The beauty follows you in a natural and un-assumed way that brings calm and peace to one's mind and spirit.

There is an elegant attention to balance and landscape design that gives nature the space to offer us a sense of homestead.

While inside in a comfortable and spacious meeting room, large windows keep the sense of nature present anywhere.

As we walked about we noticed the way in which the landscape offered picture after picture for our enjoyment.

Cattle grazed as we walked  along the country road adding a sense of partnership between all creatures.

I did stuck my tong out back at him but it didn't matter to either one of us!!!!

It is harder than one thinks to be able to take pictures of horses without them having their heads down on the ground grazing.

Now and then there were spots along the road that let us look out from the top of the mountain and see for miles all

around us and in the far distance.  I found those rocks to be perfect places to sit and meditate of contemplate!

By the time we returned to the cabin the Sun treated us to a beautiful sunset that took us into the night with our hearts

full of love, calm, and joy.  What a wise choice to bring one of the most precious issues to fruition in such an inspiring place.

When I got up in the morning I was treated to a beautiful surprise...  It was raining.  When I am out in nature and the rain comes down I always feel great inside.  I never was able to figure out why I reacted this way, when most people love sunny days.  It was about a year ago while writing my book that I came across some child time memories that brought it all up.  Now I love stormy weather unconditionally because I know why. 

In my book  --  still in its developing stages  --  "Naked Comes the Bastard" tells the story of an immigrant who from the first year of his life till today still is learning the nature of humanity through his direct experiences.

When it rains, colors gain saturation, smells are fresh, and the air feels crisp and clean.  The drumming of the rain drops create  a hypnotic effect on me that induces a propensity to  the release of creative thoughts in an abundant flow.  I felt that my muse was offering me something special.  As with all phenomena that does not manifest in the solid form of matter or in any other visible form, we eventually must either discard it or create it in a way we can relate to it in an human fashion.  All believes lead to this event in some way or another including religious ones.  So, I have chosen to give my muse a voice, a fragrance, a look, and an energy that allows my intuitive self the freedom to open to her completely and let her show me what I am to create.

This morning  I  accepted the rain as a gift from her.  Julia told me to go take pictures and just let the day lead me into its purpose.

What normally is just a dusty parking lot, becomes a rich and saturated color display of hues and reflections.

By keeping the windshield wipers turned off, the rain eventually wets the whole windshield and creates a distortion that reminds me of a form of impressionism a bit like the works of Van Gogh  in some fashion.  It is a titillation to our sense of reality and this image reflects that feeling of reality.  And yet...

This morning I found myself capturing the rain not by trying to capture falling drops of water from the sky, but rather by focusing on the signature of its passage.

The silverish   --  if that is a word  --  texture lends a feeling of organic metal to the surface of the  water puddle, while in the distance it creates a softness and haze that contrasts with the graphic hardness of the water's surface in the puddle.

Sometimes I like to look for faces in shapes and forms in nature.  This time what could be a seal, a mouse, a cat, or any other whimsical character that we may choose to relate to the arrangement of waves on the water's surface in the puddle, got captured at exactly the right moment.  No!  I was not that fast at pushing the shutter or recognizing the moment.  I hardly believe that such is possible.  What I did was to shoot a lot of these pictures of ripples with the highest quality and largest file size available in my digital cameras, and at the slowest ISO for finest grain.  Later at the computer, I go through a study of what I got.  This time I got a rally good one!!  Because of my settings I was able to crop the image to give full value to the "face" and still have sufficient quality to make it usable.

Then I went on the quest for water drops that remained in the drop form after they fell from the sky.  And some laid...

...others hanged from wire fences...

... others did both in the most beautiful way.  It was as if I was seeing jewels growing right in front of my eyes...

... while others created entire families of all sizes.  Some on top of the branch, others under, some big some small, yet all in perfect harmony. 

What otherwise would be just a leaf becomes a striking image full of color and life waiting for a photographer to notice it.

... and my muse continues to show me some of her beautiful creations in her infinite garden of love and wander.

... The journey went on until the whole place became a symphonic crescendo of color, shapes, and sounds performing dance after dance reaching to a summit of pure ecstasy.

When I returned to the center sometime later at lunch time, as I came up to the door I noticed a happy umbrella smiling at me for reasons that are anyone's guess.  To me however it represents the secret relationship between my muse and my spirit.

At lunch I visited with several of the many inspiring members of the committee and had a great time.  Then, toward the end of the meal, I had sometime to myself.  Quietly, I thanked my beautiful muse and said more in a form of an observation than a request: "It has been a long time since I have had a chance to take pictures in the fog"

The thought came and went.  I returned to the table and picked up on the conversation that was going on about various aspects of issues that had to do with the work in progress regarding the purpose to the convention.  I admired the sincere dedication with which all the teachers expressed their points of view about  issues at hand.  I felt privileged for being in the presence of such excellent group of professionals.

Soon was time to go back to work!  ...and wouldn't you know!  Fog was coming in and I felt like a kid at Christmas with free run in a toy store!!!!!

I wasted no time and went out into the fog and just let my generous musa show me the way.  It was so calm, so peaceful, so magical. 

When I walk in a foggy day, I feel like all the secrets of the universe  are right in front of me, they all hide just a few feet past the last thing I can see.  I feel like if I just take a few more steps forward, the whole universe will reveal itself to me.  But in the end the only magical revelation is that of my muse and I know that the journey has never started and will never end.  It is an eternal dance of creation, evolving from one manifestation into the next.  Again and again  cycles go on and on... always the same and always different: like an infinitely long necklace where we are the string that holds meaning and order to the experiences we have harvested from chaos. 

Life is like a foggy day.  It is by going forward that we discover the nest experience on our path..

...and as we move forward, behind us the experiences we have had go back into the fog from where they once came from.  All is temporary here and all is eternal in the fog.

...Just as this very defined and clear horse's face appeared from the fog and returned to it after I left...

...For a while we existed in each others reality but eventually we no longer will see each other. Yet, in the fog as a home all is present always, including everyone's dreams and hopes.