the landscape.  Sometime during the winter the slid beneath the surface, and were gone.  

There is always something different when I come back here to the coast.  Most of the time, it is me.