LIMITED BLESSING-A POLITICAL THROWBACK

LIMITED MERCY

    A blessing of this area is the coastal fog, especially so in this third year of California drought .

     The marine bank begins to thicken and roll when temperatures rise on the eastern side of the Santa Lucia range.  

   Here on the western slopes, fog trickles around sunset and begins to billow into valleys.

   During the night it may remain in the valleys and cling to the slopes,

 or fill the sky and obscure the pristine star field over the mountains and pacific. Some nights it hovers thickly as though written into the moors by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle but  will quickly wisp away revealing an ocean of galaxies. Coastal dreams are woven beneath this dance of misty gossamer.

  Morning will dawn under a damp blanket of moist relief and cool.

   It is a dose of mercy.

    By late morning sun angles on the grazing slopes, orchards and vineyards.

     The great golden light and saturated color returns.

     Tender shoots nurtured by the fog and the cool are quickly gone. A dry land and its inhabitants await the start of a rainy season.

     And we hope.

THROWBACK CLASS OFFICERS

    Ball State University Sophomore Class Officers 1966. John Yount, Joe Peach, Joy Novak, Sally Staley, Tom Cochrun.

     See you down the trail.

RECOLOR

RECOLORING

 Cultivated 

Lana E Cochrun

Oil 8X10  

     Drought is tempered by views as green season begins a bit reserved. Renewal is pleasing, even when late.

 TWILIGHT FOG

     Evening fog is mysterious.  Sifting into the valleys and grazing slopes it can just as quickly ghost away leaving an ascending full moon. The moisture serves a slight blessing and refresher. 

    California's spring light energizes the palate. 

Newly Plowed

Lana Cochrun

Oil 12x16  

Tilled

Lana Cochrun

Oil 8x10

     Enjoy your bacchanal celebrations as well.

    See you down the trail.  

ONE OF THE BEST IN THE WORLD

FLIRTING WITH FOG

IN BIG SUR

     As my friend Jim, who introduced me to Big Sur in 1969 said, "Big Sur never disappoints."

    On our most recent trip, Big Sur is about 20 minutes away,
we were treated to the brooding, mysterious Big Sur in the
fog and to that magnificent and magical Big Sur in the sun.
    From the marine bank in the frame below, shot from above where it hovered over the coast,  to the sunny stairs that follow later, Big Sur never disappointed.
    There is no place like it. 

      In the frame below you can see the dance between sun and fog that played around each bend and into each canyon or cove.

     I've posted a few extra shots of the ragged shore at Sandollar. A few of you have told me you like those rock and sea shots for screen savers and home pages.

     Finally the sun broke through on the splendor of 
Sandollar Beach. 

   Tomorrow, the whimsy of Big Sur, away from the road and sea.

   See you down the trail.

A THRILL OF THE COAST

SUN TO FOG

     This evening shot captures the foggy edge of a day

that ranged from the extremes available at the coast. A very warm and bright sunrise, warm morning, brilliantly sunny mid day and the rolling in of a massive bank of marine clouds and haze, pre sunset, strings together a series of micro climates and clothing adjustments.  Shorts and short sleeves, give way to jeans and fleece.  The cool marine fog fills the valleys, obscures the mountains and shrouds the trees that just a couple of hours before were brilliantly green under a cobalt blue sky.  Living near the Pacific brings these changes and diversity.

PERPETUALLY SUNNY

      Though I'm a little dubious about these things, I'm happy

to note that a fellow blogger has awarded me the Sunshine Award.

       I appreciate the sentiment, and certainly appreciate the awarding blogger Bruce Tayor's Oddball Observations, but as an old journalist I'm suspect of these awards that form a kind of mutual admiration society.  Boy, do I sound like a cynic at the Banquet of the Sunshine Society, or what?!  

      This kind of mutual support in the blogosphere is actually a wonderful thing.  It is kind and generous, and of that I am appreciative. I think it is nice that people pass this along to 

others.  That it helps grow awareness of other bloggers and writers is fine as well.  But it reminds me a bit of kids sending secret "I like you, will you be my girl friend?" notes  on the playground.  Sweet. Cute. But my posts are often

not either.  So, Thank You Bruce.  Thank you Sunshine Award

originators and fellow recipients.  As someone who loves

the sunshine, and sunny dispositions, I accept on behalf

of those of us who take our sunshine with reality, on the rocks, shaken and not stirred.  

       So, something about me, an obligation of the award.  I love film and cinema.  I admire artists regardless of medium.  I think creativity is one of the highest achievements of the human mind. My heroes include John Muir, David Brinkley, Ernie Pyle, my father Karl and there are others.  One current hero is my friend Bob Foster some 56 days into a bone marrow transplant. My clan were Picts. The bloodline is Scots, Celt, Anglo Norman, (English), Welsh, Pennsylvania Dutch from the Palitinate.

      I have two published books, and would love to add to that number if I can get a deal for #3.  #4 is a work in progress.
       Another obligation of the award is to nominate another blogger.  I think Mollie, who I have known since her birth,
is a very deserving recipient.  She is an enormously talented
young writer who has shown a gift as she plumbs what it 
means to be a young Christian in the 21st Century.
Mollies lightbymorning blog.  
        See you down the trail.