Gulf Fritillaries

Whenever I think of gulf fritillary butterflies, I think of my childhood best friend's mom, whose name was Carmen. She was an amateur lepidopterist, who sometimes went to local schools to teach the kids about butterflies. When I first got into gardening, she introduced me to the world of herbs and butterfly host and nectar plants. The passionflower, with its intoxicating chocolate or vanilla-like fragrance, was one of my favorites, which she had growing on a trellis by her back door. They are the host plant for gulf fritillary caterpillars, slimy-looking orange worms covered in black barbs.

I never knew that passion vines were native around Alabama before her. In fact, they grow in roadside ditches and forest clearings and other abandoned places with greatest ease. The other common name - maypop - refers to the passionfruit which is bloated like a balloon and pops like one, too.

Fall is my favorite time of year, and whenever I see swarms of gulf fritillaries I know summer is coming to an end. When I was a kid I used to like to go to my dad's land, which is where I work now, and walk through the woods. Little openings amid the trees would be covered in wildflowers and fluttering butterflies in September. Among the most striking flowers were the ironweed, tall as a man and glowing with their deep purple plumes.

I was walking along the road in front of the shop this week and took some photos of the butterflies and ironweed.

My uncle's shed. It's what I see as soon as I step out of my office, so I tend to warm up my camera, so to speak, with it.

Gulf fritillary and ironweed

Sulphur butterfly and ironweed. Some say the sulphur butterflies are where we get the "butter" in butterfly.

Back to the gulf fritillary. This butterfly is from a tropical butterfly family and the Southeast is about the northermost range for these. Coincidentally (or not), the passion vine comes from a tropical plant family and the Southeast is about the northernmost range for it also.

Hello there, friend.

A letter between two Saints

Yesterday was the feast of St. Augustine, the saint I chose for Confirmation. I read an abridged version of the City of God when I was a freshman in high school, and the Confessions when I was a sophomore, and On the Trinity when I was a senior. It all started during the summer before ninth grade, when we went on a family vacation to St. Augustine, Florida, and I walked inside the lovely Catholic basilica there. Who is this St. Augustine, anyway? I thought. When I got home I was looking through a bookstore and found a little paperback copy of the City of God. It took me the whole year to get through it, and I doubt whether I understood much, though I did take time to underline and look up any words I didn't know, and I read all the footnotes, too. The biggest impression the book made on me was that the early Christians were Catholics, which is why I chose St. Augustine when I converted.

I spent the weekend in the library reading from St. Augustine and St. Jerome. I thought I'd share this letter St. Jerome sent to St. Augustine, in St. Augustine's honor.

Jerome to the saintly lord and blessed father [Latin papa, 'pope'], Augustine (c. 418)

I have always revered your Blessedness with the respect which befits you and I have loved the Lord our Saviour dwelling in you, but now we add something to the heap, and, if that is possible, we fill up what was full, so as not to allow one single hour to pass without mention of your name; because the ardor of your faith has stood firm against the blasts of the wind, and you have chosen, in so far as it rests with you, to be delivered from Sodom rather than to remain there with the doomed. Your Prudence knows what I mean. Bravo to your valor! Your fame is world-wide; Catholics revere you and accept you as the second founder of the ancient faith, and - which is a mark of greater fame - all the heretics hate you, and pursue me, too, with equal hatred; they plan our death by desire if they cannot achieve it by the sword. May the mercy of Christ our Lord keep you safe and mindful of me, revered lord, most saintly father. 

Slow Thinker

I was listening to an NPR On Point podcast this week about the intelligence of trees. It had me thinking about things. I did not know that trees had such sophisticated sensory powers. They didn't teach us such things in horticulture. For instance, a tree has senses of touch, hearing, sight, smell/taste, gravity, magnetism. Trees also have what appears like emotions, such as fear or aggression. They can recognize their children and relatives growing nearby. A mother tree can pick favorites among her childen, providing more help to those more likely to thrive and less help to those likely to languish. Trees can count days, which implies some sort of memory mechanism. Otherwise how would they know what number they're on? They also remember past trauma, such as droughts, which alters their future behavior, such as behaviors that use water more cautiously.

One of the reasons why we don't recognize this in trees is because it happens at such a slower rate than stimuli in humans. Our nerves transmit electrical impulses at rates around meters per second. Trees transmit electrical impulses at rates more like centimeters per hour. Thus, a tree may be aware that you hugged it, but hours after you've gone.

The scientist made an analogy between trees and humans and humans and houseflies. To a housefly, we might appear as slow and dumb as trees do to us. A fly is long gone before we've even barely swatted at it, and many times we're not even aware that a fly is walking on us. Perhaps if Aristote was a housefly he'd count humans among the vegetative souls, or some kind of hairy fungus that slowly creeps over the earth and builds colonies in slow motion.

Filter Effects

Recently I bought some color filters to use with my film camera. Though they're designed mostly for use with black and white film, I also tried them on my Canon digital camera. Here's some photos I took, in the area around where I work:

First, an illustration of what these filters do.

This is taken with a deep blue (#47b) filter. Notice the dark stripes on the American flag.

This is taken with a deep red (#29) filter. Note the stripes this time.

This is stacking the deep blue over the deep red filter. Since this blocks out most visible light, I believe this photo shows the extent to which my camera is sensitive to infrared light. Notice the koozie next to the lamp, how light it is, whereas in visible light it is black. Also notice the flag, how the internal seams between stripes seems to be apparent. 

My uncle's shed with the deep blue filter. Landscapes with the deep blue filter look somber to me.

The same scene with both filters stacked, showing infrared light. Foliage appears bright in infrared.

The Euphabee Creek in deep red.

Forklift, deep blue

Forklift, deep red

A series of photos with a deep blue filter:

Finally, a composite photo: the deep red + green field + deep blue filter

Pinhole Beauty

I recently got a pinhole camera. It's the Zero Image 2000 handmade in Hong Kong. I haven't shot film in over ten years, and I've never shot 120 film. This camera produces negatives 6x6cm. I haven't figured out where I'll get them developed yet, but at least the local camera store sells 120 film. I saw a youtube video that you can develop film with coffee, lemon juice, and washing soda, but I'm sure the results are not as good this way.

Pinhole camera, loaded and ready for action.

As you may know if you've used or made a pinhole camera before, they do not have a lens. There is only a tiny hole in front of the film which focuses light. This camera has a focal length of 25mm and an aperture of f/138. I took a photo in my apartment with a ten minute exposure. In this field I tried a 5 second exposure. The tricky thing (for me at least) is that there's no exact way of knowing what the camera is seeing, and calculating exposure times is new to me. We'll see how it goes!

Here are some photos I've taken with my digital camera lately. I'll be getting two new filters in the mail this week, so it'll be fun to experiment with them.

A chronochromatic photo I made of Toomer's Corner. The colors represent slices of time (this is a composite of three exposures, mapped to red, green, and blue respectively). Things that appear white represent things that were unmoved. Things that have color represent things that changed.

Another chronochromatic image showing how clouds changed over the course of an hour near sunset. Notice that the lights appear blue. That's because they were only on on the last exposure, which I mapped to the blue channel.

The same barn at Ag Heritage Park, showing natural colors.

jhk

Confederate memorial on Alabama Capitol grounds in Montgomery

Alabama State Capitol one afternoon before a heavy storm

Auburn University Chapel

Lilium michauxii blooming in the woods near my dad's house.

Rhexia virginica blooming by the spring -ed pond at my uncle's

"Where in the Sam Hell are we?"

I must have been in deep thought on my commute to work this morning, like a dream. Something poked at me, like a poke in a dream of the night, to make you wonder if there is a real world out there, and you happen to open your squinty eyes and see a pale blue light in a window next to your bed, and you go back into the dream world for a few more minutes.

Something poked at me, a never seen yellow glow, alien stands of tall pines along a forgotten highway. I came back into this world. Oh my gosh, these are not the trees I see on the way to work! I looked at the clock. Oh my gosh, I'm ten minutes late to work! I waited for a mile marker to give me some sense of where I was. Oh my gosh, I'm almost to Montgomery! I missed my exit by several miles and never noticed it.

We were going to Granny's. It was getting dark. I had some chicken tenders, hash brown cassarole, and some fried side like okra or something. We left Cracker Barrel. When we pulled into that dark gravel driveway, the two narrow tire paths winding through the tall bahiagrass, lined on both sides by old oaks and cedars, that driveway to Mema's homeplace, far off the road, that house she had known for nearly a century - the headlights spotted the white house with the tin roof and the long porch with green carpet and two white swings facing each other from the ends. And there was that white arched trellis Granny made to look like one she saw in Atmore in the 1930s. And the low stone wall and the four brick-encircled oaks and the old English boxwood and the iron pole could be seen in the periphery of the headlight. Mema had been quiet on the whole two hour journey to this place, her mama's home. And, as we came to see, her memory was beginning to fade, for when we stopped at the front door, she broke her silence, from the back seat she spoke in an uncharacteristic loud shrill irritated voice. "Where in the Sam Hell are we?" 

Fr. Martin's New Book

I'm about half way through Fr. James Martin's new book, Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community Can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity. It only took me one rather short reading session to get through 50 pages. I don't think I've ever rolled my eyes while reading a book written by a priest as much as I have with this book, which is funny because at one point Fr. Martin notes that the reader is probably rolling his eyes. The closest I get to rolling my eyes with other Church leaders is when I read things Pope Francis says sometimes. Maybe it's a Jesuit thing.

Fr. Martin argues like a lawyer or a politician, meaning he appears to have a goal in mind and takes whatever step he needs to take to get there, even if it means being subtle, crafty, slightly manipulative (dare I say deceptive?). He makes cheap shots at times, employs a few scare words, and relies on the unquestioned assumptions of readers. I find that many things he says are unpersuasive if you just ask a few deeper questions. That being said, the assumptions he relies on are ones generally accepted by everyone in our culture, so it would be persuasive to many and meet them where they're at, so to speak.

As an example, he says that everyone deserves respect, and part of being respectful means calling people by the labels they choose for themselves. Therefore, the Catholic hierarchy should not use any terms for LGBT+ people except the terms they choose for themselves. But do we really believe everyone deserves respect? Do we really believe respecting people requires calling them by whatever they wish to be called? If a terrorist told Fr. Martin he preferred to be called "martyr" or "God's chosen servant", would Fr. Martin use the terrorist's self-chosen labels? Ah, but a terrorist doesn't deserve respect! But just a minute ago everyone deserved respect? Well, then, everyone, except every guilty person, deserves respect. Who, then is innocent? A murderer isn't innocent and so I can call him a murderer even if he doesn't like the term. What about a divorced and remarried person? If he is not innocent, then he needs not have any of my respect, and I can call him an adulterer and still be a charitable Christian. And if a senator said a lie two decades ago, perhaps I can address him as liar when I meet him, or should I address him with respect?

The unquestioned assumptions here are that we believe everyone deserves respect, and that respect means addressing people as they wish to be addressed, when we really don't believe this in practice. I don't call a suicide bomber "God's chosen servant and glorious martyr", even if that's the way he would want to be identified. At this point, I can see someone saying, "How dare you compare an LGBT person to a terrorist or a murderer!" And this reveals another unquestioned assumption, that LGBT people are fundamentally different from murderers or terrorists. Perhaps LGBT people don't want to be compared with murderers and terrorists because they themselves have dehumanized and marginalized murderers and terrorists. A murderer or a terrorist, despite his actions, is still a child of God and fundamentally deserving of love and respect, am I right? What right has an LGBT person (or any other sinner) to accept for himself God's unconditional love and forgiveness and acceptance but to deny this for other types of sinners? What right have I to say that, despite of my continuing sinfulness, I am on the innocent side of the line and deserve respect, while at the same time another person's sins places him on the guilty side, and he deserves none?

I would argue, ultimately, that every sinner has the right to be treated as a child of God, but not every sinner has the right to have his sinfulness addressed with terms of respect. And so, if a label a person chooses for himself whitewashes or legitimizes sinful behavior he may be engaging in, I think we have the right to refuse to use that label. But, at the same time, we should not use labels that dehumanize or harm people, no matter what their sins may be. A person should not be identified by his sins, neither to praise the sin, nor to dehumanize the person. But this is just my position. 

Now, back to the book...

This is not to say I hate the book so far. About midway through he pulls a surprise (for me, at least), suddenly turning his critical gaze from the "institutional church" to the LGBT community, spotlighting several ways they are themselves hypocritical. For instance, he points out the way that many gay activists ridicule our old conservative prelates for wearing the traditional, beautiful Catholic vestments. This ridicule only works by appealing to homophobia. People who are not homophobic will not be scandalized or ashamed of seeing men wearing silky, lacy, flowery clothes. And, while he points out that many gay people are more compassionate because they suffered shaming, ridicule, and bullying in their lives, many other LGBT people employ shame, ridicule, and bullying on others who oppose or differ from them with devastating cruelty (my words, not Fr. Martin's).

Another criticism of the LGBT community he makes is their refusal to recognize that many (most) Church leaders are acting in good faith when they speak about the issue of homosexuality. Church leaders have difficult jobs with a lot of things to balance, as well as promises and duties to hand on the faith of the Apostles, whatever that may be. This is not an easy or straightforward task, and many in the LGBT community simply dismiss the sincerity and goodwill of those who are charged with it. At the same time, some in the LGBT community themselves lack goodwill and sincerity in dealing with leaders of the Church, which further exacerbates the divide.

In short, I find this book so far to be thought-provoking, though I think it is lacking in places in transparency and has an overall sense of being jesuitical. But, what did I expect? Now, to continue reading...

Still a believer in blogs...

What in the world has happened today to blogs? There are many great ones still out there, especially blogs about specialized subjects. Personal blogs, not so much. I'm still a believer in the personal blog, though. I like that, unlike most social media these days, blogs are uncurated. When I go to a blog, I see all the content, in reverse chronological order. The blogosphere is more like a library, where I go and see an endless array of books, and none have any prominence over the others, and no one tells me which ones to read unless I ask them. 

I'm still a little torn between Blogger and tumblr. I like Blogger better for writing, and tumblr better for posting photos. Blogger is more intimate, whereas tumblr is more open. I may begin using my tumblr (subtectummeum) more for photos.

I hope others continue to use their blogs, or begin again. I like them. And thanks to those who read mine.

A Story of a Night

A priest told me I needed to do more things I enjoy, and try new things. I suppose I have more freedom than I think. Since my roommate is home in Italy for the week, I decided to try something new. I unplugged the cable modem and took it to work to leave there in my desk drawer. No internet, no TV, no smart phone. Just myself and my quiet apartment. What will it be like?

I stayed at work thirty minutes longer reading about bandpass filters and how I might attach one to my camera. Infrared and ultraviolet photography interest me, but what about intra-red or intra-green or intra-violet - the invisible visible light? As far as I know, nobody is capturing the invisible world of the visible. I couldn't find a single instance on the internet - not even information on how it could be done. I want to try it, with bandpass filters, filters that only pass narrow wavelengths of light. This is something I'm interested in, something I enjoy. I left work, saying goodbye to the internet.

When I got home, I took a bath (my favorite place to read) and began reading more of The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. I bought the novel because I read that the author writes without resorting to irony, which has plagued our cultures for decades. It's a coming of age book, which are my favorite novels. I was soaking in the hot water and enjoying the last of my mint-scented Epsom salts. I was transported back to my summers when I was 20 and 21, times when I fell in love and people fell in love with me, and I believed I had many happy years ahead. I did have happy years ahead, thank God.

I decided I'd also write out the Book of Psalms. I wanted My Daily Psalm Book in the Douay-Rheims version. So I bought a blank Moleskine notebook, cleaned my fountain pen and filled it with blue-black iron gall ink, traced a template sheet to keep things aligned, and started writing.

Sunday at Matins. I Nocturn. Psalm 1.

Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners, nor sat in the chair of pestilence. But his will is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he shall meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree which is planted near the running waters, which shall bring forth its fruit, in due season. And his leaf shall not fall off: and all whatsoever he shall do shall prosper. Not so the wicked, not so: but like the dust, which the wind driveth from the face of the earth. Therefore the wicked shall not rise again in judgment: nor sinners in the council of the just.

After six pages, I had gone through Psalm 8, and a knock came at the door. It was Jack, a Bread & Beer comrade, recent graduate with a master's degree in black bears, who is leaving Auburn for Utah, and came to say goodbye and take his beer mug. The yellow sun beamed through the sidelights. His mug, with its gunmetal sheen, glimmered from its hook on the wall. 

Bread & Beer

Jack

it said, engraved in the finish. He said he really liked having Bread & Beer to keep him grounded during his years in Auburn, and that he hoped he would find something like it in Utah.

It was soon until sunset. I texted a friend to see if he wanted to go walking in Kiesel Park. He was in Georgia, though. I went alone, with my camera. I took some photos in one of the fields, staying out until it was nearly dark.

Kiesel Park at sunset

I stopped by Chipotle and got a burrito bowl. I went home and took another bath, reading three more chapters of the novel. I want to do something new. I want to do something different. Those were my wandering thoughts while reading. I dried off and put on the clothes I would wear to work the next day. I grabbed a towel, a razor, and a toothbrush. I packed my books and pens and camera equipment. It was 10pm and I had work in the morning, but I was going to the lake. I want to see the Milky Way. I wonder if I can see it there tonight. What if someone is staying there? I can always turn around and be back here by midnight.

My quiet empty apartment

The moon was bright above the water. The Milky Way was there, but not like it was when I was a child. Dad took me there in the winter when I was a boy, to look at the stars. We stopped by Krystal's and got some chili and crackers on the way. I had never seen so many stars as that moonless night. Millions and millions of them, and the bright river of white that spanned the sky above.

I shot some photos, but I forgot my tripod in the rush to leave and had to rest my camera on decks, walls, and chairs. I took a thirty minute exposure and laid on a blanket under the stars while the camera gathered light.

Lakehouse at moonset

O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air! 

Moonset with a little Milky Way

See the Andromeda Galaxy a little above the roof on the right?

After midnight

30 minute star trail exposure with smeared Milky Way.

I didn't sleep in my bed there. I slept on the couch. It was 1am. I have to wake up at 6.

I woke at 5. The sun was rising. I took a few more photos, and read the Psalms of Matins and Lauds. This was the events of last night.

Sunrise. Now time for work.