31, or: diary of... january

today: january 31
and with it: the completion of 31 days of small stones.
more about the projethey are all lined up in my photoblog:
a river of stones, january 2011

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some reflections on stones / attentive notes:
in some ways, it's just a small thing: some lines on a specific moment of the day, every day. but what this challenge did was:  to make me more attentive for the everyday, for all the moments it brings. to look for stones.

it also made me go take my camera along, to take a photo somewhere along the way. and then, while out there, turn that extra corner, or take a road i havn't taken before. and: be more focused. here's where stones connect to that (seemingly) simple zen advice: when walk, walk. when eat, eat. when see, see. like when i went swimming – and there was the light floating through the windows, reflecting on the water surface. and it was almost hypnotic. is it different? i wondered. but it probably was my attention that was different.

another thought: i think one of the effects of the river of stones is that it gives a name to those  nameless moments, and with it, brings more attention to them and makes us more aware of them.

looking at the page of images and notes also makes me think of the peculiarity of our own perception. every day is full of hundreds of moments, but at the end of the day, just some are standing out in our memory. there could have been a completely different set of 31 entries, based on the same days.

another side effects of the stones: not only did they make go and try other roads, they also let me go and try some other templates, and arrive at the mosaic-style one, which was perfect for this, as it shifted the mosaic of images with every new entry. just like a new experience can shift our take on things that happened before.
 


also, the stone time made me go and revive my tumblr account life as a journey. i reblogged some of the stones there in larger format. it's one of the things that fascinate me: how the same content feels different when presented in another shape / size. which of course relates back to the whole idea of moments of the day, and the size / attention we give them on our way through the day.

thanks to Satya and Kaspalita at Writing Our Way Home for organizing this month!

now, to read the other stones of today
:)