Celebrate Life

It has been extremely hectic but often it's us who fail to make the time, find the time to sit back and relax and reflect.
We are so caught up with the electronic world that the mobile phone - smarter now than before - has become our constant companion.

 More so than the important people around us - our spouses, our parents, our children, our loved ones, our friends.


 

 Think back.  Have you survived a day without speaking to a particular person, thought of that particular person, done something for or with that person?

Have your survived a day without looking at your smartphone, your tablet, your computer?

 So I took a day off and spent some time with a friend looking at the beauty of Nature.  And came back with a bumper of beauties and a good day spent with a friend.  Need to do it again soon.

Quiet Month

All of September has been a busy month.  And until today, October has been equally busy.  But the major storm of work has blown over a week ago and today, I struggle to rebuild a life of solace and quietude. 

It's not any easier now.  But I am beginning to find ways to.  A moment in a quiet corner with my cup of tea.  A long glance out across the open spaces.  A few minutes spent watching the birds singing outside my window.  A sniff of the fragrance of the Wrightia religiosa.

But we've got to find out own corner of peace and withdraw into it from time to time; lest we lose our minds and, more importantly, our spirit to live.

And They Lived Happily Ever After

It's a myth, it's a lie that we've been brainwashed with since we were children.  

All the fairy tales that were read to us, all the fairy tales we read.  They tell of Prince Charming and Snow White getting married and living happily ever after.  No marriage is ever further from that truth.

Good and lasting marriages involve a lot of hard work, a lot of give and take, a lot of sacrifices.

Marriage is a union.  It means putting your own interests, your own preferences, your own whims & fancies aside.

It means taking into consideration, serious consideration, the needs, the wants, the desires of your spouse.

We spend way too much time preparing for the wedding day and way too little time (if at all), preparing for the years ahead.

We Remember

A young man died in Ferguson, Missouri, USA, this week.  A young man on the verge of conquering the world as he prepared for the university.  A young man died, unnecessarily this week.

One young man in USA.  And thousands more like him - men and women, boys and girls - across this troubled world. 

The moon watches over our troubled earth.  The stars watch over our troubled world.  And somewhere among the galaxies, a life form may come down and teach us how we should live.

Until then, we need to look inwards and make a decision on what we really should do. 

Before we destroy ourselves.

Rest in Peace, Mike Brown.

Gone

My hard disk crashed.  Along with the thousands of photos, captured over the years.  The memories of childhoods, the memories of growing up, the memories of growing old.

I have learned, the hard way, that nothing in life is permanent.

I have learned that we need to be more prepared.

I have learned not to take things for granted.

And to the memories of the days past, the memories etched not in the hard disks and virtual disks of the new technological wilderness, but in the recesses of our minds and our hearts, I dedicate this photo.

Taken in some faraway land, in a forgotten time.  A time and a place where the children and grandchildren will probably puzzle over in the years ahead.  A time and a place special to only to the ones who were there.

谢谢 and спасибо

My blog stats shows that my most avid visitors come from Singapore and Russia.  So somewhere out there across the physical miles and the micro-dots in the Internet world, I hope I am making small changes to people's lives.

I haven't heard a single whisper from the people who visit but I grateful that people do take the trouble to visit.

In time to come, I will learn what type of pictures will be more appealing and what encourages all of you to come back to visit.

And for the rest of the world, thank you for visiting and your continued visits will encourage me to keep the posts coming.

Three Words

Three words we don't use often enough.

It's always good to spend time with the family - doing things together. It may not be the best use of time, it may be just being together doing things that could have been done better or faster by myself.

But it's time with loved ones.  We take such moments for granted, until someday those moments are no longer available to us.  Whether because the loved one has moved on in life, or life has moved out our loved ones.

Either way, remember that the moments are here and brief as they are, these individual moments come back together someday and make up our memories.

Say it before it is too late.

Goodbye and Sleep Well

And in a morning's light fleeting moment - like that moment when the sun first shines over the horizon - a life is gone.

A mother's short life is taken.  She returns to the Lord.  And the family grieves.

No matter how much time we had to prepare for the day, since the news of the cancer, we hold back - believing that the battle will be won, believing that Lord will not be so harsh to take away our loved ones.

So another life is lost to the dreaded one.  We mourn.  We grieve.  And life will never be the same again.

And the pain will never go away, even after all the years.

For Agnes, for Anthony, for Jacqueline, for Philip, for Josephine, for Celine, for every single family and friend I have lost over the years, the pain has not gone away.  The memory has not faded.

So today, we said goodbye to another.  And pray and hope that someday, we will find the cure - to the illness, to the pain.


Picture courtesy of 
http://homeofflowers.blogspot.sg/2013/01/the-flower-daffodils_19.html

Value Life

A mother is dying tonight.  A friend, a mother lies in her hospital bed.  The doctors have asked family members to come back.  It is a painful vigil; waiting for the moment to come.

We value too many seemingly unimportant things in life; we take the precious and important aspects of life for granted.

While the passing of a friend pains me, it is reminder that we need, that I need to re-prioritize my life.

Life Moves On

This invention called Facebook puts me in touch with people and places and times long separated or just celebrated.

I celebrate the wedding of two young friends, online of course; joined in matrimony as they prepare for their journey ahead.

I celebrate the 30th wedding anniversary of another couple, who through difficult moments early in their relationship, have endured and survived these past decades.

I celebrate little ones, born of the next generation, completing another circle of life.

I look back at my own past and see the footprints I have left behind.  Faded at some places, completely washed away at others.  And I lament how quickly my own youth has passed me by.

I turn and look and lo! I see the vast expanse of beach ahead of me and realise that I have much more ahead to celebrate.

My old friend of many years has decided that he will take the plunge literally and has completed his skydiving and seadiving experiences.

It's up to us, what memories we want to put into our lives.   And what we want to leave behind.

Who reads me?

A large number of my blog readers indicate that they are from countries like Russia, United States, Germany, Venezuela, Brazil, South Korea, United Kingdom, France and Serbia.  But I have no idea who these readers are and what I am doing right to attract their attention.  I hope someone will talk to me.

Old and New

It's an old brick wall.  Weathered and covered with moss.  It's been around for a long time, since the time I was a little child.  And the plant has been there for several years now but it's not the same flowers, it's not the same leaves.

It's simply not the same us.

Happy Mother's Day

To all the Mothers - the mothers, the grandmothers, the great-grandmothers, and the mothers of children to be born in the year ahead - to the mothers celebrating the glorious day for the first time; and to the mothers who have lost a child and will no longer want to celebrate this day - thank you for the patience, the suffering, the perseverance, the dedication, the tears, the smiles, the hugs, the kisses, the just-being there moments, the heartaches, the silent memories. 

The words will never be enough but we the children, we remember.

Thank you.

Summer Road Trip

The pathway to the house, summer of 1989

It was a summer trip.  Nowhere fancy; just to visit the home of a writer.

But as with most of our memories, we don't remember the details - we remember significant moments.  And the photographs that accompany our scrap books and photo albums serve to trigger those memories.

In today's technology and pace of life, we no longer fill our shelves with photographs.  Instead, we fill our hard disks and our cloud storage with millions of digital photos which probably no one will talk about.

Only those of us who have been there at that moment will recollect the day.  For the rest of us, strangers to these digital photos, these are just digital images which are only understood by those whose lives they have touched.

Technology has moved us, but has it moved us forward in everything?

First Look

First look at the Golden Gate in the 1990s.
  

The years have past but some things have not changed much over time.

There will always be bedrocks and foundations on which we rest; on which we know that we are safe and secure.

We count on our trusted friends to see us through the difficult moments in our life.

Travel

A little bag sits at the side on every trip - whether it's a day trip out to nowhere or a summer vacation.  

And in the bag are the tools of life.  

A bag of cameras - big and small - to capture the moments which in time will become the memories. 

The memories, when strung together over the years, make our lives.

The memories will mean different things to different people at different times.

But they will still be memories, preserved and memories lost in time.

Reflections

It's 2 am and after a long day at work and running through an episode of Carl Sagan's Cosmos and a few commercials from Solvil et Titus, I begin to wonder about purpose and life again.

Perhaps it is just fatigue from work. Perhaps it is age catching up on me,

Perhaps all those are not important.

I stumble across some photos taken during a family holiday years ago. The children look so young and fresh. Perhaps it is time to sit back and celebrate life, celebrate living.

Perhaps we think too much and live too little.

Two Weddings and a Funeral

Several years back, I witnessed the weddings of a couple of friends. One got married in 2010 and the other in 2013.  Today, I hold their babies in my arms.  That warm fuzzy feeling of new life, the promise of fresh hope, the dreams of a future yet untold.


Yes, spring is here.

And in the same moment in time, I am informed that a long-time friend has passed on, yet another victim of cancer.  Not much older than me, I wonder why her life has been cut short.

Yet that is what the seasons are all about. Spring is not just about new life.  Spring is also about renewal - of a time when the circle of life come a full turn.

Little Flowers

 Parked under a tree last night and in the ensuing rain that fell, a whole bunch of little flowers fell on the car.  Little flowers, petite and gentle.  

And as I drove home that night, I hear the words of that hymn

Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling

Calling for you and for me

See on the portals, He's waiting and watching.

Watching for you and for me

Come home, come home

Ye who are weary, come home

Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling

Calling, oh, sinner come home.

Why should we tarry when Jesus is pleading?

Pleading for you and for me

Why should we linger and heed not His mercies?

Mercies for you and for me.

Come home, come home

Ye who are weary, come home

Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling

Calling, oh, sinner come home.

Oh, for that wonderful love He has promised

Promised for you and for me

Though we have sinned, He has mercy and pardon

Pardon for you and for me

Come home, come home

Ye who are weary, come home

Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling

Calling, oh, sinner come home

Calling oh, sinner come home

Good Friday

Somewhere out there is this guy who is looking to find images of the Stations of the Cross.

Not just any image, only one particular one - the Sixth Station.

He says that of all the 14 stations, it is at the Sixth Station where a person voluntarily steps out from the crowd to help.

It's an interesting point and I thought about it.  There were a lot of gawkers and followers on that final journey.  The women of Jerusalem just stood there and wailed.  Simon of Cyrene was co-opted to help Jesus carry the cross because the soldiers feared he won't make it alive to be crucified.

So indeed, Veronica was the only one who willingly came up to help.

And if there is anyone out there reading my posts, this is one guy who needs a hand.

https://www.facebook.com/ProjectSixthStation

Little Me

I looked up and realised how small I was.

A mere speck in the cosmos.

First Love

When I first took up photography and bought my first SLR, I headed to the park where I knew there would be countless opportunities to capture great shots.  There were plants and shrubs, little critters and fish.  The plants and flowers were cooperative enough.  The fish weren't.  And of all the other creatures there, the dragonfly was the most cooperative.  Left alone, they sit motionlessly on thin stalks over the lily pads, waiting for me to capture the right moment in the right light.

So today, I dedicate this photo to the first dragonfly which posed ever so patiently for me.  That dragonfly, long gone back to the Maker, was captured on 35mm film and lost somewhere in my multitude of photos.  But tucked away in my memory, is that day I spent in the park going through a few rolls of film before calling it a day.

It's the same with first loves.  We don't really remember the date or every single detail.  But we remember the moments.  And long after it is over, when the hair turns grey, we still remember.

We do not really forget because memories are what make our lives special.

I still remember.

Life Changes

Tidying up my hard disks and I find a photo of the peregrina.  It's a plant I have taken oany times before.  It's a flower I've featured many times before.

Except that these particular flowers have long since been gone.

This photo was taken in June 2006.

Each day of our lives, things change.  We are not the same person as we were two years ago, a year ago, yesterday.

Biologically, we are not the same.  Psychologically, we are not the same.  Emotionally, we are not the same.

Yet we expect everything to remain the same.

Life changes.  Move on.

Do You Want to Build a Snowman?

It's always summer in the tropics - sunshine, warm weather; and depending on where you end up - sea, surf and sand.

And so this winter, a certain young lady decides to spend some time at the beach; relaxing and reminiscing an afternoon spent with her sister watching Disney's Frozen.

And suddenly, she drew a picture in the sand and the two of them burst into song:

But sometimes I like to close my eyes and imagine what it’ll be like when summer does come.

Bees will buzz,

Kids will blow dandelion fuzz

And I’ll be doing whatever snow does in summer

A drink in my hand,

My snow up against the burning sand

Prob'ly getting gorgeously tanned in summer

I’ll finally see a summer breeze blow away a winter storm

And find out what happens to solid water when it gets warm

And I can’t wait to see

What my buddies all think of me

Just imagine how much cooler I’ll be in summer

Dah-dah, da-doo, a-bah-bah-bah bah-bah-boo

The hot and the cold are both so intense,

Put 'em together, it just makes sense!

Rrr-raht da-daht dah-dah-dah dah-dah-dah dah dah doo

Winter’s a good time to stay in and cuddle,

But put me in summer and I’ll be a...happy snowman!

When life gets rough, I like to hold on to my dream

Of relaxing in the summer sun, just lettin’ off steam

Oh, the sky will be blue,

And you guys will be there too

When I finally do what frozen things do in summer!

Such energy, such youth, such innocence!

End of Day

The end of day.  A time to let go the work, a time to focus on the family and the friends.

But we get caught up in the hustle and bustle of life.

We don't take time to watch the sun slowly sinking below the horizon.

Always in a rush to get things done.  We forget what life is really about.

The destination is the same.

It's the journey that counts.

The Parched Earth

Deprived of the rains for over a month now, my periwinkles are dying.

We thought we controlled the earth.  Let this be a reminder that we are guests of Mother Earth, not her lord and master.

The Parched Earth

Leaves bursting with thirst

suicidal descents

into the sands of oblivion below

the final searching

so much brown

green - a lost

bewildered orphan

disappearing children

crucified limbs

flesh torn

slowly from hanging skeletons

we journey through the desert.

Ben Gieske

Life is Fragile

Life is more fragile than we think.  In our younger days, we believe ourselves to be immortal; we look to our grandparents as being in an ancient world, relics.  We even consider our parents to be over the hill.

In our teenage years, we could for the life of us, fathom why our parents were so stubborn or so stupid not to understands the things that we were going through.  We thought of them as old-fashioned.

Then came a time when we experienced the loss of a friend, a family member, cut down before he or she reached the age of antiquity.  Then we realize the life is fragile, life is temporary, life is not to be taken for granted.

These past couple of weeks, no matter how close or how far we are from the MH370 incident, we are once again reminded of the frailty of our lives.

Before you turn in tonight, say a prayer for someone dear.  Call them tomorrow.  Better still, visit them.

You Only Live Once - Live it Well

An old photo from a time when youth and exuberance and a sense of adventure.  I have lived a life that might have made Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer proud. But looking back,there were moments of folly and stupidity which aged wisdom would now know but youthful inexperience would have just count as YOLO! 

Spring Time

It's that time of the year again when new life springs forth the earth.

Dogwoods at their best as they prepare to explode into the beauty we love.

Peace within

One of my all-time favorite photos.  Winter stream at Yosemite National Park.  Shot at a time when digital cameras were non-existent.

At a time when the world is in an uncertain and turbulent state, we need to find some semblance of peace within.

Spider Lily

gentle, fragile,

reaching out to the sky

catching the dewdrops passing by

white and majestic the spider lily stands

until winds howl, they bend

heads bowed low

spirit broken

A friend's father-in-law passes.  We are all connected, you and I, in ways we do not know and in ways we do not understand.

In ways we NEED not know or understand.

Tinklebells

Little tinklebells.

Swinging quietly in the morning breeze.

Eventide

It is the evening of another passing day.  

It is supposed to be a season of colors 

as new life springs forth from the womb of Mother Earth.

Yet the trees are bear and the earth still scorched.

Climate change is Mother Nature's way of telling us

that she is not well.

Are we listening?  Are we acting on the urgent pleas?

Colors on the Ceiling

Colors

Dancing on the ceiling

turning a promise into a rainbow

Colors

Splashing all my feelings

in a colorful coat, I just feel like singing

Color me, with the light of Your love, Lord

Shine in me, like the sun up above

so others can see

the colors in me

Let me be the colors of Your love.

Cactus

It's been scorching hot lately, 

so hot and dry that the cacti thought it was their time to show their colours.

Nature's gone berserk 

with the snows that fall when they should not be falling

with rains pouring when none should be pouring

when lands burnt dried and cracked when they should be soft and squishy

It's time to rethink our purpose on this planet

Little Purple Flowers

"The earth laughs in flowers."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Purple

I walked out I the summer
To behold at our backyard a wonder
Nature's beauty epitomized by a farmer
- My dad's garden of farmer

Amidst the calmness and quietness
I heard of all sounds, the quietest
I strained my ears to hear the sound again as in a forest
But restored again was the tranquil calmness

Ola Joseph Kolawole

Orange

 A  burst of orange flowers lie quietly in the corner of a garden.

Rising over stems of green, they flutter like orange butterflies in the late morning breeze.                                                                                                                                            

Each one, independent of the others; a part of a family.

The Sacrifice

Life would not be complete if one never makes a trip to the cemetery or columbarium.  Imagine where we would be if Siddhartha Gautama never learned about suffering and death.

So I took another trip to the War Cemetery.  To remind myself that there are so many things to be thankful for.

So many worthwhile memories I have had over the years.

So many people and things I have taken granted for.

There are so many young men and women here.  Gone before they could have given more in life.  But they have given; some in courage, some in vain.

There will be family and friends who still miss them after all these years.  They were taken before the family and friends could have a proper farewell.

Live each moment well.  They didn't know when their time would come to an end.  And honestly, neither do we.  Every moment alive is a moment we can choose - to curse, to swear, to grumble, to complain.

Or to celebrate.