About the Author
It takes a lot of work being a perfectionist. For example, if you view the source
of this HTML you will see that is is quite small - but still it is terribly oversize and quite
inefficient, perhaps 50% waste. That bugs me. But I want to publish and get things done and to
not spend all my time editing HTML.
Use web editing tools you say. They are all horrible, striken with the desease of bloat and nested DIV syndrome.
But, by not actually being a good HTML designer I cheat sometimes. I use and AI to make a template of how I want
a page to look - AI is actually good at that, though they vary (more on that later) - I then clean it up by
deleting all the garbage it tends to have. Satisfaction not gauranteed but it is sufficient.
Growing up in a crazy household makes indelible marks - loneliness not the least of them. So images on
the TV was a saving grace. Film Noir most of all. Having and eye for good imagery made handling a camera
easy. It was also a lonely person's way of getting out and about. Although taking pictures of people
were not exactly my thing.
But I was no Ansel Adams. He traveled with his camera and gear always ready. I traveled back roads
and hiked in the woods. While the forest looked interesting to me, it looked less so to the camera.
But color and form on the ground sticks out amidst the blends of the forest, and kept attracting my gaze.
Eventually I turned my camera toward the ground. Flowers and mushrooms, were obvious choices for the camera.
So, when I came upon a stream I was already looking down, thinking of color and form.
Within the water I saw memories of childhood - larvae and tadpoles swimming above decaying leaves,
along and waterbugs on the surface, caught my eye. Then I noticed that with one eye closed the
water looked different.
But it was not the water that I was seeing. It was the water's surface.
And something more. Through one eye I saw the surface of the
water, the reflections on the water, and through to the
bottom of the water.
All at once I was seeing the sky and the trees, the wind as it buffeted the surface, and the myriad life
in the water and plants and debris of years of leaves on the murky bottom.
With one eye I saw more than I ever had.
See Pondscapes and Reflections
