I had always converted this image to a black and white. It just seemed to lend itself to that. It just invoked a sad look which is how this old tree made me feel.

An acquaintance of mine stopped me and told of how she always liked this image, it made her happy. I had to inquire as to how she felt happiness looking at an image of a dead tree. She told me that she had grown up in the town (Coyonosa TX) near the tree. There once was an old store next to the then living green leafed tree, offering perhaps the best nearby shade. Her and friends would buy their iced down Nehi’s and a box of Sugar Baby’s. Rest in the life that simply could not be any better!

Drink ’em if you got ’em, in the shade if you can.

 

“Photographs open doors to the past but they also allow a look into the future”                                                                                                                                  Sally Mann

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Oh how we say time flies, but then there are those days that just seem to stay frozen in time. It was just about two years ago that I had to put my good friend down. I still feel a little lost without him. I miss his fierce protection of all under my roof. I miss his smell. Probably only true dog folks can follow that, but every dog I have owned had their own distinctive smell along with their own pedigree of personality:

Samantha (the sweetest), Pork Chop (the happiest), Midnight (a troubled black lab I could never quite follow), Clovis (the only dog we ever paid for, unconditionally the smartest and who was so tight with his pack) and then comes Grace (our blue-eyed deaf rescue found abandoned at a West Texas railroad station and who is now my only four-legged shadow).

I have loved each of them greatly and differently. Each one has brought me their lifetime of joy and buckets of tears upon leaving. Clovis was my poser dog. Whenever I got out my Nikon, he was quick to notice and quicker to upstage anyone and anything.

Since I lost Clovis, I have not, with any degree of seriousness, picked up a camera. He just took that out of me. I have tried to shoot at some images, but every time I pick up a camera I hear his tags a jingle, a bump on the leg wanting to know where he should pose. My heart goes adrift and the camera back in the backpack.

I am a sentimental old coot and damn but I miss them all and can pull up many a tearful memory. I have to ask, how can a dog steal my vision? Hey, if they can steal your heart, vision is pretty much a simple task.

Get busy living or get busy dying!…”Red”…aka S. King

Peace Out,   jasL

Shades of Gray from Grayson Co, TX #807 – A nice greeting

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It was a pleasant change to travel back to West Texas. We did enjoy the great sky vistas and the dry heat was nice for a change.

But as Dorothy so wisely repeated, “There is no place like home …”

We know few people here at our new digs, but I have never lived at a place that just feels so quickly and warmly like home.

Our evening walk was heralded by this lovely swallow-tail roosting for the night in our back yard. I wasn’t sure if he was there to just rest, or to welcome us home. I will take the latter thank you so much.

There is no place like home wherever it may be…†…monos en  theos   jim

IMAGES OF SMALL THINGS FROM THE BIGGEST COUNTY IN TEXAS #686 -THE LONGING FOR HOME!

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We have been keeping a friend’s dog while they took a little vacation.

I have not had the pleasure of being with a Jack Russell before. While Ditto has been a fairly good visitor ( other than a couple territory battles with our cats) we are not a total replacement for her masters. At times I feel and see this sense of longing and wondering as to where has my master gone.

Dogs are as much a kin to us as they are different.

No matter where you are there is no place like home.

enjoy where you are ††† en theos ††† jim

Photo of Da day @ Da Pine #310

This Yellow-crowned Night-Heron greeted me and the morning sun just like most of us, with a yawn.

Unlike other “night herons” it is active during the day as well as the night. That being said, most of them I saw during the day at Bosque Del Apache were sleeping very soundly.

The Yellow Crowned variety will usually nest in colonies with their homes being constructed on a platform of sticks in trees or shrubs. Once these birds find a nice place to live, they usually keep the nest for quite a while, some nesting sites being used repeatedly for over 20 years.

The Yellow-Crowned Night Heron was hunted during the 18 and 1900′s since their feathers were popular amongst humans.  The hunting has ceased but now we destroy their habitat. You know those homes they stay in for 20 years…well, they are getting destroyed. Luckily, the population of these handsome birds are mostly stable but who knows how long that will last if we continue to move into their habitats.

Stay alert on your perch on your journey, you never know who else might like where you are†††nada te turbe†††jim