Autumn In Berkeley

"There's something to walking with autumnal thoughts through the evening fog. One likes to compose poems at a time like that."

~Hermann Hesse

Grape leaves! Beautiful, glorious grape leaves! Berkeley, Tilden Park to be exact, has a lovely fence line filled with grape leaves. It is right between the small botanic garden and the Brazil House. It's stunning in October. It has every autumn color in one place. One quiet corner of the park that you would completely miss, if you weren't look for the autumn leaves. It makes me sad that folks could drive through the park and not see all that beauty, living peacefully, in that one magical spot. The best part though? They will be there again next October. And I will be there too, Camera in hand, overwhelming happiness in my heart. And some love too. How could anyone, not love this?

 Photographed October 9th 2019

Tilden Park Botanic Garden

Berkeley, California

 Autumn Leaf Of The Day...

#76 Leaf Of The Day

December 7th 2019

Sacramento, California

Nikon

~Mood: Happy
~Me   :)  

Autumn Reflections In Golden Gate Park

"Looking up, I observed one solitary leaf that remained

 on a spindly branch of an old oak tree. And as winter's frigid winds

 blew against it twisting it this way and that,

 I thought that it was either committed to holding on as long as it could or it was afraid to let go."

~Craig D. Lounsbrough

 It was a beautiful day at the duck pond, in Golden Gate Park, on October 23rd, and the leaves were falling almost constantly. They reminded me of a sky full of stars, but they also reminded me of soggy cereal. Mostly they were just so damn beautiful they made me smile! I really miss Golden Gate Park, we spent a lot of time there when we were in the Bay Area, and I don't think I realized how much it had really meant to me. I don't get to see it as often as I would like to, which makes it all the more special when I do visit I suppose. Lesson learned... never take the places you love for granted, life is very uncertain. I took these photos on Family Day, which means I got to make another wonderful memory, in a place I love, with the guy I love, and that's the best of all worlds.

#76 Leaf Of The Day

December 6th 2019

Grass Valley, California

Nikon

~Mood: Happy

~Me   :)

Black And White In Autumn

Autumn moon

Incantations in the dark river

Winter's ghost walks with covered face

And silver bones wait in all animals

To be bone cloth upon her shoulder

Wait for her happiness in that they are silvers

~Tamara Rendell

  Mystical Tides

I have been looking through my archives, as I usually do at the end of each year, looking for photos I may have passed on posting, or taking ones I did use with a specific thought in mind, and perhaps giving them new life by converting them to black and white or by adding a filter, to bring out a different emotion then when they were previously used or posted. It can be a lot of fun to remember the day I was out with the camera, and do a deeper emotional dive at how I feel about the same day, months later. It's funny how your memory can move a day around, either positively or negatively, once the pressure of actually being in that day is removed. As autumn turns to winter, thoughts change too. I like the leap into darkness, I always have, even though it spells the end of the outrageous color of autumn. The black and white of winter gives my eyes a chance to relax, and return to the almost exquisite pain of waiting for autumn to come back. It's good to have something to long for, something you know is waiting just out of fingertips reach. It encourages to heart to keep beating. There is a purpose to wait for. It's the best way I know to not fall for lies of loneliness.

 Leaf Of The Day

#74 Leaf of The Day

December 5th 2019

Berkeley, California

Nikon

~Mood: Happy

~Me   :)

 

I Love No Leafless Land

"Give me a land of boughs in leaf

A land of trees that stand;

Where trees are fallen there is grief;

I love no leafless land."

~S. E. Houseman

Autumn falls at my feet...

#73 Leaf Of The Day

December 4th 2019

Stockton, California

Nikon

~Mood: Quiet

~Me   :)

In Dreamful Autumn

Autumnal

~Ernest Dowson

The Poems and Prose Of Ernest Dowson

Pale amber sunlight falls across

The reddening October trees

That hardly sway before a breeze

As soft as a summer: summer's loss

Seems little, dear! On days like these

Let Misty autumn be our part!

The twilight of the year is sweet:

Where shadow and the darkness meet

Our love, a twilight of the heart

Eludes a little timer's deciet.

Are we not better and at home

In dreamful Autumn, we who deem

No harvest joy is worth a dream?

A little while and night shall come,

A little while, then, let us dream.

Beyond the pearled horizons lie

Winter and night: awaiting these

We garner this poor hour of ease,

Until love turn from us and die

Beneath the drear November trees. 

 #72 Leaf Of The Day

December 3rd 2019

Cull Canyon Park

Nikon

~Mood: Happy

~Me   :)

Autumn Cathedral

I stood in a clearing among a stand of beech trees, leaves as red as rubies, branches black as jet. It was sunset and shafts of richly colored sunlight struck through the delicate pillars of the tree trunks, as if through the lancet windows of a cathedral."

~Kate Forsyth

Bitter Greens

October leaves in every color of autumn. Honey, cinnamon, caramel, nutmeg, ginger, brown sugar, rum and brown butter. Delicious October, my favorite month of the year!

And Now...

#71 Leaf Of The Day

December 2nd 2019

Grass Valley, California

Nikon

~Mood: Happy

~Me   :)

There Really Is Something About Autumn...

 I am pretty sure I have used that quote in a previous post this year, but there really is something about Fall that makes me feel alive, but I have never been able to figure out what it is exactly. All I know is, my mood suddenly improves. I am a much more positive person over all and I think more clearly then in any time during the previous seasons of the year. It's like the first day of autumn each year is like New Years to my soul. I suppose if I haven't figured it out by now, I won't be in the future, so it will more than likely remain a mystery. Which is fine, but a part of me does wish I knew what it was, so I could have little moments during the rest of the year! But perhaps I am being greedy in wanting to take more than my fair share of the magic of a perfect autumn day.

#70 Leaf Of The Day

December 1st 2019

Nevada City, California

Nikon