#Earthschooling365: Day Fifty-Five
Inner Work Meditation (Heart): There are so many old pieces of wood and rotting trees I pass on my nature walk each day. They are not something one would usually look at or consider beautiful. However, paying a little more attention to these things has taught me that beauty comes in many different forms and that often surprises are hidden within that beauty. Today, take some time to meditate on something you think is ugly around you. Is it an unkempt garden? A broken pot? Old paint on the wall? Ripped wallpaper? An old shirt? Someone’s habit of cracking their knuckles? The new haircut you really didn’t want? Once you choose your item(s) try to find a way to make them beautiful or find the beauty within them.
Nature Walk Idea (Head): Today I enjoyed watching a little squirrel poking his head out from a hollow tree. I’ve seen him before playing in this tree but it really is so delightful to stop and watch him that I did it again today. And today he surprised me by doing something new. He stopped, scrunched down into the log and looked right at me as if he was posing. Today, your nature walk assignment is to explore all the old logs and dead trees you can find/see on your walk. What kind of life do they have in/on them? Are they homes to birds, squirrels or insects? Is a woodpecker using it as a food source? Are there snakes or beetles living under them on the ground? (only try this if you don’t have poisonous snakes in your area or if you know how to avoid them). Are they home to colonies of moss and lichens? Mushrooms? What kind of amazing worlds can you find in old logs and dead trees today?
Photography Notes (Hands): Today’s assignment is to photograph dead trees and logs. They may be alone or they may have animals, insects or plants growing on them. The goal of this assignment is multi-faceted. Taking pictures of simple logs you will learn to focus on the beauty of the texture and patterns within them and practice seeing that beauty around you. Taking photos of logs will also force you to pay great attention to lighting. Because they are a simple subject lighting becomes even more important with a log. You don’t have color, activity or amazing angles to “save” your bad lighting situation like can often be the case. It is also a lot harder to take a picture of a log than one might imagine. If the sun is shining directly on it it is hard to expose for the different shades of wood. If the log is in the shade it is hard to bring the texture and varied colors alive. Try different f-stops and ISOs. Try different angles and lighting. What amazing things can you do with logs today?
Verse: Ode to a Log
Copyright Kristie Burns
Timber your mysterious beauty awaits
Peel back wooden flesh to reveal
Highway for worker ants, cardinal beetle
While a woodpecker’s song resonates
Beneath your weather-scarred frame
Snake curled up cozy like a cinnamon roll
Where a warren of rabbits once dug a hole
Threatened by the campfire’s flame
You rest so tolerantly and wait
Never complaining of unwanted guests
Accepting each invasion of fate
Welcoming beasts and birds with their nests
While I so surely feel the weight
Of Mother Nature’s enduring tests
**The Petrarchan sonnet, perfected by the Italian poet Petrarch, divides the 14 lines into two sections: an eight-line stanza (octave) rhyming ABBAABBA, and a six-line stanza (sestet) rhyming CDCDCD or CDEEDE.
*These poems have been created for many purposes – from early childhood circle time verses to inspirational or expressive. They vary from day to day so you may find the way you use them or enjoy them also varies. If you would like to set these poems to music consider our tutorial: Creating Your Ow Waldorf Verses or Finding Your Inner Voice.
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What is #Earthschooling365?
This series takes you through an entire year of our nature walks and is part of our non-profit project #Earthschooling365 at www.Earthschooling.org. The photos and posts in this series are all copyrighted. Please do not share or re-print them. Instead, share the link to this blog with your friends.
Along the way I will be sharing our favorite photo of the day, an inner work meditation for the day, photography assignment/tip for the day, nature walk theme for the day and a short verse for circle time (children) or meditation (teens/adults). We invite you to “walk along with us” this year, take some time to use the inner work meditation, be inspired by the nature walk theme of the day and perhaps even start a photo series of your own. To join the community on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram please tag your photos #Earthschooling365. To receive these inspirations in your e-mail inbox daily please subscribe to our blog alerts HERE. Don’t worry about missing days – you can join us as many days as you want this year!
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