Thursday, September 09, 2010

The sea offers up orange


One of my favourite beaches, Aramoana - 'gateway to the sea' - is about half an hour's drive from my front door. I walk there often. Each time I go there, the ocean expresses a different side of her personality. Perhaps my perception is affected by whether I'm alone or with someone, what mood I'm in or who it is I might be walking with. Whatever it is, there's something about the ocean that has me imagining we're in conversation together; we take turns to reveal something new about each other each time we meet. 

Several months ago, I drew a circle in my diary around two weeks in September. Earlier in the year, my very dear old (though not so in age!) Cape Town friend, Nan, expressed a full-hearted wish to come to Dunedin. We agreed to hold the idea in light hands, since life is full and unpredictable, but I wanted to make sure that whatever happened, she and I would have an uncluttered, undistracted time together should she go ahead and decide to buy an air ticket. Well, she did! She's here! Sharing time, space and new/old friendships with her in this place I love is deep joy.

Yesterday, we went for a walk out at Aramoana (Nan in the bright orange windproof jacket her daughter bought her specially for this trip). 


It was a moody day; the sea, not exactly tempestuous so much as agitated, as though she's doing what she must to shake off the energy of Saturday's earthquake (there was another unnervingly big jolt - 5.6 - yesterday morning)...


I really don't know what we can do over distance to be of practical help to our friends up in Christchurch but one of my strongest impulses is to turn to the Earth, not away from her. It seems to me that times like these call us to more nurture - to nurture more. Each other. And the Earth. Perhaps if we all put our hands into her soil, dig and plant and express our appreciation of her, she - mother earth - will feel affirmed, valued, tended. Perhaps it will help her settle back down? When someone we love - brother, sister, friend, child, parent - is in the grip of trauma or a violent seizure, is not our instinct is to hold them, to stroke their forehead, to speak soothing, loving words to them? We want to be in physical contact, to reassure them this too will pass, that everything will be alright, calm will be restored? Apparently the plants Rue and Witch Hazel have healing properties that would nourish both the planter and the 'plantee'? (Rue is considered an effective antispasmodic; Witch Hazel helps with bleeding and reduces swelling in knotty veins.) I don't know... am thinking aloud here. 

The passage down to the beach has elements of a birth canal... a walk over tussock-covered dunes, through a narrow gap then out onto a whole other landscape. As if she knew a lovely woman in  an orange jacket would be visiting her for the first time that day, the sea offered up a collection of beautiful orange treasures. . .     






On our way back to the car, the sea's signature - also in orange. . . kelp script, written casually onto the flank of a dune.




~~~ I'm sorry I've not left many comments on your blogs over the past few days. I've been reading your posts - your wonderful, enlivening posts - but I just haven't had a lot of words to put out. Thanks for popping in here. Your presence means a lot. I'll be out and about more soon. xx ~~~

23 comments:

  1. What pleasure there is in introducing loved ones and loved places . . . now they know.xx

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  2. the photos of kelp are beautifully done, claire...and what a tribute to a special friend.

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  3. What a lovely blog. Glorious photos. A calming influence in a turbulent time.
    Harvey

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  4. I know a little of what color means to you, Claire, how it beckons, fills, makes one rejoice. You've told, in words and photos, a wonderful story by showing us what you see and what and who you love. It turns out to be a relay race--you offer to us what the sea offered you, and we take it and turn with full hands to someone near. Wonderful, bracing stuff.

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  5. Beautiful photos, beautifully expressed thoughts, Claire. Have a wonderful time with your friend. My heart goes out to our friends in Christchurch and the broader Selwyn district. I can imagine how terrifying this ongoing nightmare must be and I send my love and thoughts to them.

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  6. As always, I'm delighted to see a new post here, Claire! How lucky you are to have to seaside a half-hour from your door.

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  7. Ah, Mother Earth. The ancient Greeks link her to Fury.

    Thanks for photos of soft edges.

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  8. I adore these photos they make me feel at home. I love to step on the fat bulbs and make them pop :)

    oxr

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  9. The final photo is sublime, its natural composition an almost readable glyph. If we do not carry the power to restore peace to our shaking planet, even to think of it spreads tranquility. And what beauty in sharing our treasured, even sacred, spaces with kindred spirits. A small holiday for all who visit here.

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  10. what wonderful images that the agitated sea left for you...
    I've never believed that speaking nicely, lovingly to nature will help at all, though I do think we should stop destroying her in all the ways we do...but that destruction has nothing to do with the earthquakes...
    thank you for the images, I'm glad your friend visited!

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  11. The orange script of kelp, and your responses to the earthquake in Christchurch bring back childhood memories of living there. In Christchurch I began to learn to write. We lived on the airport (near the present Antarctic Ceentre) and I dug a hole to England!

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  12. Hmmm ... I agree with Melissa that human impacts on the planet have nothing to do with earthquakes. But I love the images that you bring us from the sea. They connect us to each other and remind us that we are part of the earth (earthquakes and all).


    xx

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  13. Hi Pen - these introductions are a welcome pleasure, yes.

    Hello Susan - thank you. Kelp is inherently photogenic, though; it can't help itself! I love the way it drapes itself so elegantly on the sand. Yesterday's kelp conjured images of a sea goddess and her sisters who'd tossed their tresses onto the beach. (How many women, in a fit of pique or reactivity, have gone off and cut their hair off? Or men, shaved off their beards?).

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  14. Dear Harvey - thank you. We need balm with all the disruption and disturbance, don't we... I found your recent post on Stoatspring - Guilt - very moving and could identify with all you said. These are not 'ordinary' times. It seems to be that whatever comes up in terms of response is understandable - a sense of loss in the aftermath of the quake, especially. Go gently, Harvey. I send warm greetings to you and Anne.

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  15. Dear VesperSparrow, you do know how much colour means to me. I love the idea of our shared stories being something like a relay, so that what each of us sees, discovers, grieves or celebrates, is passed around. Open hands, open hearts. Thank you.

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  16. Dear Carol - thank you. I have no doubt your loving thoughts for friends in Christchurch will be very reassuring to them and making a difference. Like you, my heart goes out to them. Love, Claire.

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  17. T., hello... yes, I am very fortunate Aramoana beach is just a half hour away. Whilst walking there with Nan, I thought of you over in Ireland and was reminded of Seamus Heaney's poem 'The Peninsula' in which he writes '. . . The sea is the land's edge also... '

    No matter where we are in the world, we're not all that far apart, really, are we? Such good, good news about your son, T. Enjoy your trails on Achill Island. L, C

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  18. Mim and Rebecca - glad to know the soft-edged images please you and make you feel at home...

    Yesterday's beads/bulbs/pods were SO big and FAT, Rebecca... bigger and fatter than any I've seen for a long time.

    I can see you running along the beach playing the kelp like a percussion instrument. (You would so love our beaches.)

    L, C

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  19. Dear Marylinn - these special places are indeed 'sacred groves'. It is a joy to be able to share them. Welcome. x

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  20. PS. Marylinn - I agree, tranquil thoughts help spread tranquility - during tremulous times, especially.

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  21. Dear Melissa - I agree we can't change the way our earth behaves; all we can do is choose how we respond to her... It can be very difficult to conjure loving, trusting, gentle feelings when life's in disarray and we're seized by fear, that's for sure. Walking beaches won't give us answers but is nevertheless grounding. (We have in common a love for walking with a camera in our pocket... ; )).

    PS. I've been finding Blogger's new font formatting tricky, too.

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  22. Dear Lisa - lovely to meet you as A Young Girl on Rollerskates! (I had a pair just like yours when I was growing up in Africa...).

    I didn't realize you once lived in Christchurch - no wonder you have such empathy towards its people and for NZ in gen. Thank you. x

    re; what you say about ways of connecting. We - our various countries and cultures around the globe - have so much more to link us than divide us. This is a thought I find deeply sobering.

    It's always a treat to find you've been here, Lisa - thank you ; ) x

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  23. Beautiful, Claire.
    I love the idea of nurturing the earth - especially after such traumatic events and shakings. A new way of thinking of her, to embrace her in such times and not be angered. She is as much of an entity as we are and when our core's shake don't we all need an embrace? A lovely thought. thanks.
    xo
    Rachel

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