Spiritual Archives - Page 9 of 13 - Retired in Costa Rica

November 28, 2020November 27, 2020

Forest Window

Not only does one create his/her own happiness but also the world in which you want to live. When I moved into this fairly new rent house it had the basic trees and shrubs but I immediately planted a garden and added other plants around the yard and that now big Cecropia tree that appears in so many of my photos.

Another one of those early plantings was a row of palms outside my two bedrooms to gain additional privacy from the street that my bedrooms face, howbeit down a steep hill through lots of other trees and flowers and my big Strangler Fig Tree. It was not only for additional privacy but for the feeling that I live in a forest as seen from any of my windows and doors. Yes – we can create our own world! That is what I was trying to show in an earlier post: My Windows – My World, and back then the above bedroom window feature photo was different with an indoor palm (at right). I have to change pot plants occasionally because this window gets minimal sunshine! 🙂

And because it also changes a lot, there’s another earlier post titled Kitchen Window View. I love being surrounded by nature, the main art in my house along with some of my nature photos.

“Nature is the art of God.”
—Dante Alighieri

*My Monstera deliciosa plant provides a good habitat for the birds in my photos! 🙂*

“Just remember life is all an illusion…..
it’s your creation and you can dismantle it and re-create at will.”
― Nanette Mathews

¡Pura Vida!

For more pix of my “forest house” see photo galleries: My Home Garden, or My Rent House in Roca Verde, or Vistas from My Terrace, or Vistas from Hill Above My House. Of course all of Costa Rica is my big backyard and I travel to all parts of the country about every other month in national forests, parks and reserves, so watch for reports on the blog and/or check out my big gallery where I have photos documenting more than 80 Costa Rica trips in the CR Trips sub-gallery! 🙂

¡Pura Vida!

Costa Rica offering all-expenses-paid vacations: How to enter

An article in Tico Times on how Canada and U.S. Citizens can win one of 15 free trips to Costa Rica for 2 people each. Just write a brief article or statement on an “Essential Person” to you during the pandemic. The 15 best will be published and you get the free trip! 🙂

November 26, 2020November 25, 2020

Sunrise Obliquely

Yeah . . . that’s sort of how I get it – every morning at breakfast – from a slanted, sideways view (obliquely) with the distant hills lit first, then part of the town and then it reaches my tiny patch of wildness. Kind of fun – makes me smile – and it’s a great way to start a day! 🙂

The feature photo is of sunrise over Atenas as seen from 105 Roca Verde yesterday morning. The sun is rising from behind a hill to my far right, thus not hitting me yet, but it soon will! 🙂 Our world can be magical!

My Vistas Gallery has lots of different kinds of sunrises & sunsets – all of which are fun! 🙂

“There’s a sunrise and a sunset every single day, and they’re absolutely free. Don’t miss so many of them.”
― Jo Walton

🙂

¡Pura Vida!

November 25, 2020November 24, 2020

Why I Make Photos . . .

“Practice any art . . . not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow.” ~Kurt Vonnegut

And that quote, I just found, describes exactly what I am doing with my photography, with this blog, and with me being “Retired in Costa Rica!” I am becoming, discovering and growing. Living in and focusing on nature is my idea of life now, “almost heaven.” 🙂

The feature photo of a Red-eyed Tree Frog in the hand of another nature explorer at Aguila de Osa Lodge, Drake Bay, is an example of what lights up my life! As is the frog on the cover of my latest photo book below, photographed with my simple cell phone at the Danta Corcovado Lodge, Los Patos Ranger Station, Corcovado National Park. Frogs are almost as dear to me as birds! 🙂

One of my most fun creations yet: Animal Faces.

My Photo Gallery

becoming, discovering and growing

¡Pura Vida!

November 18, 2020November 18, 2020

The Overcast Between Rains

This photo was made yesterday morning when for awhile the Hurricane Iota rains had stopped but the skies still overcast. The last hurricane (Eta) gave us 4 days of non-stop rain, so at least this one has given us a break in the rain, even if overcast! 🙂 And I even got to walk to town without opening my umbrella! 🙂 Tomorrow I will show these same hills in the sunshine from last Sunday’s walk.

Post Script: As of this morning, still very little rain compared to the identical sized hurricane on the same path, thus we are not getting as much rain from Iota as we did Eta. No two the same! 🙂

“Gray and overcast from my earthly perspective, but it’s sunny above these storm clouds. Grace lets us see life from God’s point of view.” ~Mark Hart

¡Pura Vida!

November 9, 2020November 9, 2020

Why I Deleted a Post

A post I wrote yesterday was scheduled to release at 4 am this morning and it did – for 30 minutes – then at 4:30 AM I woke up and felt compelled to delete it, meaning most of you who subscribe got an email linking you to “Whiffs of West Africa” and received an “Oops message” saying the post is not there.

I felt guilty that I was inflaming the few Trump supporters who still follow my blog, so at 4:30 AM I deleted the post that compared Trump to Yahya Jammeh, the Gambian despot who refused to step down when he lost the election and the featured photo showed him being escorted out by military troops.

Joe Biden has declared this “A TIME FOR HEALING” and I don’t want to make it more difficult for him. So I will honestly try to write no more anti-Trump posts and I hope you “other guys” will decide to work with Biden to bring America back together for peaceful progress as one nation, not two! And yes, the above flag photo is mine, photographed back in 2005 at the Everglades National Park Visitors Center. 🙂

E pluribus unum – Latin for “Out of many, one”

God Bless America!

P.S.

StoryCorp.org and Public Radio are trying to organize “One Small Step” where you can join them in getting people with opposite views or politics to simply talk to each other. Click the link to check it out and see if you want to participate. Sounds like a great idea Americans!

August 17, 2020August 17, 2020

As Night Falls

As Night Falls
By John Herlihy

Now the night is falling gently,
Shadows from the East intently.
The sun descends as a pale dome,
Sinking beyond the horizon to roam.
Taking the day without any comment
Stealing like a thief daytime’s moment.
Feelings in the heart may surge,
As the stars begin to emerge.
They awaken from deep slumber,
Gathering together in great number.
Muted sounds begin to be heard,
Footsteps and night whispers feared.
Lanterns alight a spark and a wink,
Illuminating the night blink-a-blink.
Smoke rises like threads in a loom,
Inscripting words that harbor doom.
The night begins itself to remember,
Tracing new memories fragile, tender.
All the nocturnal beings now awaken,
As day bids farewell to a world forsaken.
Distant mountains fade into darkness,
In the shadows, night eyes see lightness.
During the night, all the world simmers,
I embrace the night as my soul glimmers.

¡Pura Vida!

July 1, 2020July 1, 2020

A BLM Example in Nature

Today was my first “bird day” with what looks like will be around 40 species, but still not through processing nearly 2,000 photos! 🙂 So I will have to show the collection later and it looks like I could beat the 53 species I got here last year!

My interim post will be an interesting little oddity in nature. For whatever reason, the Giant Cowbird (a big blackbird) sometimes lay their eggs in the nest of the Montezuma Oropendola and the really good mother Oropendola hatches the egg and raises the child as her own (do the cowbirds know that?). I had heard about this but never seen it until today. At the rather ugly fruit feeder at the dining room I got this photo of a mother Oropendola feeding a juvenile (bigger than a baby) Giant Cowbird she evidently is raising it as her own child. Since the baby is in the blackbird family I somehow thought of the Black Lives Matter movement in the states and thought this might be considered a beautiful example in nature! Hope so! 🙂

Mother Montezuma Oropendola feeds a “baby” Giant Cowbird she is raising as her own child.

Love the world as your own self; then you can truly care for all things.
~Lao Tzu

And for you birders, I know it is a Giant Cowbird juvenile because he has red eyes, not obvious in my photo but in real life it is. No other blackbird has red eyes.

See my Costa Rica BIRDS Gallery for many more birds, though none from this trip are added yet.

¡Pura Vida!

June 23, 2020June 23, 2020

Breakfast Visitors

My favorite time in my house is during breakfast on my terrace when I usually have many visitors and sometimes try to photograph them, whether bird, butterfly or other creature. This morning I managed to grab shots of 4 after trying and failing to get shots of two tiny orange & black butterflies that flew as a pair and never lighted on a flower for me. Shooting them in flight is very difficult and I failed. Both these butterflies and birds are regular repeats for me, but each one is a unique individual! 🙂