Garden Chronicles: Day 5

Weathering Time

Perhaps the interesting part of building a large garden is observing its passage through time and weather.. :)  So far, each balance in the overall garden has proven to be relatively sturdy, with the core holding strong for nearly a week.

*Again, I do not normally recommend leaving rock balances standing unless the situation makes it safe to do so… Let’s see.. I’ve been the only human in sight to be crawling around in a freezing creek for the last 5 days..ha.. the water is painfully cold… I imagine it is safe. :)  I actually love watching people stop and take pictures with curiosity about how the rocks got there… especially in the freezing creek.. to an inexperienced passerby, the sight must somewhat confounding :D

 

Sunrise

This sunrise was particularly beautiful watching the sunlight comb in my direction.. through the distant garden this time.. :) I tried wetting all the rocks again hoping for the same instant freeze I experienced in the previous “Frozen Sunrise” of Day 3. But… this morning was less frigid. The water froze but much slower.. Again I really enjoy the drastic difference in light character in the mornings :)

Another important part of any garden’s flow is human traffic levels and changes.  In the next picture, I can describe the layout of this huge area a bit more. The garden in the background of all single rocks, was very obvious to passing joggers, cyclists, and walkers…  The immediate garden where the camera is shooting from is much more secluded and hard to notice simply due to terrain and relative path location.  Very few people even noticed this immediate garden.. But most of the same people stopped to look at the distant garden.. So.. In a way, the distant garden is where most of the chaos element exists. chaos as in unpredictability due to increased human attention.  It would only be a matter of time before awareness caught on and spread from the distant to the more immediate core cluster.

 

Sunset

Normally my favorite light is around sunrise and sunset, so I’ve been returning to record the weathering of my garden at those times…Here is the status of the garden at sunset… as usual i like wetting all the rocks with creek water.. at this point it is almost a natural reflex upon finishing a balance in the water.. almost like an initiation.. if the rocks can hold up through a slight water splashing, then so it goes… they remain standing.. :)  splashing water also gets me very familiar with the strength of each balance.. Of course this procedure tunes into mastery through tons of practice, repetition, errors.. EXPERIENCE… by noticing what kind of water splashing the balance can resist I begin to get a sense for what kind of wind it can withstand also. :)

***

This garden as a whole, both sections, each balance, is definitely one of the toughest, inadvertently,  I’ve created. There must be a reason i’ve become so enthralled by this garden… Now in hindsight, I’m realizing this garden is all part of an organically flowing system of “stepping stones” leading to something exciting and unknown… Through the whole evolution of this garden, my awareness has been slowly shifting from the immediate foreground garden, to the garden in the distance.. Through placing all those distant rocks, I also have done a fair bit of exploring and observation in that distant location as well.. :)

“Certain things catch your eye, But pursue only those that capture the heart.” – Unknown