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resting up

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

beach1_myshoesbResting at The Dunes – Limantour Beach

For years we stayed up late each night, then would rise for work, averaging 5 hours of sleep a night. I used to think that was normal, until I watched a series of documentaries on PBS about the health factors of sleep. The statistic that struck me was that getting less than 8-hours sleep every night was akin to smoking! Catching up on sleep was a myth that I had believed. It does so much extensive damage to your health system that you lose about 10 years off your lifespan. After losing two siblings to smoking–related cancers, that was the science that changed my sleep habits. Not only do I make getting a solid 8-hours of sleep a priority, I take naps, and consider rest an essential health priority. When we bought the cabin we spent every weekend working constantly on various renovations and tasks; stripping floors, knocking down an old chimney, prepping and painting walls. We were exhausted working weekends on construction projects, then working all week at our day-jobs. After a year of such abuse we made a pact that we would work one day and just relax and enjoy this paradise of a life on the next. We would have at least one day of rest. Gratefully we are to the stage where we can spend most of our weekend just resting and relaxing, with the occasional shelf installation, door handle adjustment, and regular yardwork to keep the blackberries from taking over the backyard. Built in to every weekend are rest traditions, like our scheduled Sunday beach sunset picnic. We stop and get a hot dinner then drive to the beach, spread a tarp just beneath the dune peaks to shelter from the wind, and lie down with a lovely spread of wine, olives, fried chicken and an occasional slice of pie. Resting and renovating our emotional and spiritual health has become a precedent. I relish watching Greg stretch out in the sand, arms folded behind his head, clouds or fog rolling in across the beach along the horizon. In this composition I follow the example of Mark Klett, whose exhibition Reinvention of Landscape transfixed my imagination upon seeing his work for the first time in 2001 at the Huntington Library in Pasadena. Klett would include himself in the composition by leaving a pair of gloves, including his legs, or his shadow. Here I have integrated my shoes at the bottom,… for you to step into and share my perspective – to rest and enjoy the view.

making time for everyday miracles

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

denwr_west2The Magic Portal Along Don Edwards National Wildlife Refuge West

Lately I’m intrigued by the idea that my thoughts and anxiety about past or future events regularly blinds me to the most meaningful aspects of my life – the present moments. I started a daily course of study (based on the work of Columbia professors Dr. Helen Schucman and Dr. William Thetford) through The Foundation For Inner Peace with a few friends from the East Coast. Each day we read a lesson, practice the single mind task, and post reflections on ways in which our thoughts work to sabotage or support our lives. I usually arrive at school around 6:30am to avoid Bay Area traffic, sit in my car, read the lesson, practice the meditation, then post my thoughts on our group text thread. The quiet time in the morning has definitely reframed my priorities and focus. Problems and irritations at work are minimized, while oddly meaningful things rise in importance. One evening while driving home I noticed flocks of California clapper rails alongside the bridge in the shallow waters of Don Edwards National Wildlife Refuge West. As I passed a short turn-off from the freeway leading to a parking area along the bridge to view the wetlands, I thought, “Some day, when I have time, I will explore that turnoff.” The following afternoon during my prep I decided to make that time and headed to the Dumbarton Bridge expecting to have to cross and pay the toll back to pull into the parking vista area and get back to school for my Flex period supervision. I decided that it was worth the  roundabout effort. What I discovered was a magic tunnel on the west side that takes you along slim shorelines beneath the bridge for bird-watching,…and allows you to drive under the bridge and back around to the main road without crossing the bridge – for free! There were no clapper rails, only plovers and avocets feeding in the low tide mudflats, but what I discovered was the magic portal that takes me to extraordinary joy right in the moment – but only when I make the Now a priority. Suddenly I’m not willing to allow “lack of time” to be a barrier to my experience and enjoyment. I’m living in the abundance of the magic portals and everyday miracles in the moments,…when I make the time to notice.

setting sail

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

best-boat-sfView of San Francisco from the Stern of Sky High – Catalina 350

The last year has taught me quite a bit about navigating a meaningful life. In a previous post, marine dreams, I shared the story of how we came to live on a boat on the San Francisco Bay. Greg is expert at nurturing dreams and holding fast to the intention that seems to manifest them. The choice to live on a boat started out as a social experiment, a convenient option to forestall buying a house in a high realty market. Over the last year it has become a lifestyle sprung from the daydreams of childhood. It feels like I live in a luxury treehouse (another of our daydreams) with my best friend. Close quarters presses us to resolve conflicts quickly and appreciate the feeling of being in harmony, with a sudden intolerance of being out of sorts with each other. Choosing to live a retirement lifestyle while still working has emboldened us to do what we enjoy as part of our daily life rather than “waiting for” a vacation or retirement on the horizon. The exhilarating part of this is the changes that open to us. Rather than ignore my annual retirement evaluation email when school started this year (assuming that it would be so small that I would have to work until I’m in my 70’s) I scheduled a meeting and was stunned by the reality of a generous pension within 3-4 years. I am writing and drawing on a regular basis imagining my next career as author-illustrator. Greg decided to study and work for his Skipper’s License, spending evenings studying sailing manuals and weekends taking tests and lessons, some days exhausted by the physical demands of challenging trainings at sea. It is exciting to watch each other, imagine ourselves, set sail in new directions.

solstice sunset

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

solstice12_16bWinter Solstice 2016

Solstice is from the Latin solstitium, which means “sun standing still.” Today is the first day of astronomical winter. On school break, I have granddaughters and their two friends at the cabin while parents are working this week before Christmas. We’re basking in leisure; sleeping in late, watching movies, backwards meals with cereal for dinner, leaving beds unmade. Eventually we head to town for groceries at 3:30pm. I am watching the time, very keen on seeing the Solstice sunset at 4:50pm today. We get our almond milk and dish soap then head back to Bear Valley Road toward the beach. Walking down the sandy path disappointment washes over me as I realize that lack of clouds will minimize the colors of sunset. My expectations and agenda corrupt my enjoyment of the moment. Fortunately, I am surrounded by fine teachers. Chilly weather in the 40’s does not dissuade the kids from peeling off socks and shoes to race to the water’s edge. Their embrace of the Now is infectious. This week I’ve been reflecting on the frequency of distracting thoughts that prod me toward impatience and dissatisfaction with life. Along the path I notice that everything I desire or need is really right in front of me at any moment; scrub bushes aglow in the low slant of autumnal light, sound of surf and smell of sea air, a sigh of breeze across my face, and the time to enjoy such beauty. I use the Solstice sun to backlight frame my perfect masters as they banter and bolt from wave to wet sand in the humble game of experiencing life to the fullest,…because it is simply so irresistibly delight-full.

even in a parking lot

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

skydreams_parking-lotTowards Evening in an Alameda Parking Lot

As a photography teacher I often advise my students to avoid boring or distracting subjects,… like parking lots. In contrast, when I want to assign a visual challenge to my advanced students I will ask them to find a boring subject, like a parking lot, and use their critical thinking and observations to find the extraordinary in the finer details. I build my class on the foundation of ways of seeing – that being a photographer is less about the camera and more about how we train ourselves to look, to see, to notice. The eye scans and sees the whole yet we notice only a few parts of any gaze. Gestalt posits that the parts are greater than the whole because we group the whole without considering the weight of the parts. Elliott Erwitt claims, “Photography is about finding something interesting in an ordinary place,…it has little to do with what you see, and everything to do with the way you see.” As a cloud aficionado I always pay attention to the sky. I look up first thing as I step out into my world and scan the horizon. Throughout the day, I keep looking up, focusing especially on gathering clouds (or lack of) nearing golden hour. I am constantly mining the particulars of sky. Walking into this parking lot where my EV Volt was charging, I stopped to frame the astonishing view that makes even a parking lot exquisite sometimes,… taken by the geometry of architecture in sharp contrast to the organic sprawl of clouds.

overcast

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

skydreams_fog2Highpoint @ Limantour Beach Road – Point Reyes National Seashore

We take the road to the sea for our weekly sunset beach picnic, stopping in at the Inverness Park  Deli for the Sunday fried chicken special. Ghostly gray patches of fog  ripple through creases of mountainside along Vision Peak as we wind our way along the road to ocean upon the rippling back of seismic plates. Milky white of clouds obscure the profile of the Farralon Islands that usually punctuate the horizon at the peak. Reminiscent of the descent in a plane, waves of clouds sheer then disperse, sweeping around us teasing with panoramic views, then around the next turn a wall of white. We park and walk the sandy path across Limantour Estuary, crest the dunes to the beach where sand and fog become one, the sound of crashing waves muffled in troposphere tight around us. We sit on a log  and enjoy the strange obfuscation of this massive beach, foreshortened and swathed in fog. It is a short stay as we lick our fingers and gather our dinner remnants. As we mount the summit, we pull over in awe bursting from lowland obscurity into elevated clarity. The fog line blankets the ocean and estuary below while clouds and sun replay the grand finale above. It illustrates the warp and weft of our limited vision, the clouded clutch of depression and sadness nestled just beneath the illuminating light of enjoyment and ease at the next rise and turn of the road. We frame the spectral show along roadside paths, walking in opposite directions. Greg descends along a narrowing trail and I trace the edge of the peak road for a wider view of sky. We meet and descend once again into thick fog, water droplets suspended in atmosphere tight upon the surface of our world. We are graced to live beneath an atmospheric river.

turn back for beauty

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

nicasio-arcContrail Arcs Above Black Mountain – Nicasio Valley Road

Saturday morning fog rises slowly all along the Bay Area. At 55mph I notice in passing the radiant swathe of fog at left drifting off Nicasio Reservoir. I breath in the beauty, conflicted. Reaching the end of the road, I turn around. I am compelled to turn back. I must go back and frame this splendor. The dichotomy of land, suddenly green from the first winter rains, against brilliant azure sky awash with a calligraphy of clouds. The serpentine form of fog almost passed across the water’s surface. This mirror marks the memory, paints a portrait of elements: earth and air. The first panel of Hieronymous Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Deights comes to mind with its complementary blue-green creation scene. Artists and writers ponder on the surreal images of Bosch. In her book LEAP, Terry Tempest Williams raises the possibility that we are actually still in the Garden of Eden, that the story of Adam and Eve, the final panel of Bosch’s triptych, those are the cautionary tales. I would agree. Every effort that we make to frame the beauty, to appreciate the gift, is one step toward averting the tragedy of the loss of this Eden. National Geographic and Leonardo Dicaprio frame the importance of turning back for beauty in the documentary Before The Flood. Turn back for beauty,…as often as possible. It may very well be our saving grace.

fledging

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

osprey-triptychSecond Valley Osprey Nest: A Garden of Earthly Delights  – July 2016

On the hillside parallel to Second Valley a breeding pair of osprey return each year to nest atop a towering dead fir capped by a nest the size of a bathtub. In past years 1-2 chicks hatch and sometimes do, sometimes don’t, make it to maturity. This year at the end of July we are amazed by 3 hulking chicks crowding the nest and filling the valley with their long raucous cries of hunger. The parents land with a fish in claws, the same size as their full grown offspring clamoring for food. Osprey are the only raptors that survive solely on fish so they build a nest adjacent to water for their concentrated buffet. Through observation we learn some interesting avian parenting tips. Camera poised as a parent approaches, she hovers with a large fish in her grip then turns abruptly away as the chicks, quieted and poised at her approach erupt in hysteria as she flies off with their anticipated dinner. We erupt in laughter at the clever “fish fake” maneuver to entice them to fly. Hiking up each day to enjoy the show, 2 chicks fledge, while the last lingers for another two weeks in the nest screeching mournfully. The siblings return to the nest for the next 2 months as parents teach them to fish and to keep the last chick company. One sibling brings fish to the nest and the other sits on the lower branches. The scenario reminds me of the advantages of growing up in a larger family, learning lessons from those fledged before us, and enjoying the benefits of spoils left behind while having older siblings close at hand. Fledged chicks stay in the nest as parents roost nearby imparting hunting lessons and learning the lay of land and water. In late autumn they will begin the 2700 mile flight to South America to their wintering grounds where chicks will mature for another 2-3 years before they make the flight back for mating in their birthplace on this National Seashore. I realize how essential it is for humans to preserve habitat for wildlife to share this range of life. Finally the last chick, the last egg laid, fledges and she hovers over the valley for weeks screeching it seems with sheer joy to the world, “I can fly! I can fly!” We are privileged to be her witness.

 

you really can’t go back

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

CantGoBackSunset Reflection Before the Full Moonrise @ Abbotts Beach, July 2016

The height of my week with grandchildren in tow at the cabin is planning for Tuesday, the full moon.Tonight will be the Buck Moon.  They are here with me with their two best friends – four kids ages 6-10. We stop at the Bear Valley Visitor Center to get Junior Ranger nature guidebooks for each, and they pick out sketching journals to write about observations in nature this week. We spend the morning observing a nest of three osprey chicks ready to fledge, weed the side yard of our cabin, and watch for various bugs and birds. I talk up the Abbotts Lagoon Trail on the schedule for the evening hike and fuel them up with hotdogs and full moon facts. We gather flashlights and jackets for the hike to the sunset-moonrise. I am so excited to share this with them after several near-spiritual experiences in this monthly natural event myself. I so want to go back and share the awe and joy of a sunset-moonrise with them in this special place. They race ahead on the trail as I chat with my niece who has stopped by for the night to enjoy the hike, campfire, and pick up a loaner bike for her move this month up to UC Davis for college. The pack of wilder-younglings are rolling down the sand dunes by the time we reach the bridge to the beach. I encourage them to follow me up the largest dune to see the sunset that is quite a bit farther north than I realized. They grumble at the climb, interrupted from their romp in the sandy dunes at hand. As we hike up a sign and rope designate that the dunes are closed due to snowy plover nesting. They get prickers in their feet, we never get to see the sunset, darkness gathers around us in both exterior and interior ambiance. I am disappointed that I have disappointed them after such a long hike, and they grumble as we walk back until they discover a makeshift seesaw assembled from a large round log and long rough plank at the base of the dunes. Scrambling onto it to balance, experiment, and play with this new attraction unearths a unique pleasure. I photograph in bursts to show them the time-lapse later this week of their exploits. I smile at how they  discover their own delights and natural ways to make this place special. I swat away clouds of mosquitoes with my hat in the dusk hurrying back along the trail, far ahead they are spooked by a skunk in the dark (fortunately she does not spray them!). We have not yet seen the full moon and it is already dark. When I photographed it before in mid-winter, the moon rose conveniently over the dip of the lagoon as the sun set in the open breach of beach between obscuring arcs of dunes. In summer it rises further north obscured by high arcs of dunes during sunset. Finally as I approach the parking lot, the moon rises in darkness through the cleft of hills beyond the marsh. Later around the campfire we roast marshmallows for s’mores to their laughs and taunts about the skunk, the dunes, and the seesaw, reminding me that even in familiar places, we are always going forward to a new place in the now.

in the distance

Posted on by Margo Wixsom

SunriseNow1Gathering Fog on Tomales Bay, July 5, 2016

I am grateful for a house on the Point Reyes National Seashore. Days are rich in the prism of colors that annunciate sunrise and sunset. Bright skies this morning shift to mild fog rising like a slow-motion leviathan ghost creeping across the backs of the pinch-pressed peaks of this geological wonderland. Mountains shoved up at all angles from tectonic action as the North American and Pacific plates dance together, not always harmoniously. The beauty of the pleats of Black Mountain are explained in scientific poetry in US Geological Survey documents as “The Miocene and Pliocene sedimentary rock formations folded into a broad syncline with a northwest-trending axis running between Inverness Ridge and Point Reyes.” The local nicknames describe the compressed crests as Knuckle and Elephant Mountain more accurately. It is the tallest roll of mountain just right of center. Our house is nestled into Inverness Ridge at the base of Mount Vision. I lie in bed until afternoon reading about sea turtles on my first solo summer vacation day. After lunch in Point Reyes Station I stop along Sir Francis Drake Boulevard, midway down Tomales Bay, and watch as the fog unfolds slowly, rotating the lighting below as if in a theatrical production, highlighting a tree on one slope, a copse of birch trees on a point, then glowing through thin patches of fog for dramatic punctuation. I frame a panoramic view of this eastern scene at sunset. The barren foreground seems a metaphor of the dark challenges, losses, disappointment at our feet nestled into the history of our experience, and yet fog slowly parts to shine on the illuminated destination of a more luminous future in the distance. I am betting with the currency of gratitude and optimism on the richness of the now, and the promise of tomorrow in the distance.