yin and yang

there is something wise-seeming about an olive tree that is hundreds of years old. a friend who makes wine here recently transplanted two olive trees that were standing on the day, 500 years ago, when leonardo da vinci died. they are still here, gnarled and thick, listening to the sounds of traffic on the highway, and looking as if they understand all of the difficulty and sorrow of life. i thought that yin and yang, made of olive leaves, was maybe the correct symbol to acknowledge such calm in the face of the world.

olive leaves from our terrace: autignac, france

one beach five ways

every beach is different. our beach on the mediterranean looks like this. it looks nothing like the north shore of lake superior, or the gulf coast of florida, or the pacific beaches of northern california, nor the windswept beaches of brittany.  those aren’t the only beaches i’ve seen in my life, but they are the ones i have spent enough time with to claim a little piece of them for myself. along “our” beach, just outside of sète, you will not find kelp like california. nor sand dollars like florida. i have found striped rocks and hermit crab shells, and sand dollars, and agates, and sea glass, and coral on beaches. but on none, not one, of all my beaches have i ever found terracotta roof tiles tumbled into ‘rocks.’

beach collections from the plage de la baleine, in sète, france

first thought best thought?

this was my first effort with these twigs. in the end, i think i preferred my second effort, which i posted yesterday on STILL blog. but it may be simply because the second one took more effort. so i’m having a hard time being objective. anyway, the point of today’s post is that i only just barely preferred my second try, and would have been happy with this one, because it has an energy that goes along with the improvisation of its creation. there’s a loose, fun, vibrant spirit to this composition that yesterday’s does not have. even more fun, i think some of you will prefer yesterday’s and some of you today’s. and you’re all right.

lichen-covered twigs from agde, france

having a back-up frees me up

this was the second pattern i made with these beautiful golden lichen colored branches that i scavenged from the side of a french rural highway. i will post my first effort tomorrow. not to be boring, but to talk about how i work sometimes. i like to do a quick take of a subject (quick and dirty i call it), and know that i have that photo as a fallback. then i can try something fancier with less pressure, and let it be a failure if that’s the way it wants to be.

lichen-covered twigs from agde, france

la saison des champignons

these were harvested by my husband, if we’re going to be honest, from the market stall in front of the covered halles in sète this morning, while i sipped from a glass of late-morning rosé on the sunny cafe terrace next door, and waited for a platter of oysters and sea urchins to be delivered to our table. let me tell you. this blogging life in france is going to kill me.

cèpes (porcini)