Posted in from the dark room, photography on June 14, 2007| Leave a Comment »
rain on the mountain, originally uploaded by bobsee.
Here comes the rain! In the distance, over Ben Ledi, I can see the rainclouds, frayed at the edges, dropping the rain onto the earth below.
I love seeing the rain start to fall in the distance like this. It’s as if the clouds are showing they can have rays too, just like the sun.
Posted in from the dark room, life, photography on June 11, 2007| 2 Comments »
anvil cloud, originally uploaded by bobsee.
I just looked out of my window and couldn’t resist snapping this.
What a wonderful anvil shape. You know there is a whole organisation and a book dedicated to noticing clouds. You can see why!
Sometimes the best place for my head is in the clouds…..
Posted in from the dark room, health, life, photography on May 21, 2007| 2 Comments »
I think it’s good to know where you feel most relaxed, to know what helps you to feel good about life. We all need some time for ourselves. I often tell my patients that they should schedule into their busy diaries some time for themselves – not time to catch up on chores (well, you need that too probably!), not time to spend with your loved ones (yes, you DO need that too!), but time spent alone. It can be simply an hour one day a week (that’s better than no time at all) and it shouldn’t involve anything elaborate. A walk in the park, sitting watching the world go by for a wee while, listening to music, or reading, or just noticing your environment, really whatever works for you is good.
For each of us particular environments are most relaxing. Some of us prefer the seaside. For others, its a park.
This photo is taken in Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh – plenty of seats there!
Go on, try it. Schedule some YOU time!
seats in park, originally uploaded by bobsee.
Posted in from the dark room, health, life, photography on May 21, 2007| 1 Comment »
We are all different and we all find different ways to relax or wind down. One of my colleagues always asks her patients to tell her what’s their idea of a great holiday. The answer can reveal a lot about a person’s coping strategies. I think it’s important to know what makes you feel good, where you feel good, when you feel good. We often get fixated on our problems and one way to not get stuck with problems is to focus on possible solutions. The solutions come from what works for us, the places, times and situations that help us to feel good.
This boat (for many people a boat is a symbol of freedom) and the blue, blue sky, at the seaside represents a way of relaxing for many people.
Where do you go to relax?
What’s your favourite holiday?
boat and the sky, originally uploaded by bobsee.
Posted in from the dark room, from the living room, life, photography on May 21, 2007| 1 Comment »
There are 4 million CCTV surveillance cameras in the UK. But who is at the viewing end? This camera is at the Floral Clock in Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh (no clock there! Long since gone! Just a patch of earth…)
This poor man looks like he’s bored stone rigid! No wonder, this camera’s video feed must be worse than watching paint dry!
But seriously, we live in a command and control society. Who’s in command? Who wants the control?
surveillance, originally uploaded by bobsee.
Posted in from the dark room, life, photography on May 21, 2007| Leave a Comment »
Saturday, 19th May was an usual night in the sky. Venus and the waxing moon were only about a degree apart just after sunset. I looked out of my window and took this photo.
The following day I was browsing around Edinburgh and found myself outside the National Gallery on the Mound. On the spur of the moment I decide to have a look around. It’s a lovely building and I like many of the paintings there. Having browsed for a bit I went down to the gallery shop to see if they had any postcards of some of my favourite paintings there. Well, have a look and see what I found…….
This is “Francesca di Rimini” by Dyce. I don’t recall ever seeing this painting before but look at the sky! Yes! There it is! The exact same configuration of Venus and the Moon.
So what are the chances of that? I love these synchronicities in life. I can’t explain them but they do add to the pleasure and the wonder of life.
Posted in from the dark room, life, perception, photography on May 7, 2007| 2 Comments »
Harry Eyres’ column in the Weekend FT this weekend was about colour vs black and white photography. He was making the point that he had always preferred to work with black and white, but when he printed some old colour slides of his father’s he found the colour made the photographs much more emotional. This is an interesting observation and I think it happened for him because the slides were about family, specifically about his last holiday with his grandfather. Our visual memories always seem to be in colour, don’t they? So colour photos, personal colour photos, can much more powerfully reconnect us to strong, emotional memories.
I think colour memories also begin to produce largely subconscious general responses to particular colours. I read this article while waiting for a connecting flight to Edinburgh in Charles de Gaulle airport this morning. The amazing thing for me is that the particular colour photos Harry Eyres was writing about were taken around Tain and Dornoch, exactly where I spent a few days with friends at the end of the previous week. My friends are South African and commented on how the colours of the north of Scotland were so reminiscent of the colours of Africa for them – until we came across the gorse in bloom. That incredible yellow is utterly Scotland for me, especially next to blues and browns. Later in the year when the heather comes into bloom it’ll be the shades of purple which will do exactly the same for me.
So that got me thinking (surprised?)……
Posted in from the dark room, life, photography on April 23, 2007| 5 Comments »
From the window of my apartment I can see across to the hills. One hill in particular stands above the others – Ben Ledi. I got to thinking the other day about how things change, how everything constantly changes, but how if something changes slowly we think its staying the same. You know what I mean. A plant changes quickly, growing from a seed to a seedling and blossoming under the sun’s rays to show its petals to the world, then developing its fruit or its seeds and withering away again, in endlessly repeating cycles. But mountains, now, they change so slowly they look the same for hundreds or even thousands of years. Don’t they? But then, as I gazed out of my window across the fields at the light and the shadow on the hillside, I thought to myself, actually, Ben Ledi looks different every day. OK, the rocks probably don’t change very much, but Ben Ledi is more than its rocks. The Ben Ledi I see from my window is not just the rocks, the slope, the shape of the peak. It’s foliage, the colours, the light and shadow. When I look at Ben Ledi I see something different every day. Here are four (of many!) photos of Ben Ledi all taken from my window.
Ben Ledi just after a storm.
Ben Ledi with morning mist.
Ben Ledi covered in snow.
Ben Ledi in a winter setting sun.
If you like these Ben Ledi photos you can find more on my Flickr page here.
Posted in from the dark room, photography on April 15, 2007| Leave a Comment »
train table, originally uploaded by bobsee.
For over ten years now I have lived over an hour’s commuting time from my place of work. I love it. What I don’t do is drive! Well, sometimes I do, but only if I really have to. I take the train or I take a bus. I should point out that I live in Central Scotland so commuting for me USUALLY means getting a seat. I know in some places commuting by public transport doesn’t include sitting down!
What this gives me is at least two hours a day to myself. I don’t have to do anything. Just sit there and be chauffered by either a train driver or a bus driver. I take my ipod (I’ll blog about that separately!), notebook, book and maybe laptop. I can sit and think, write, listen to podcasts, music, read and reflect, use my laptop. Mostly I have a low-tech commute, drlnking a coffee, reading a newspaper or a book, or using my notebook to jot down ideas, make mindmaps, do a bit of planning.
My commuting time can be for working, for relaxing, for reflecting and for creating.
It’s a gift
Posted in from the dark room, photography on April 2, 2007| 1 Comment »
basketballseye view, originally uploaded by bobsee.
Now look at this photo. To take this photo I crouched down next to the kerb. How different the street looks when you change your perspective! In the first photo you might not even have spotted the ball, but now, it becomes the main subject, as if it says “This is my street. See how it looks from where I live” (OK, probably letting my imagination run away a bit with me there, but, hey, that’s what heroes do, they find ways to stimulate and develop their imaginations)
Heroes Not Zombies 