Stealthee, a gain

A master, holding up his staff,
says: “If you have one,
I give you mine:
If you have none,
I will take it away from you.”

Zen and the Japanese Culture Daisetz T. Suzuki

My camera reaches out and grabs a piece of someone— a person with feelings, achievements, sorrows—a visual summary expressed as a moment between the past and the future.

Maybe its someone I know, or knew and have not seen for a long long time.

My camera meets people and knows things about them that I do not know and perhaps never will,

Curious, intrusive, obnoxious—One spending a Sunday afternoon sitting on a boat fishing while another walks around taking photographs the two connected only by this moment between the past and the present.

A secondary glance over a shoulder, a mindful moment embedded in a visual totally unrelated to reality..A photograph enables you to know someone as the person you want them to be :

I’m gonna buy a paper doll that I can call my own
A doll that other fellows cannot steal
And then the flirty, flirty guys with their flirty, flirty eyes
Will have to flirt with dollies that are real.

Paper Doll (song lyrics) sung by The Mills Brothers written by Johnny S. Black released February 18, 1942

Alameda Creek

Alameda Creek runs right by my door, Almost daily I walk along the Alameda Creek Levee, for exercise. and to enjoy the experience.

As I walk along the trail I can glimpse images of the inside lives of others . . .

and see people doing “everyday” things.

All life has to be “praxis,” each individual whether human, insect, cow, snake, whatever, has to do behaviors to survive.

Some might say there is no “free lunch”,

Some might say “everyone has to work to survive” . . .

and then add in the next breath—“Those that do not work do not deserve to live. or at least not to eat or have children”.

They are lazy, shiftless, irresponsible . . . people not working and still be allowed to live , well, its socialism?

That is why people are poor, why they do not have enough money to to buy a house, to buy food, to buy clothes . . .

Some believe such people should never be allowed to experience life’s enjoyments . . . they need to be punished, not rewarded . . .

They have not earned the “right to experience happiness”

“Are blossoms to be viewed only in their fullness, the moon only when it is round and bright?” Men and women of sensibility have their own rules in such matters.

Quote from Yoshida Kenko (1283-1350) Tsurezuregusa and commentary by Rosanjin from Uncommon Clay, The Life of Rosanjin by Sidney B. Cardozo and Masaaaki Hirano

EndPapers

So many photographs of myself? Because I am a cheap model, I am anywhere-anytime available and I understand the feeling of the purpose.

“I“ ”probably could do it with with someone else, but I can not afford that, much less lose the advantages previously mentioned—It fits better with me.

In the early part of the 20th Century hats were commonly worn. Many such as farmers .had to wear hats but photographs of urban and suburban areas at that time show most people wearing hats.I am 77 years old and can remember when I was young my father wore a hat.

Don’t let it get too complex, its easy to do. I mean, these images must have some meaning?

The Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara,
while dwelling in the deep practice of Prajnaparamita,
looked upon the five skandhas, and seeing they were empty
was freed from all suffering.

(Beginning of) Heart Sutra

Does ending all suffering mean that you would, or could, never experience the joys of being human again? Which would you choose? to experience life with its suffering and happiness, or as it was before you were born and after you die with no suffering and no happiness? Maybe its just not a choice left up to us.

Gate gate paragate parasamgate, bodhi svaha

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