dedicated to saving the endangered word "divinipotent"
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Autumn Rain
I took this photo a year ago. It reminds me of today. I'm not sure why — it's raining much harder now. Perhaps it's just the memory of that chilly, damp day.
"I was in love with the whole world and all that lived in its rainy arms."
~ Louise Erdrich
Such a beautiful photograph. It has a haunting feel, but also suggests so much soft beauty and possibility. It's a comforting photograph. It's warm on the West Coast. We are having the last late summer warmth, which used to be called Indian Summer, a phrase I loved, until I, half Indian myself, read that Indian came to mean false, as in Indian Giver, and therefore that term is lost to me even if I don't necessarily want it to be. And, interestingly, because of my musings about the phrase, you follow your photograph with a quote from Louise Erdrich whose ancestors are from the Ojibwe Turtle Mountain band, close to my own Grandmother's White Earth Band. Today, a strangely warm day in San Francisco, I'm grateful to think of your cool autumn, your amazing city, and an American Indian writer I love, who despite everything, has moments of pure bliss in the rain, in love with the world.
Thank you, Katherine. The photo is the product of pure luck. I took it with my cell phone. The mist and wind were swirling and I could barely see through the lens.
I've always known about Indian Summer, but not the negative connotation. My childhood reasoning led me to believe it was a North American phenomenon that Indians knew about and Europeans didn't. What a shame that it comes from an old lie. And such a bald lie: when the government violates the treaties it signed, who's the liar?
I love that Louise Erdrich quote. How wonderful that you are somehow connected.
Such a beautiful photograph. It has a haunting feel, but also suggests so much soft beauty and possibility. It's a comforting photograph. It's warm on the West Coast. We are having the last late summer warmth, which used to be called Indian Summer, a phrase I loved, until I, half Indian myself, read that Indian came to mean false, as in Indian Giver, and therefore that term is lost to me even if I don't necessarily want it to be. And, interestingly, because of my musings about the phrase, you follow your photograph with a quote from Louise Erdrich whose ancestors are from the Ojibwe Turtle Mountain band, close to
ReplyDeletemy own Grandmother's White Earth Band. Today, a strangely warm day in San
Francisco, I'm grateful to think of your cool autumn, your amazing city, and an
American Indian writer I love, who despite everything, has moments of pure bliss
in the rain, in love with the world.
Thank you, Katherine. The photo is the product of pure luck. I took it with my cell phone. The mist and wind were swirling and I could barely see through the lens.
ReplyDeleteI've always known about Indian Summer, but not the negative connotation. My childhood reasoning led me to believe it was a North American phenomenon that Indians knew about and Europeans didn't. What a shame that it comes from an old lie. And such a bald lie: when the government violates the treaties it signed, who's the liar?
I love that Louise Erdrich quote. How wonderful that you are somehow connected.