a change of plans and planes

post #142
        It is now Sunday, 8 pm, and the adventure of the day is that I am stuck in the Detroit airport for several hours.  So the post I had planned will not happen in full today, but luckily there is always next week.  
         Instead I would love to share some photos I took yesterday during a happy time at the beach in La Jolla, California.  (We were there for a nephew's college graduation.)  I experimented with the sports setting on my camera, finally.  So much fun!  I didn't even have my polaroid filter with me, but hey, starting somewhere is better than not starting at all.  My granddaughter ran back and forth and back and forth on the hard sand, following the incoming waves, loving the running and loving the water.  The first photo shows our nephew with his first cousin once removed, who is on the move!

       I am still shy/reluctant about showing faces of most people I know, especially the very young ones, in a public forum.  I remain wary of privacy and digital intrusion.  I know, everyone does it, all the time, but that doesn't mean I am comfortable with it for myself.  In any case, I think the happiness shows in these photos, even without a frontal smile.   It does mean that my favorite photos from yesterday are not in this post.

      PART 2:  MONDAY ADD ON -- Part of what I had ready for this blog got lost when the airport wifi quit last night, so I quickly posted what I could.  Now I want to replace the California bit I had ready to go:
       On this trip, I was able to stay a few nights with a close college friend.  This fall she plans to try to take on a major conundrum.  Over a century ago, somehow, a lone redwood tree started to grow on a hillside north of San Francisco. This was a long time before the Golden Gate Bridge was built (see this fascinating history of the bridge) which was in the 1930s.  Today most of the houses in the area are close together and have been there a very long time.  But not as long as the tree!  Now the tree is tall, growing in between her house and the neighbor's.  The tree is member of the family, in so many ways, but it can't be guaranteed to behave well.

     Before seeing my photos, however, here is a poem to keep in mind, written by Jane Hirshfield, who now lives in the same town:
 
       Tree
 
It is foolish
to let a young redwood
grow next to a house.

Even in this
one lifetime,
you will have to choose.

That great calm being,
this clutter of soup pots and books --

Already the first branch-tips brush at the window.
Softly, calmly, immensity taps at your life.

     

 Now here are the photos I took one morning. 

the tree, the house

closer look, the bougainvillea

      

the rest of the tree, the roof

the tree's view to the east

        Any suggestions??  I guess this is another graduation of sorts!  Possibilities competing with the unknown.  And some inevitables thrown in for good measure.  Along with beauty.