I have heard others wonder, many a time, a thing that I have speculated on myself, namely, what the animals we look at so quizzically in nature, home or zoo think, in turn, of us. Do they even think of us at all, and if so, is it with curiosity? Is the curiosity limited to what we could feed them or whether, in point of fact, we could be fed to them–or does it go beyond this into realms we cannot even begin to guess?
As the calendar year trickles toward its end, many of us turn our inquiring minds toward the future and ask ourselves what lies ahead, and whether we can have any influence on it. We long to be happy and healthy, rich and free, but are often puzzled when directed to think not about how the universe can confer these delights upon our undeserving heads but instead, how we might earn or attain them by our own efforts.
For some reason, all of this recently began to merge in my own head, coalescing into an odd and perhaps contorted mystery of a related but new variant. Thanks to my appallingly unscientific mind, I suppose I have often pondered the universe in the same way that I do animals in relationship to humans, imagining the universe’s workings as some sort of parody of Baroque stage machinery. We occupy a stage on which we animals and plants and other living things act out a madly unscripted play amid the apparently clumsy clockworks of our artificially constructed container and wait for the deus ex machina resolution to clarify all that is, was and ever shall be therein.
Suddenly, though, I’m struck by a further thought that if there is indeed any such power running the show, perhaps the universe is looking at us, at me, in great consternation and mystification, wondering when and how I will be explained. It makes me feel smaller than ever in the grand scheme of things, yet somehow comforted that I may not be entirely alone in my wondering. Will the year ahead, or the decade or lifetime, see my questions answered? Will the universe get its answers? I can’t even begin to imagine. But I like the thought that whatever is waiting on the other side of New Year’s Day may be just that much more miraculous than all of the exciting and surprising and wonderful stuff that went before it. I, for one, plan to stick around until the curtain falls.
Art-Colored Glasses 
I am so glad you plan to stick around some more Kathryn 😉 Great visual treat! Thank you Hugs to you in this passage towards a New Year
Many hugs back to you, dear Anyes. May your 2014 be a delight from beginning to end! I look forward to seeing what *you* get up to as well, you know. 😀
Love the photos today – they ARE photos, right? 🙂
Happy New Year, Sweetie! I may or may not get back tomorrow to say it again…
Happy New Year to you, too, Beautiful! May you and Grandad and your kids of all ages be happy and healthy and prosperous in the year to come!! Yes, photo-collages. I did them when I put together the various images for Richard’s Pro Coro Canada space-themed concert (https://kiwsparks.wordpress.com/2012/06/02/the-large-and-the-small-of-it/) a few years back.
xoxoxo!
gives a new meaning to “thought bubbles”! I too wonder how the universe sees us, scurrying about our business of making stuff and changing our environment in creative – if not always wise – ways. These are beautiful images and beautiful thoughts to take into the New Year. Have a Happy Celebration!
You, too, my lovely! May we all keep bubbling along at a happy rate!
Very beautiful post along with the photos!
Thank you, Laura! I can’t take credit for the original photos, but I certainly had a great time messing around with them all in Photoshop until they were merged into these odd conglomerate image-paintings. Art-making was always fun, but I have to admit that digital tools/toys sometimes make it all the more entertaining an adventure. 🙂
Whatever comes your way in the New Year ahead of us, I hope it is all good.
The same to you, dear Karen! Can’t wait to see what great and glorious pleasures lie just around the next turn of those backroads! xo
A lovely post Kathryn and one that could easily cause me to think too much, but I do that anyway! Gorgeous images too.
I hope you enjoy a good New Year celebration in whatever way it happens to be. I shall be spending a quiet evening in watching TV 😊
I’m more likely to get accused of *under*-thinking things! 😉 But you needn’t overdo it either–I just like to let my thoughts drift this way from time to time. And speaking of aimless drifting, I love your mode of NYE celebrating. That’s what Richard and I will be doing, too, and we’re very happy to let others enjoy their noise-making, party-throwing, firework displays, annual summations and prognostications while we curl up cozily and watch a movie (or even less taxing TV fare) at home. Ahhh!
Happy 2014 in every way, my dear.
xo
I love your thoughts on life, Kathryn.. I’d like to think we’re not perplexing the audience (who is the audience?) but entertaining them:D I know your art and writing has captured my attention! Wishing you a grandest of shows in 2014!! xx
Thanks, Beautiful! May your year be gorgeously filled with peace, love and happiness all through, too!
xoxo
There is nothing appalling about science. I love it. I sincerely enjoyed your artwork as well as your write. Have a wonderful year ahead!
You are so right, my friend; science is wonderful, mysterious and exciting–the only appalling aspect at all is how ignorant *I* am of its miraculous workings! But I’m delighted you enjoyed the post all the same. May your 2014 be full of joy and wonder, too!
I’m such a twit. I hadn’t realized my error until after I’d made it. That’s what I get for reading so late at night. Forgive me, and thank you so very much!
If you really *were* a twit, you’d be in the perfect company here at my place, but from what I’ve seen thus far I sincerely doubt your claim! 😀 In any event, you are most welcome to come over to my place and play any time!
xo
If only we had the common sense to approach each day with the same optimism that we reserve for New Year’s Day. “What a wonderful world this would be … ”
Loved the images today, Kathryn. They’re quite beautiful.
Thank you, dear John–I had fun playing in my Photoshop workshop to create the images, and I think they represent, however seemingly fanciful they may be, a fairly accurate picture of my wonder in the face of the Awesome Universe in which I find myself living. And now I’m hearing Louis Armstrong singing ‘what a wonderful world’, and that, too, is awe-inspiring! Thanks! 😀
Looking forward to the next act of the play. I’m sure it will be just as full of beauty and surprise as what went before.
I must say the same to you as well, dear lady. May 2014 be a grand year in all ways!!