Desert Walking – A Meditation

Desert Mountain Trail

Desert Mountain Trail ©2012 Bo Mackison

Every soul innately yearns for stillness, for a space, for a garden where we can till, sow, reap, and rest, and by doing so come to a deeper sense of self and our place in the Universe. Silence is not an absence but a presence. Not an emptiness by a repletion. A filling up. ~ Anne LeClaire

When I want to do deep thinking, ponder the questions that, as of yet, have no answer, I head to the desert, walk one of the trails through this bountiful wilderness. I do some of my most productive thinking here, walking the desert path. Alone. In this deep stillness, the only sounds are far off – coyote in song.

Trail in the Sonoran

Trail in the Sonoran ©2012 Bo Mackison

The desert is my garden; it is where I till, sow, reap, and rest. I walk the paths carved around the desert plants, trees, climb in and out of washes, struggle with the changes in elevation.

Ideas come out in plain view for consideration. I dissect my goals into tiny seeds, doable baby steps. Plans ripen, lead to commitment to action.

Desert Tree

Desert Tree ©2012 Bo Mackison

My gratitude for the life I lead is huge. I speak to the desert, and so I, too, speak to the Universe. My list of gratitudes — people, places, events, things — is long. I give thanks, I cry at the wealth in my world, I sing a song of thankfulness, while wondering if the coyotes hear my off tune melody.

Nurse Tree to Young Saguaro

Nurse Tree to Young Saguaro ©2012 Bo Mackison

In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks. ~ John Muir

When I walk with nature, my world expands, I see where I stand in my life’s journey. I stand upon the Mother Earth, grounded, and feel connected to a greater plan for the greater good.

Saguaros

Saguaro Forest ©2012 Bo Mackison

 To be alive, to be able to see, to walk, to have a place to live, music, art — it is all a miracle. I have adopted the technique of living life miracle to miracle. ~ Arthur Rubenstein

Tucson Mountain Park

Tucson Mountain Park © 2012 Bo Mackison

Our way is not soft grass, it is a mountain path with lots of rocks. But it goes upward, forward, toward the sun. ~ Ruth Westheimer

Couple of Cactus

Couple of Cactus © 2012 Bo Mackison

I speak to the tall saguaro – tell of my plans, my hopes, my fears. I ask for courage and patience and understanding. The desert responds in its steadfast stillness, yet answers and awareness boomerang towards me on rays of sunlight.

Desert Moon at Sunrise

Desert Moon at Sunrise ©2012 Bo Mackison

If you look for the truth outside yourself,
it gets farther and farther away.
Today, walking alone, I meet it everywhere I step.
It is the same as me, yet I am not it.
Only if you understand it in this way
Will you merge with the way things are.
~ Tung-Shan

Strength. Courage. Understanding – all desert teachings, all are gifts from the desert.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Bo walks the deserts in Arizona, and pays attention.

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The Gifts of Generosity – Sunday Series

Threshing ©2012 Bo Mackison

Generosity in working together to provide food.

Whitewashing the Fence ©2012 Bo Mackison

Generosity in working together to provide beauty and fun, memories in the making.

Gathering © 2012 Bo Mackison

Generosity in working together to make clothing and quilts for comfort and warmth.

Gardening at Koepsell’s Heirloom Farm © 2012 Bo Mackison

Generosity in working, growing food for the community.

Generosity — sharing talents for the betterment of self and community.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Photographs are from Old World Wisconsin, an outdoor museum of history. Eagle Wisconsin.

Harvest at the Farmers Market – A Sunday Series

Peppers of All Kinds at the Dane County Farmers Market

Peppers of All Kinds © 2012 Bo Mackison

“As autumn returns to earth’s northern hemisphere,
and day and night are briefly,
but perfectly,
balanced at the equinox,
may we remember anew how fragile life is —-
human life, surely,
but also the lives of all other creatures,
trees and plants,
waters and winds. (cont.)

Heirloom Tomatoes

Heirloom Tomatoes © 2012 Bo Mackison

May we make wise choices in how and what we harvest,
may earth’s weather turn kinder,
may there be enough food for all creatures,
may the diminishing light in our daytime skies
be met by an increasing compassion and tolerance
in our hearts.” ~ Kathleen Jenks

White Mushrooms

White Mushrooms © 2012 Bo Mackison

Shall I not have intelligence with the earth?
Am I not partly leaves and vegetable mould myself.
~ Henry David Thoreau

Many Colors of Peppers

Many Peppers © 2012 Bo Mackison

“I trust in Nature for the stable laws of beauty and utility.
Spring shall plant and Autumn garner to the ends of time.”
~ Robert Browning

Cartons of Tomatoes

Cartons of Tomatoes © 2012 Bo Mackison

It’s difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato.
~ Lewis Grizzard

Bunches and Bunches of Radishes

Bunches of Radishes © 2012 Bo Mackison

“The trouble with simple living is that, though it can be joyful, rich, and creative, it isn’t simple.”
~ Doris Janzen Longacre

What better way to say goodbye to summer and hello to autumn than to stroll around the Farmers’ Market, gathering peppers and potatoes, pumpkins and squash in our string bags, tucking bags of squeaky cheese curds and a jar of freshly pickled relish in our pockets, greeting the farmers we’ve been visiting all summer while they tell us of tonight’s weather prediction – a hard frost in the low lying regions.

We bought a huge bunch of flowers after we heard the forecast for a hard freeze. If it gets that cold, there will be no more fresh flowers at any of the vendors’ stalls next week.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She is celebrating the autumn equinox by giving thanks for the bountiful harvest and setting her table with a bouquet of some of the last garden flowers of the year.

Walking the Tallgrass Prairie – Sunday Series

Sunny

Prairie Rosinweed © 2012 Bo Mackison

The disappearance of a major natural unit of vegetation from the face of the earth is an event worthy of causing pause and consideration by any nation.  Yet so gradually has the prairie been conquered by the breaking plow, the tractor, and the overcrowded herds of man…that scant attention has been given to the significance of this endless grassland or the course of its destruction.  Civilized man is destroying a masterpiece of nature without recording for posterity that which he has destroyed.  ~  John Ernest Weaver, North American Prairie (1954)

Tall Grass Prairie

Little Bluestem in Tallgrass Prairie © 2012 Bo Mackison

I like to think of landscape not as a fixed placed but as a path that is unwinding before my eyes, under my feet. ~ Gretel Ehrlich

Autumn Macro

Autumn Macro of Wings and Leaves © 2012 Bo Mackison

. . . the joy of prairie lies in its subtlety.  It is so easy—too easy—to be swept away by mountain and ocean vistas.  A prairie, on the other hand, requests the favor of your closer attention.  It does not divulge itself to mere passersby.   ~ Suzanne Winckler (2004, Prairie: A North American Guide)

Prairie Rosinweed © 2012 Bo Mackison

Prairie Rosinweed © 2012 Bo Mackison

. . . there don’t seem to be words, let alone colors, to do justice to the land and sky-scape that surrounds me . . . as empty as this place can seem, a person might never weary of looking at the land and sky.  ~ Kathleen Norris, Introduction to On the Plains (1999)

Tall Grass Prairie - Seedheads

Achenes and Wings of the Autumn Rosinweed © 2012 Bo Mackison

The sea, the woods, the mountains, all suffer in comparison with the prairie. . . The prairie has a stronger hold upon the senses.  Its sublimity arises from its unbounded extent, its barren monotony and desolation, its still, unmoved, calm, stern, almost self-confident grandeur, its strange power of deception, its want of echo, and, in fine, its power of throwing a man back upon himself. ~ Albert Pike (1831-32, Journeys in the Prairie)

Eight Foot Tall - Sunflowers in the Tallgrass Prairie

Prairie Cup-Plant © 2012 Bo Mackison

A world of grass and flowers stretched around me, rising and falling in gentle undulations, as if an enchanter had struck the ocean swell, and it was at rest forever. . .   ~ Eliza Steele, Summer Journey in the West (1840)

Bluestem Grasses in Tallgrass Prairie

Autumn Macro of Little Bluestem © 2012 Bo Mackison

“Grasslands challenge our senses, calling us to open our eyes to impossibly broad horizons and then, in the very next breath, to focus on some impossibly tiny critter hidden in the grass.” ~ James R. Page, Wild Prairie: A Photographer’s Personal Journey (2005)

Looking Above my Head

Above my Head in the Prairie © 2012 Bo Mackison

 It seems to be a constant contradiction of itself.  It is delicate, yet resilient; it appears to be simple, but closer inspection indicates that it is extremely complex; it may appear monotonous, but it is diverse and ever-changing throughout the seasons. ~ James Stubbendieck (1988)

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Today I offer you a few photographs of the prairie combined with quotations that describe the prairie in America’s Midwest throughout its recent (200 year) history with man. There isn’t much prairie left to see, but whenever I walk in a remnant, I feel awed by the possibility of a prairie that goes as far as the eye can see. More to come . . .

Traditional Fish Boil – Sunday Series

Traditional Fish Boil - Begin with Potatoes

Begin with Potatoes ©2012 Bo Mackison

A visit to Door County is hardly complete until one experiences a Door County Fish Boil, a Scandinavian tradition. Now the Fish Boil is a tourist attraction, but in the 1800s it was the most expedient and cheapest way to feed the masses of fisherman and other workers in a sparsely populated area.

Traditional Fish Boil - Lake Michigan Whitefish

Lake Michigan Whitefish ©2012 Bo Mackison

It is cooking at its simplest. Outdoors over a log fire. A huge black kettle. Plenty of salt water. Basic ingredients – potatoes, onions, and Lake Michigan Whitefish. Tradition has given way to modern convenience in one way – the stainless steel inserts  often come from recycled washing machines. The Whitefish is only hours from Lake Michigan. Three or four steaks are cut from each fish, and fileted by machine.

Traditional Fish Boil - Checking the Progress

Checking the Progress ©2012 Bo Mackison

Potatoes go in almost whole. The ends are cut to allow the salt water to flavor the whole potato. Next the fish boil master adds the onions. And then he adds the whitefish last.

Traditional Fish Boil - Adding a Little Salt

Adding a Little Salt ©2012 Bo Mackison

He adds a huge scoop of salt. This is salt water cooking!

Traditional Fish Boil - Hard to Wait!

Hard to Wait! ©2012 Bo Mackison

And then the wait is on. All the diners circle around the cooking area, all with cameras in hand. The littler kids squeeze up front for a good view. These little guys, brothers who wer 5 and 2, kept chanting. “Hurry up! Hurry up!” Ten minutes is a long time to wait when you’re a little kid (or an adult for that matter) and you’re waiting not only for dinner, but for the fish boil master to yell “boil over!”

Traditional Fish Boil - Regulating the Boil

Regulating the Boil ©2012 Bo Mackison

The fish boil master regulates the fire and the cooking temperatures by kicking away logs. Logs standing on end keep the fire burning intensely. Logs kicked to the side allows heat to escape and reduces the heat.

Traditional Fish Boil - Adding Kerosene to Fire

Adding Kerosene to Fire ©2012 Bo Mackison

When the fish and accompaniments are fully cooked, kerosene is added to the flames. This cause a flash of fire, the water boils over the pot, and the excess oils from the fish wash over the pot.

Traditional Fish Boil - Boil Over

Boil Over ©2012 Bo Mackison

The fish pot is then lifted by two men with long poles, and delivered to the kitchen where dinner is quickly put on plates and served. The clean plate award is a slice of cherry pie. That’s another Door County tradition, courtesy of the many orchards on Door County. Its geographic position, a peninsula stretching into the waters of Lake Michigan, keeps the county more temperate than the rest of Wisconsin, so apple and cherry orchards are plentiful.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC.  She took this series of photos while on a weekend trip to Door County this summer. Bo has been to many a fish boil, beginning with her first one when she was ten years old. She remembers taking a single photograph of a fish boil with her Brownie camera, and wishes she still had a few photos from her earliest attempts.