Happy Late Night, Sweet Baby,
I hope your day was good. That was a great shot this morning, with the guitar player in the fog. One thing I noticed on that one is that your framing was excellent. You didn't cut the guitar neck off, and in fact you lined it up exactly at the edge of the frame. That's what I mean about really paying attention to your composition before you snap the pic, and that's what I try to do in all my nature shots. Now, in live action shots, such as with rock n roll, it isn't always possible to get a perfectly composed shot because those doggone musicians keep jumping around, haha. But that time, you lined everything up just right, and if you are in the habit of looking for that balance before you snap the pic, it will become automatic.
Here's a question, probably dumb but worth asking : do digital SLRs have viewfinders, or do you look at an LED screen like with point-and-shoots? I guess it doesn't make that much difference, but I always liked the viewfinder in old film cameras because it shut everything else out and you could concentrate on the frame.
Well, anyway......
Today I tried to go visit a place called The Japanese Garden, which is ironically located on the grounds of our local sewage treatment facility, which is called the Tillman Reclamation Plant. They wanted to beautify it, so about 25 years ago (give or take), they created this realistic Japanese Garden on the grounds, using "reclaimed" water, i.e. filtered sewage water, to irrigate it. It's supposed to be a model of ecological efficiency, and the Garden is so beautiful, so they say, that people get married there, TV shows are shot there, etc. It is located right across from Lake Balboa, on the same giant-sized park grounds, and once again it is a place I've never been, even though I've lived in the Valley all my life. But the Valley is huge, 28 miles across and 12 miles deep, and there are tons of places a person might never see, if they didn't make a point to go to.
So I went to visit The Japanese Gardens, finally, but it was closed. I dunno why. There were trucks there, so maybe they were doing some maintenance work. So what I did was to walk over to the Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, also on the same grounds, and take a walk down the path there, which is where I found the baby geese that were in my FB photo this evening. At least I think they were geese. Mama goose was just outside the picture frame, and she was big like a goose, with a long neck, but different colored. She had a black face, black and white neck, and a brown and white body. I need a guidebook to identify the birds I see. I know some, like coots, or Canada Geese, or egrets, but this one I didn't know.
I am reading another Dr. Farrell book I just got in the mail, which is a text of a University course he taught, and the first book (my new one) of four in all which make up the whole course, is called "God, Dialectics and The First Europe". I'd heard the term "dialectics" many times, but had never really known what it meant, so I had to look it up. It's the arguing, using logic and reasoning, for the "truth" of opinions. In the preface he explains how the church was unified before the schism in the 11th century. The schism was caused by the dialectic reasoning of St. Augustine, who changed the Holy Trinity from one of Essence (God) and Substance (God as unknowable and pure spirit), to Essence (God) and something material, a person.
I just started the book, and I know nothing about Eastern Orthodox Christianity, but it is blowing my mind because I want to know if they are saying that Jesus Christ was a philosophical invention of St. Augustine.
You know me, I am always interested in The Truth Of Things, right down to pulling out the roots.
Dr. Farrell, in the book, describes himself as an Eastern Orthodox Christian, which is based on a more mystical and less dogmatic interpretation of what is said to be the original Gospels.
He describes modern, Western, Christianity as "Hellenised", meaning that it was mixed with Greek philosophy in the 11th century. Pure Christian spiritualism was mixed with the logic and reasoning of Aristotle, and thus says Dr. Farrell, that it resulted in Modern Christianity, in which humans, with their often flawed reasoning and logic, have chosen to somewhat equate themselves with God in trying to interpret Him.
I mean........I am just getting started in this book, and I know nothing about the Eastern church, but as I was just reminding myself after reading the preface tonight : I blow my mind every time I consider the Christian story, because it happened so recently in the scheme of things. 2000 years ago is nothing, as we have discussed.
There is physical evidence of humans, or their predecessors (cave men) on Earth for perhaps 100, 000 years or even more. And yet "history" only began just a few thousand years ago, and then was changed, irrevocably to this point, by the appearance of Christ.
The appearance of Christ changed history - the act of writing everyday happenings down or passing them on orally - into something called religion, which was on a whole different level, the belief in an afterlife, and the hoped for adjusting of morality to acheive it.
The events of 2000 years ago are still shrouded in myth and mystery, and in modern times have become a source of incredible divisiveness because of the shrill rancour between secular folk (who believe it's all BS) and True Believers who believe every last word of the Bible as if something called God actually wrote it.
But what stands out, to me anyway, is that something major happened. And the Flood prior to that. There is no doubt that a major catastrophe hit the Earth and resulted in geological change, the continents pulling apart and drifting. If you look at their shapes, it's pretty obvious they all once fit together as Pangaea.
That is obvious geological history, much as one can see the huge sandstone rocks at Chatsworth and in all of the West, and thus can see, from years of study, that this region was once underwater.
So we had geological catastrophies, perhaps sometime in the last 10,000 years, and then a very short time ago, a person called Christ appeared in a specific region, where Greek philosophy had previously been the source of wisdom, and Roman rule had been the source of human power and government.
So those folks figured they had it all down, I suppose, using reason and logic.
But we are still trying to figure things out to this day.
This is why a book like the one I began reading tonight intrigues me, because I am less interested in "what is happening now", i.e the continuation of the 24/7 cycle, which is a roundabout, and I am more interested with discovering how we got here. What are human beings, and why do we do what we do?
After all, it was only 2000 years ago that something major happened. That much can't be disputed, I don't think. The important thing is finding out exactly what it was. What was the story of Christ? Was it changed by St. Augustine? I don't know. I'll guess I'll just keep reading......... :)
(and for the record, I believe in Jesus Christ, whose words cannot be improved upon)
That's all I know for tonight. I will see you in the morning, Sweet Baby.
I Love You. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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