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Big Basin: didjiman's version
Dec. 8th, 2009 03:39 pmhttp://didjiman.livejournal.com/449329.html
For someone who claims to have difficulty grokking trees, no less.
I'm not sure I necessarily agree with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
didjiman, particularly after reading the latest chapter in Eco's The Island of the Day Before, in which the protagonist tries to think about what it must be like to be a stone. Can a stone think? Can it observe the world around it? Have memories? Perceive other stones around it? Can a stone know the difference between being part of a cathedral vault or tumbling in an avalanche or melting into magma? Roberto tries to grok stone and fails. His flaw as a character is thinking too much and being bad at it.
A stone is not a person, nor is a tree. One does not have to put a tree at ease as one does with a human subject, or even an animal which may flee from you or move when you do not want it to.
"I think that I shall never see/A poem as lovely as a tree," is one of the lamest verses ever to gain popularity. At Big Basin, there is the usual cross section of a very old coastal redwood with various historic dates shown in relation to its tree rings, as well as a small indoor museum with displays about the trees, birds and other wildlife of the area. Science can describe a tree by genus and species, it can count tree rings and observe dna and measure height and diameter. These are all attempts to "grok trees" and they are nothing to the shadowy darkness, the smell of rot and life mingled, the soft "fur" of feathery green moss on a tree trunk that begs you to pet it, the quiet that isn't so quiet if you take a moment to listen.
Art is about subjective perception and photography is about seeing. It's about looking around and letting the subjective you take over and cry, "THAT!" and try to catch it with the tool in your hands so others might see and say, "Yes, THAT!" Yes, it helps if you have time to think about what you're doing, but sometimes you just have to point your camera and wait until you get home to see what you've got.
The trees owe no one their secrets.
For someone who claims to have difficulty grokking trees, no less.
I'm not sure I necessarily agree with
didjiman, particularly after reading the latest chapter in Eco's The Island of the Day Before, in which the protagonist tries to think about what it must be like to be a stone. Can a stone think? Can it observe the world around it? Have memories? Perceive other stones around it? Can a stone know the difference between being part of a cathedral vault or tumbling in an avalanche or melting into magma? Roberto tries to grok stone and fails. His flaw as a character is thinking too much and being bad at it. A stone is not a person, nor is a tree. One does not have to put a tree at ease as one does with a human subject, or even an animal which may flee from you or move when you do not want it to.
"I think that I shall never see/A poem as lovely as a tree," is one of the lamest verses ever to gain popularity. At Big Basin, there is the usual cross section of a very old coastal redwood with various historic dates shown in relation to its tree rings, as well as a small indoor museum with displays about the trees, birds and other wildlife of the area. Science can describe a tree by genus and species, it can count tree rings and observe dna and measure height and diameter. These are all attempts to "grok trees" and they are nothing to the shadowy darkness, the smell of rot and life mingled, the soft "fur" of feathery green moss on a tree trunk that begs you to pet it, the quiet that isn't so quiet if you take a moment to listen.
Art is about subjective perception and photography is about seeing. It's about looking around and letting the subjective you take over and cry, "THAT!" and try to catch it with the tool in your hands so others might see and say, "Yes, THAT!" Yes, it helps if you have time to think about what you're doing, but sometimes you just have to point your camera and wait until you get home to see what you've got.
The trees owe no one their secrets.
