The edges of nature: When snow kisses the ocean

When it snows on Kodiak Island, something magic happens at high water. The black shale rocks are dusted with white, transforming them into tiny marshmallows. Then as the tide recedes, the snow is raked into the ocean, leaving a straight, horizontal line along the beach. Offshore, winter storms paint the rocky outcroppings with layers of water that freeze like candle wax. I came upon this scene last weekend while walking along a cliff. I’d brought my camera and tripod, though the dull light wasn’t very inspiring. Still, a little voice kept nudging me along. “Go a little further, there’s something waiting for you.”

Winter scenic one east side of Kodiak Island, Alaska. Marion Owen photo.

Thanks for stopping. May your week be filled with blessings. If you visit Kodiak Island, let me know, I’ll put the coffee on. You can also find me on Facebook at Marion Owen Photography and see more of my images at my main photography website: www.MarionOwenPhotography.com.

If you had minutes to flee a disaster and could take only one item…

If you had minutes to flee a disaster and could take only one item, what would you choose? Most people name a possession that can be impossible to replace: their photos. Photographer Allison  Kwesell traveled to Japan last November, armed with two cameras and donated Fuji instant film. Her goal: to help survivors of the earthquake and 20-foot tsunami build new photo albums by asking survivors if they’d like to pose and then giving them the instant prints. In an interview with The Rotarian, Allison recalls photographing a woman with her grandchildren in front of their temporary home. “She told me she was happy I chose to photograph her there, because it gave her the courage to move forward.”

Now hold those thoughts as you fly from Japan, across the Pacific Ocean, to Kodiak Island where I live. I’m in a grocery store, high-grading bananas, when a fellow shopper starts chatting about digital photography. “So, why do you take pictures, Marion? Are you going to sell them or something?”

A bumblebee dines on pollen grains alongside red velvet mites on a ragwort flower growing on Kodiak Island beach.

I stared at the bananas. Why do photographers take photos? Why do artists dab paint, write poems or knit hats? Is it to say something, call attention to ourselves, or prompt others to take the road less traveled? Of course, only you can answer why, but reading about Allison’s work gave me pause to dig deeper.

Later that day, while sampling an apple muffin, I pondered “photography” which, to me, is all about looking for great light and then finding something to put into it. So why do I take pictures? Two thoughts came to mind:

Thought No. 1: Practicing my art gives me an excuse to enjoy nature more intimately. Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods calls it Nature Therapy. Meanwhile, it forces me to slow down (even the finest tea spills out of a jostled cup) and concentrate (“What’s for dinner”? has no place behind the tripod). Grace and guidance flows continuously within and without us, whether or not we’re conscious of it. Sometimes it manages to filter through in quiet prods like, “Look over there, drive down that road, tilt your camera down a bit.”

And many times, nudging me like a bird tapping my shoulder, is a comment from Galen Rowell’s provocative book, Mountain Light:

“One of the shocking realizations of adult life is that most of us are not fulfilling the most closely held dreams of our youth. Instead of pursuing dreams that were once integral parts of our personalities, we end up in one way or another fulfilling someone else’s ideas about who and what we should be, usually at the expense of our creative urges.”

Still with me? Here’s the kicker. Read this slowly. More than once:

Thought No. 2: All true religions tell us we are made in the image of God. Therefore, God is the very Essence of our being and “we cannot truly express ourselves until we learn to manifest His presence within us,” wrote Paramahansa Yogananda in Autobiography of a Yogi.

When I hear Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, my heart swells with hope. When I read about people like Allison Kwesell, I am inspired to create less from my head and more from my heart. Thanks, Allison.

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Thanks for stopping by. Have a wonderful week. You can also find me on Facebook at Marion Owen Photography and see more of my images at my main photography website: www.MarionOwenPhotography.com.

Celebrating salmon, ice and spring to come

If you live in California, winter’s passing is more of a transition. In Alaska, keeping tabs on day length is a statewide sporting event. As a gardener, I watch these things, even to the point of knowing The Day when our day length marches past 10 hours, the life-switch that triggers plants to start to growing again. At latitude 58 degrees north, it’s February 22. (To see a daylight/darkness table for anywhere in the world, click here). Day length influences everything from the reproductive cycles of red crossbills and a salmon’s return to the rivers, to the moment a harbor is free of ice and hey, our moods over the course of a day. I took this photo as a celebration of spring to come…

Winter sunlight bounces off ice paddies in Saint Herman Harbor, in Kodiak, Alaska.

To the North Pole with 16,000 pounds of flour

A homespun scarecrow in Kodiak, Alaska keeps bald eagles out of the garden.

When Robert E. Peary prepared for his final attempt to reach the North Pole in 1909, his provisions included an astounding list of supplies: 16,000 pounds of flour, 10,000 pounds of sugar, 10,000 pounds of “biscuit”, 100 cases of condensed milk, 3,000 pounds of dried fish and 30,000 pounds of pemmican. The expedition was a success, largely due to Peary’s previous experience in the North which gave him the knowledge of “exactly what I wanted and how much of it.”

In today’s world, it’s difficult to wrap our heads around planning meals beyond tonight’s dinner and referring to a shopping list that contains 10,000 pounds of anything. One of my neighbors, a longtime resident of Kodiak Island, remembers when groceries arrived by ship — once a year. “I remember my first strawberry,” she once told me.

On February 13, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released new 10-year agricultural projections, including food prices through 2021. How they can extend data points out to 2021 is beyond me, but after wading through the corn, poultry and beef projections (where’s the fish?), you get to the good stuff. Turns out we are thinking more about how and what we eat. Phil Lempert of SupermarketGuru.com for example, says more people are choosing to eat at home to save money. [Well, duh.]

Ever heard of Extreme Couponing? A new one on me. There are cooks out there who pride themselves on making the most for the least. Isn’t that what cooking from scratch, using basic ingredients is all about? I say issue a slow cooker and a copy of Joy of Cooking to every household.

Size matters, too. Americans are using smaller pieces of beef, chicken and pork (again, where’s the fish?) and filling the rest of the plate with grains and vegetables; which by the way, is just what the Dietary Guidelines recommend. So perhaps the upswing of a down-turned economy is that we not only save money but also eat healthier.

Last year, global food prices hit an all-time high. Whether you call it a time to tighten our belts or ditch the Doritos, I’m even more convinced that we have an obligation to ourselves and the world, to grow at least some of our own food. No room to garden? Grow herbs on a windowsill, sow a few salad greens in a container, or participate in a community garden.

What can we learn from Robert Peary’s grocery list? For one thing, he didn’t just drive his Suburban up to a big box store and load it up with 30,000 pounds of pemmican. The famous explorer was a master planner, and he knew a little something about nutrition.

“The absolutely essential supplies…are few, but they should be of the best quality,” he noted in his journal. “They should be prepared in such a way as to secure the maximum of nourishment.”

Interesting, eh? Securing the maximum of nourishment. Like making the most for the least. In terms of our own health, we need to cook from scratch more often; and shop with intention, keeping the motto, maximum nourishment in mind while navigating grocery store aisles, visiting a farmer’s market or buying seeds online.

In terms of the planet’s health, how about reducing the number of times you go to the store? Could you go for a week–or a month–without buying groceries?

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Dear Reader,

I’ve put together a Top 40 List of Vegetables to Grow; one that I share in my weekly column and with my Organic Gardening students. Though the varieties are more suited for Southcentral Alaska’s growing conditions, the list contains a lot of helpful information. If you’re interested, I’m happy to email you a copy.

Are your decisions tainted by “analysis paralysis”?

A woman celebrates the morning in Kodiak, Alaska. Marion Owen photo.

Dan Burns is a professional sports photographer. To pay the bills though, he shoots “anything that moves,” from dance rehearsals and polo matches to brown bears and pro football games. Based in Connecticut, Dan is an “in-the-trenches” kind of guy who also teaches workshops for Audubon groups and Wounded Warriors. So you can imagine that 30 years of experience brings a pocketful of insights, like this one:  ”Many people are afraid to fail,” he shared last week over the phone. “They suffer from paralysis by analysis.” As Dan elaborated, I realized that paralysis by analysis is an action-killer for photographers, doctors, gardeners–you name it.

Paralysis by analysis is where  you don’t take any action due to over-thinking about details or over-planning. “People end up frozen in a panic, unable to move forward,” Dan says. “They might bring their camera to a workshop, but they don’t take many pictures.”

Beginners often suffer from paralysis by analysis. Beginning gardeners, for example, might experience thoughts like these: What if my soil’s not right? What if my carrot seeds don’t come up? What if the dog gets into the daffodil beds? So let’s pick on gardeners for a bit (I can do that, since I too, am a gardener, so long as the weather here in Kodiak permits me to do so).

How to de-fuse analysis paralysis

Planning certainly helps when we start a new project but it shouldn’t go to the extent that it overwhelms us to the point where we fail to make a decision and take action; or give up part way through. Take this broad-based example: The hottest trend continues to be “grow your own” and organically (if possible), which is fueled by:

• Economic conditions
• The desire for better flavor
• Increased nutrition
• Food safety concerns
• Convenience

Seed retailers are noticing the heightened concern with nutrition among home gardeners. Evidence of this trend is found in the pages of 2012 seed catalogs where item descriptions feature levels of vitamins and other nutrients. So while the number of gardeners in the U.S. continues to rise, I’ll bet quite a few of them won’t be back after their first year. Most of them probably found vegetable gardening too much work or they felt overwhelmed as the season unfolded. Or they never even planted a seed.

In order to help gardeners overcome Analysis Paralysis, I’ve generated a list of tips to encourage folks to take action and reach for a trowel. Even if you’re NOT a gardener, I think you’ll find these tips enlightening:

Seven ways to beat analysis paralysis

1. Plan: You still need a plan no matter what, but avoid over-planning. If it’s your first time gardening, start small, plant a few things; begin with one raised bed or three containers on your deck.

2. Listen and learn: Experience is your best teacher, but there are many local gardeners who have blazed the trail before you. Attend garden club meetings and workshops. Online resources are great, but one-on-one “face mail” is better. Consider hanging a trowel around your neck when you do errands so people will recognize you as a gardener and strike up a conversation with you!

3. Just begin: After planning, listening and learning, stop asking “what if” questions. Place a seed order, prepare a garden plot and trust that you will learn true lessons along the way.

4. Forget perfection: Many photo-gardeners secretly wish their gardens and yards looked like something out of Better Homes and Gardens. Sure, it’s great to aspire to be the perfect gardener, but there’s practicality to consider, too. Do your best (that’s all anyone can expect), and learn, learn, learn from your mistakes.

5. Keep the momentum going: Once you start this season’s garden–however polite– do something each day to keep things moving forward. It might be something small like pruning a shrub, pulling weeds for ten minutes, cutting back dead perennials or cleaning out a hanging basket. If your garden is an indoor one, then re-pot a suffering houseplant. Every step is an accomplishment.

6. Learn to make decisions: This is an important skill that helps you overcome analysis paralysis. Practice your decision-making skills by setting mini goals or timelines. For example, what lettuce should I plant, bib or leaf? What pansies should I grow by the front door, orange or blue? When should I transplant broccoli seedlings, in May or June?

7. Hang around do-ers: The company you keep is one of the greatest influences to your well-being. Armchair gardeners simply talk about it; true gardeners have dirt under their nails. Volunteer to help a neighbor build raised beds or put up a hoophouse. Help with the community garden’s plant sale. You’ll accomplish more in the course of a day and feel better about yourself by hanging around half-full, not half-empty kind of people.

How your daily decisions shape your whole life

Bronnie Ware, an Australian nurse who spent several years caring for patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives, says that regrets are the worst things you can cling to during your lifetime. Bronnie shared her experiences in her book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. I’m not trying to be morbid here. Rather, I wish to share a slice of wisdom that continues to shape my life, my decisions. Bronnie writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom.

“When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently,” she says in an interview printed in The Guardian, “common themes surfaced again and again.”

What is the most common regret of all? “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

In other words, don’t worry about whether your neighbor likes blue pansies or pink ones. Just grow them. If you want to erect a Saint Francis statue next to your lilac bush, then do so. “It is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled,” says Bronnie. “Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams.”

Learning how to take good pictures; growing spinach for the first time, building a better mousetrap, starting a new business; it’s all the same stuff. Forget the “what if” questions and get growing, photographing, running, jumping, cooking…

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Thank you for stopping by. Have a wonderful week. You can also find me on Facebook at Marion Owen Photography and see more of my images at my main photography website: www.MarionOwenPhotography.com.

Brown bear running after salmon in Katmai National Park. Marion Owen photo.

Snowflakes: Pretty in Pink

Photograph of a real snowflake, taken in Kodiak, Alaska by Marion Owen. (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, ISO 100 1/4 sec)

Keys in hand, grocery list in my pocket, I head to the door for a round of errands.

While slipping on my gloves, I glance out the office window just long enough to watch several snowflakes make their way earthward. Finally, snow! I tossed the keys on the desk and scoot outside. Grabbing the black, 3-ring binder sitting on the barbecue, I hold it out at arm’s length like a beggar. One, two, three… the clear, individual snow crystals follow an air current down to the black plastic, and then touch down, oh so gently, like Apollo 11 landing on the surface of the moon. Magic fills the air as I prepare for what turns out to be 10-hour session of photographing snowflakes.

For five long days I had waited for snow. Outside, my camera-microscope waited by the barbeque, balanced on two milk crates in the wood shed. The weathermen teased me with forecasts of snow and single-digit temperatures, ideal snowflake conditions.

Photograph of a simple stellar dendrite snow crystal, by Marion Owen, Kodiak, Alaska (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, ISO 100 1/4 sec)

One after another the snowflakes come: Stellar dendrites, sectored plates, needles, double-plates, split plates, and snowflakes that look like cartoon characters. I work without gloves to allow for easy handling of the camera controls. But first I have to capture the snowflakes…

This is done by lifting a snow crystal off the notebook with the tip of a small paintbrush and transferring it to a glass microscope slide. While holding my breath I quickly focus and press the shutter release cable.

After 20+ years of practicing the art of snowflake photography, I still have a lot to learn. Lighting, for example, is very critical to illuminate an otherwise clear object. But I’ve picked up a few interesting factoids along the way. Like this one: Did you know that it takes only 15 minutes from the time the snow crystal begins to form around a tiny particle of dust (like a pearl around a grain of sand) to the moment it lands on my black notebook?

And that there are skinny snowflakes and fat snowflakes? Snowflake triangles and 12-sided snowflakes?

Photograph of a stellar dendrite snow crystal, by Marion Owen, Kodiak, Alaska (Canon EOS 5D Mark II, ISO 100 1/5 sec)

I suppose it’s easy to overanalyze snow crystals, how they form, what controls their shape and so on. Believe me, my mind craves to go there. But I’m reminded of a quote I read the other day, which helped me let go of the restlessness.

“One who mentally dissects and analyzes the botanical properties of a flower misses a full appreciation of its beauty. But one who focuses on how beautiful that flower is, allowing one’s intuitive feelings to respond to its pure essence, enjoys fully its loveliness.” – Paramahansa Yogananda

I hope you have a wonderful week. Thanks for stopping by. I’m finally off to do those errands I talked about at the beginning which includes mailing my seed orders for this year’s gardening season. Ah, the garden. That’s another story…

You can also find me on Facebook at Marion Owen Photography.

Kodiak Island Granola: Sorry Whole Foods, homemade is better

Granola. You know, that nondescript blend of whole grains and nuts that’s baked until crispy. What you might not know is that granola was invented way back in 1890s and was served at New York’s Jackson Sanitarium health spa. Humble beginnings. Then, in the 1960s, granola enjoyed a revival as a hippie cereal. Quaker, Kellogg’s, Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods–lots of companies jumped on the granola bandwagon. That’s all well and good, but the granola you buy is way too sweet. Your taste buds–and your body–deserve better.

So I’d like to share the granola recipe I use at home and for our bed-and-breakfast guests. Is it good? I can only say that I make dozens of batches every year. We give it away as Christmas gifts and send our guests home with bags of it so they have something healthy to nibble on during the flight home.

Give it a try, and let me know what you think. If you’ve never eaten much granola or you’re shy or clueless about how, I’ve listed 12 “how to eat” tips below.

Kodiak Island Granola
By Marion Owen, Kodiak Granola Company (just kidding)

1/2 cup water
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup honey or maple syrup
1 cup peanut butter*
2 teaspoons vanilla

8 cups regular (not quick or instant) rolled oats
1 – 2 cups cup brown sugar
1 cup unroasted wheat germ
5-1/2 cups wide-stripped unsweetened coconut
2 cups shaved (slivered) almonds
2 cups cashews (odd-sized bits are fine, and less expensive)
3/4 cup raw sunflower seeds
1/2 cup ground flax seed (flax seed meal), sesame seeds or teff grain

Mix the five wet ingredients together in a saucepan and place on low to medium heat. Stir occasionally. Mix the dry ingredients in a separate large bowl.

When the liquid mixture begins to boil, pour it over the dry ingredients and toss with a spoon or rubber spatula until well mixed and the dry ingredients are evenly coated. Spread onto two or three large cookie sheets or jelly roll pans and bake at 250 to 275 degrees until light brown and toasted; this could take a couple hours. (I turn the oven off occasionally). Stir occasionally for even browning. It’s tempting to turn up the heat and hurry the drying-cooking process. (Don’t do this because the granola usually ends up too brown and unevenly dried.) Allow to cool thoroughly before storing it in airtight containers.

* You can substitute peanut butter with cashew butter, tahini (sesame butter) or almond butter

How to enjoy a good granola

1. Eat it as is (right out of the oven is best).
2. Enjoy it as your morning cereal, topped with yogurt or milk.
3. Stir it up with fruit and yogurt.
4. Top your favorite ice cream (to reduce the guilt factor).
5. Sprinkle onto pancakes and waffles; inside crepes.
6. Top off muffins and quick breads before baking.
7. Spoon some inside peanut butter ‘n jelly sandwiches.
8. Use as the topping for fruit cobblers and pies.
9. Serve it with warm rice pudding or tapioca pudding.
10. Fold it into brownie batter before baking.
11. Use as croutons on a tossed salad.
12. Create your own hiking snack by adding dried fruits and chocolate chips.