Finding Something New but Familiar — Harmony and Resonance
I was looking for something, without knowing quite what.
Treks to Yosemite in years past have produced powerful memories of being surrounded by intense scenery. Yosemite was a focal point for several personal lenses; in that focal point, trivial cares of the world fled me. Even the nearly constant drone of left-brain thinking, analyzing, and planning left me. A normally suppressed part of me was wide awake and in control. Feeling the light of these lenses trained on me, I felt uniquely alive. I yearned to return to a place where I could experience those feelings again.
Scheduling a trip has, for me, become analogous to threading multiple needles at once — rare is it when all the eyes of the needles line up, and at the same (right) time. This summer’s hopes of returning to Yosemite after a long absence were dashed when it became too late to secure lodging (the eye of one needle failed to line up). Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks had been on the travel list for many years, and proved to be a very satisfying alternative.
There were a great many beautiful sites in my travels through Sequoia and Kings Canyon (and I expect to feature some of the chronicling photographs in upcoming blog entries), but it wasn’t until we arrived at Grizzly Falls that I experienced the familiar flavor of feelings and emotions I had sought. At only 75 feet in height, this waterfall is a mere fraction of the heights of the famous waterfalls of Yosemite Valley (like Yosemite Falls, Vernal and Nevada Falls, Bridalveil Falls, etc.). But there is a quality, transcending the modest height, that Grizzly Falls possesses in the same quantity as any of the Yosemite Valley waterfalls. It is a quality without a name (a term coined by Christopher Alexander), and it speaks deeply to my core. That normally suppressed part of me was awake once again and, standing near the base of the falls and gazing upward, I heard simplicity, confidence, and elegance.
I found what I was looking for. I had never seen (or heard anything) about Grizzly Falls prior to this trip — it was only a named location on a map. So, for me, it was a new place, and yet I felt I knew it and understood it; it was familiar. For several precious minutes as I photographed this wonder, I resonated with joy from my past, and a felt a new and harmonizing joy of my present. O, that I can make a sublime triad of this harmony by adding a note of resonant joy of the future! I can almost hear it now.
Photo of the Week
2007.06.18
