Watching the Sunset
09/08/12 04:23
I have thousands of digital images on my computer. I carry a camera with me almost all of the time and I enjoy taking pictures. When I began this blog, my goal was to choose one picture to go with each blog. The formula for the blog came from the old saying, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” My idea was to choose one image and one thousand words to share. Over the years, the idea has evolved. I began to use stock images from time to time when I didn’t have a picture of my own. I also began writing about things that were occurring in distant locations, and often accompanied those blog with news photos. Later I migrated my web site to a new host and changed the software I was using to develop it. In that move I changed the look of the page and began to use multiple images. Life changes and the new blog is working well for now.
There is, however, something meaningful about the discipline of making photographs each day, sorting through the images and selecting one or two that make a statement about the day. Last evening, as I uploaded the images from yesterday, they were all sunset shots. We drove a little over 400 miles and I didn’t get out the camera until the evening when we went for a walk. As I looked at the images, I remembered other sunset shots. I like to take sunrise and sunset shots across the water. As I looked through the images on my computer, I noticed that sunset pictures are almost always a product of vacation. Part of this is the way that our house sits near the crest of a hill. We live in sunrise territory. Our view to the east is almost unrestricted. Our view to the west looks into forest and hills. Still we get nice sunsets at home. The main difference between being at home and being on vacation is how we spend our time.
At home, we have plenty of evening meetings. On evenings when we don’t have meetings, we tend to try to get a little work done after dinner. Usually the work consists of domestic chores. With two people working away from the house, we need to spend our at home time with tasks like mowing the lawn, cleaning the house, and light maintenance. There are always plenty of undone chores around our place. So we tend to keep going and don’t take time to just sit and observe our world. Most evenings when we do slow down and relax, it is dark and we are inside. I curl up with a book in a comfortable chair.
On vacation we take time to go for walks and often, in the evening, we have time to just sit and watch the sunset. Our forebears found time to sit and watch. In the days before electricity, there were plenty of wakeful hours when the tasks of life couldn’t be pursued. They got good at observing the movement of the planets and stars across the night sky. They remembered the phases of the moon and used them to mark the passage of time. They watched the sunsets and sunrises each day and paid attention to the birds and animals. They tuned in to the natural rhythms of life.
We tend to spend too much time inside. We like our climate-controlled, comfortable spaces. We like our reading lamps and televisions and computer screens. Whenever I read statistics about how much time the average American spends watching television I am shocked. We don’t watch television very much. Sometimes we go days without turning on the set. But when I read the statistics about computer use, I know that I exceed the averages. It seems that I am always sitting in front of the screen clicking on the keys. I’ve become habituated to the daily use of the machine. This blog is just one example. I read other blogs. I check the news. I read about things happening in distant locations. I do research. I read the bible on my computer. I do a lot with the machine.
Using the devices is not the problem, but there is a need for balance.
Vacation is one way for me to restore balance in my life. I have a deeply ingrained sense of the need to work. I enjoy my work and I keep active. But there are times when sitting is critical to keeping one’s mind and spirit healthy. When we are focused on work, our attention turns to what we can accomplish. I think about my creativity, my responsibilities, my contacts, my goals. These are important, but they are not the most important things in the world. When I sit and watch a sunset I am reminded that there is much that goes on without my action. The beauty of a sunset is not dependent upon my looking in order to exist. The glory of creation is revealed whether or not I am paying attention.
As I watched the sunset last night, I was aware that the scene was relatively modern. The lake is the result of the massive Garrison Dam across the Missouri. It wasn’t always here. The mighty Missouri flowed through the bottomlands in this part of the world. There were breaks and relatively steep hills leading down to the river. Up on the flat the prairie stretched for miles – as far as one could see. It was the domain of buffalo and antelope, wolves and coyotes, rabbits and mice and fox. The river breaks were the place to find deer and an occasional bear. The skies teemed with birds, but there were a lot fewer seagulls than we see these days now that the lake is here.
In geological time, the lake is a brief interlude. It will one day be gone. If the dam does not fail and is not removed, the lake will fill with dirt and silt and the river will return. But this will not happen in my lifetime. What I can observe is a tiny fraction of the whole of reality.
Sometimes it helps my perspective to just sit and watch the sunset and be reminded how small I am in the larger picture of this world.
There is, however, something meaningful about the discipline of making photographs each day, sorting through the images and selecting one or two that make a statement about the day. Last evening, as I uploaded the images from yesterday, they were all sunset shots. We drove a little over 400 miles and I didn’t get out the camera until the evening when we went for a walk. As I looked at the images, I remembered other sunset shots. I like to take sunrise and sunset shots across the water. As I looked through the images on my computer, I noticed that sunset pictures are almost always a product of vacation. Part of this is the way that our house sits near the crest of a hill. We live in sunrise territory. Our view to the east is almost unrestricted. Our view to the west looks into forest and hills. Still we get nice sunsets at home. The main difference between being at home and being on vacation is how we spend our time.
At home, we have plenty of evening meetings. On evenings when we don’t have meetings, we tend to try to get a little work done after dinner. Usually the work consists of domestic chores. With two people working away from the house, we need to spend our at home time with tasks like mowing the lawn, cleaning the house, and light maintenance. There are always plenty of undone chores around our place. So we tend to keep going and don’t take time to just sit and observe our world. Most evenings when we do slow down and relax, it is dark and we are inside. I curl up with a book in a comfortable chair.
On vacation we take time to go for walks and often, in the evening, we have time to just sit and watch the sunset. Our forebears found time to sit and watch. In the days before electricity, there were plenty of wakeful hours when the tasks of life couldn’t be pursued. They got good at observing the movement of the planets and stars across the night sky. They remembered the phases of the moon and used them to mark the passage of time. They watched the sunsets and sunrises each day and paid attention to the birds and animals. They tuned in to the natural rhythms of life.
We tend to spend too much time inside. We like our climate-controlled, comfortable spaces. We like our reading lamps and televisions and computer screens. Whenever I read statistics about how much time the average American spends watching television I am shocked. We don’t watch television very much. Sometimes we go days without turning on the set. But when I read the statistics about computer use, I know that I exceed the averages. It seems that I am always sitting in front of the screen clicking on the keys. I’ve become habituated to the daily use of the machine. This blog is just one example. I read other blogs. I check the news. I read about things happening in distant locations. I do research. I read the bible on my computer. I do a lot with the machine.
Using the devices is not the problem, but there is a need for balance.
Vacation is one way for me to restore balance in my life. I have a deeply ingrained sense of the need to work. I enjoy my work and I keep active. But there are times when sitting is critical to keeping one’s mind and spirit healthy. When we are focused on work, our attention turns to what we can accomplish. I think about my creativity, my responsibilities, my contacts, my goals. These are important, but they are not the most important things in the world. When I sit and watch a sunset I am reminded that there is much that goes on without my action. The beauty of a sunset is not dependent upon my looking in order to exist. The glory of creation is revealed whether or not I am paying attention.
As I watched the sunset last night, I was aware that the scene was relatively modern. The lake is the result of the massive Garrison Dam across the Missouri. It wasn’t always here. The mighty Missouri flowed through the bottomlands in this part of the world. There were breaks and relatively steep hills leading down to the river. Up on the flat the prairie stretched for miles – as far as one could see. It was the domain of buffalo and antelope, wolves and coyotes, rabbits and mice and fox. The river breaks were the place to find deer and an occasional bear. The skies teemed with birds, but there were a lot fewer seagulls than we see these days now that the lake is here.
In geological time, the lake is a brief interlude. It will one day be gone. If the dam does not fail and is not removed, the lake will fill with dirt and silt and the river will return. But this will not happen in my lifetime. What I can observe is a tiny fraction of the whole of reality.
Sometimes it helps my perspective to just sit and watch the sunset and be reminded how small I am in the larger picture of this world.