Cell 2 Soul: The Humane Health Care Blog

Snaphots

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,     
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;   
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile     
The short and simple annals of the poor.   
                                                                   Thomas Gray

In a year's end section, The NY Times has collected  over 260 pictures with short blurbs honoring common people who died in 2011.  It is hauntingly touching.  We can each think of someone to add.  If any of you are moved to do so, send a photo and a vignette to C2S.  Better yet, why not also honor living common people who do uncommon things?  We encounter them every day.

See: The Lives They Lived

Dorothy Loney
My mother passed away on August 21st. She had only a short few years to her enjoy her only grandchild, Madeleine. The picture captures the one walk they ever took together.
Submitted by Matthew Loney

Maple Leaves

Williamstown Morning

Stone HIll, July 28, 2011

Res Ipsa Loquitur

via cell2soul.typepad.com

No Ashtrays, No Souvenirs

Reknown potter, Toshiko Takaezu, died in Honolulu on March 9, 2011 at the age of 88.  Born on June 17, 1922, in Pepeekeo, Hawaii, the middle child of 11, her parents were Japanese immigrants from Okinawa.

She was strongly influenced by her study of Zen Buddhism, and regarded her ceramic work as an outgrowth of nature and seamlessly interconnected with the rest of her life. “I see no difference between making pots, cooking and growing vegetables,” she was fond of saying. Indeed, she often used her kilns to bake chicken in clay, and dry mushrooms, apples and zucchinis.

“You are not an artist simply because you paint or sculpt or make pots that cannot be used,” she said. “An artist is a poet in his or her own medium. And when an artist produces a good piece, that work has mystery, an unsaid quality; it is alive.”

Full NY Times Obituary.

In 1975, Takaezu had a workshop at Kauai Community College which was organized by Wayne Miyata.  Martha Elpern was one of the participants and has these fading photos in an album.

 

10,000 Buddhas

On a recent visit to Japan, Ginny Tanji captured a vivid image:

the hillside temple's
paper lanterns burn brightly --
10,000 Buddhas!

Marginal Notes: Metamorphosis

 
"Frequent Flier" ©2010 Thomas A. Doty

When I was a boy, my friend and I used to stalk butterflies in the expanse of fields near our home:  cabbage butterflies, white with black wingtips and two dark insignia dots on the wings; golden sulfurs; tiny coppers and azures; orange monarchs; fluted swallowtails; admirals and fritillaries.  >>more

Brian T. Maurer has practiced pediatrics as a Physician Assistant for thirty years.  His "Marginal Notes" column appears periodically in the Cell2Soul Blog. The title "Marginal Notes" is taken from a quote by Henry David Thoreau: "I love a broad margin to my life."

Marginal Notes: The Asiatic Dayflower

Yesterday, while out for my morning walk with the dog, I noticed a stand of Asiatic Dayflowers (Commelina communis) in bloom at the end of our neighbor's driveway.

Each blossom contained three petals: the two above, cobalt blue Mickey Mouse ears; the one below, an opaque white. >>more

 

Brian T. Maurer has practiced pediatrics as a Physician Assistant for thirty years.  His "Marginal Notes" column appears periodically in the Cell2Soul Blog. The title "Marginal Notes" is taken from a quote by Henry David Thoreau: "I love a broad margin to my life."

Spring Sign

A Forest preserve -
Early Spring
Aimlessly wandering
A strange sign
Follow the arrow
Hidden away -
Inaccessible
The moss covered Spring --
In it's basin
Sky, Clouds, Branches

Which is reality?

Marginal Notes: The Sensual Sea

Hemingway wrote that la mar is what the Cuban fishermen call the sea when they love her.  For his fictional old man, the sea was always feminine, even though in the Spanish language the sea is traditionally masculine, el mar.  “The old man always thought of her as feminine and as something that gave or withheld great favours, and if she did wild or wicked things it was because she could not help them.” >>more

Brian T. Maurer has practiced pediatrics as a Physician Assistant for thirty years.  His "Marginal Notes" column appears periodically in the Cell2Soul Blog. The title "Marginal Notes" is taken from a quote by Henry David Thoreau: "I love a broad margin to my life."