Kahlil Gibran and the Kadisha Valley of Lebanon

Two years ago, I had the opportunity to walk through the Kadisha Valley of northern Lebanon. It is a gorgeous area and it also happens to be the birthplace of Kahlil Gibran. Thus, I will combine some of my photos with some of Gibran's better known quotes.

You may forget with whom you laughed, but you will never forget with whom you wept.

You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts.

Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children.

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.

If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours. If they don’t, they never were.

Sadness is but a wall between two gardens.

They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.

The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the greatest intention.

In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed. [More . . . ]

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Photography Tip – Shooting People Who Are Happily Talking

What a cool idea. Photographing people having a happy conversation is difficult because normal conversation involves a lot of sounds that scrunch up people's mouths. Nicole Young came up with this idea to have the people pretend they are talking, but the only two words allowed are "hey" and "yes." This brings a lot more smiley looks into the scene.

I'm looking forward to trying this next time I need a shot of two people happily talking.

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Anti-Woke Artists to the Rescue?

Woke-thought, especially in the form of Critical Race Theory, has drilled deeply into many of our primary sense-making institutions: schools, government, corporations and news media.  Cancel culture is its enforcement arm as you can read in many places including this website. Wokesters refuse to subject their ideas to public scrutiny, as Coleman Hughes recently discovered.  How do we turn this ship around?  How do we publicly and effectively shame people whose version of morality is to shove each other into color categories and treat some of those colors with scorn?

How do we pressure those who espouse these types of principles? Is there an end in sight?

James Lindsay, who created the above graphic (and who created the website New Discourses) recently wrote an article titled, "Wokeness will bring a second Renaissance," in which he argues that artists have just about had their fill of all of this political correctness:

What is it that artists across the arts have had enough of? Woke colonization. Woke censorship. Woke culture. Woke hegemony. Woke complaining. Woke negativity about everything. Wokeness. Period.

Artists are telling me more and more frequently that they’ve had it with Woke control over their professions and their outlets. This is an interesting circumstance because artists who feel silenced, repressed, controlled, and dominated will, as reliably as day follows night in the morning, begin to produce incredible works of powerful, defiant, and subversive art. They will make art that will communicate the injustice of this oppression in a way that does something no amount of intellectual explaining can possibly do. They will make art to connect with people—and to connect people to the oppression they sense but don’t know how to make sense of. . . . What I’m hearing from artists is a cry to produce the beautiful again. The stirring. The unsettling. The hilarious. To get out of this stifling environment and throw off stagnation.

James argues that art is organic and artists are unstoppable. He believes that help is on the way in the form of art..

I'm more than ready for this to happen.

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Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis – More than a Cemetery

People in STL call it "Bellefontaine Cemetery" but on its website you'll see this: "Bellefontaine Cemetery is a nonprofit, non-denominational cemetery and arboretum . . ." I know it best as an extraordinary place for getting lost on feng shui inner roads and for reveling at the 5,000 trees. And for reading the 87,000 graves and monuments for the meagre clues they offer about those who used to walk and talk like you and me.

 

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Memories of Istanbul

Until COVID struck, I was traveling once or twice per year to Istanbul, Turkey, to teach law school (week-long courses). I look forward to the day when I can again travel to Istanbul. I truly miss the visiting in person with students and friends. The Turks are awesome! I keep in touch with several of them. But I also miss the many astounding images one sees everywhere in Istanbul. I took the top photo in 2017. I reworked it tonight. This is an image of the Blue Mosque that I took from the Hagia Sofia (which was built in the year 532). The photo below is the interior of the Blue Mosque (built in 1609). Seeing these ancient buildings in person gives rise to deep emotions of admiration for the architects and builders. Seeing them with your own eyes caused me to think of the multitudes of people who have visited these structures at so many key points in their lives.

This final photo is one I took while riding one of the many ferries that plow the Bosphorus day and night.  The city of Istanbul is partly in Europe and partly in Asia, and the waters of the Bosphorus Strait mark the boundary.

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