Nature's Place

The last couple days there have been some colourful visitors to the house. An unusual black and orange wasp, an opalescent beetle and a kind of mantis or mantis mimic. A little colour from the deep psyche where light and beauty begin to take on wondrous form.

The orange wasp was the first to appear. It was on the end of a metal wire hanging from the ceiling of the shed. I wondered what it was doing there since there was obviously no food to be had and from the web I could see this was spider territory. Then it occurred to me, some wasps attack spiders and paralyse them with a sting and carry them off to a prepared nesting site where the wasp lays an egg or something on it to feed as it grows then seals the chamber and flies away on more wasp business. Ingenious, and it’s back again today in the same spot. I wonder why.

I’ll have to go and watch it for a while. But cautiously, this wasp is like others in my experience. It doesn’t like me to get too close. And I have to respect its intelligently defensive nature.

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The beetle appeared after sunset last night. It was attracted to the light I leave on to keep insects from coming to the lights of the house and getting in. It didn’t work last night there was so many beetles. The frogs must have had a ball though, signs of much eating left on the shed floor, insect shells.

I cleared a few of the opal beetles from the sink this morning and brought them to the table outside, alive and kicking. I shot them in the morning light of the sun filtered through passing clouds but the opalescence didn’t show in the image. I saw one of them as it shit a dark liquid and just then it lifted its carapace and spread its wings and flew off in the direction of the sun, towards me. As it did I was splashed by this dark liquid, the price of a photo.

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When I went to the car this afternoon to put the camera in the boot I saw what looks like a praying mantis but I’ve never seen one like this before, with the colour and the wings and size. I’ve seen shades of green and grey and camouflage but not this one. It might be a mimic to protect it from other creatures, I have seen a picture of a wasp that mimics the mantis but those front arms look potent to me, big and strong, authentic. Amazing little creatures.

I went to the nearby forest for a walk and the mantis was still on the rear windscreen when I got there, and when I got back. I didn’t go fast. It’s still there as the sun goes down and I write this.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

There is a plant flowering in a clearing in the nearby forest right now. A tall slender stemmed plant with bunches of small white flowers at the end of each branch, not many branches. It has a strong and unusual smell and attracts many small insects, beetles, flies etc. And some larger insects like the butterfly and moth.

On every bunch of flowers there is at least one white crab spider and a couple of other kinds of spider too. The crab spider is so called because of how it preys, or prays, sitting with front legs spread like the claws of a crab, waiting for something to come within grasping range. It is also nearly invisible, white against white, and seems to be able to vary its shade of colour for camouflage.

One of the other spiders appears to pounce on its prey, another moves directly across the distance to grasp and bite with lightning speed. Not much escapes the wily spider.

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I have noticed some things about spiders, the thread they make is not just to ensnare the unlucky bug in a web, it is also for travelling on, and a lifeline for when knocked off or jumping off the security of the solid nature.

It communicates to the spider through vibration what’s going on at the other end of it. The spider probably recognises the correct signal for prey of varying kinds – too small or big. If you left click it and open it in another tab and left click it again you can see on the first picture of the spider its second ‘foot’ isn’t resting on the flower, it’s resting or ‘feeling’ on the thread. There are also signs of a network of thread there, as there are on the flowers in most of the other pictures.

The thread is also for casting, like a fishing line, to take the spider to new ground or to find a hook – by sticking to some other structure so it can start building a web, or as an anchor against being blown away in the wind. Guide rails, anchor, safety ropes and fishing line as well as a net and telegraph. I understand some spiders also use a denser, more visible weave in their web, a zigzag pattern, often in the shape of an X to warn and attract. I have also seen them eat their own web when it is destroyed – waste not – want not.

I see it all as an expression of the magnificent intelligence behind.

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There was one flying insect about the size of a mosquito that displayed unusual behaviour when approaching the flower heads from above. It behaved as if it was about to land on the flowers and just before it touched down up it rose again. It looked as if it was bouncing in slow motion off the surface but without touching it.

It performed this manoeuvre many times before actually landing which would serve to draw any waiting spider out of hiding – hiding can be just not moving when the spider is the same colour as the flower. Often the only way to know something is there is if it moves.

That’s all intelligence too, that’s Nature.

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There is an equivalence of the spider in human nature – but emotionalised. There always is since we came ‘up’ through the species and the knowledge of the being of spider – or anything else – is within. Nature is a reflection of my nature and in most people one aspect or another can manifest at times. Have you ever noticed some people display characteristics of different creatures? I met a mouse-like person recently.

I have recently – unavoidably – had dealings over a period of time with a man of position who is sometimes overtaken by a spider-like nature – the ‘right’ vibration strikes the vicious – emotionalised attack complex – snatch and bite and bind – if it can. He has also displayed other less predatory characteristics in various disguises, shape-shifting according to the prevailing wind of mind. He knows the pain of it too. But not enough to do anything effective about it, yet.

That’s Human nature. Tricky stuff, to be handled with caution. And what man isn’t a tricky fellow at some time? Everybody has it, more or less.

Everybody is also of the divine and thank god for that, the God nature – or whatever it’s called. Really, and for being able to see it because seeing it enough frees me of the sticky binding of tricky emotion.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

Yellow Dragonfly and Colourful Friends

It’s not a he or a she, the ‘Photographer’. It’s an id-entity. An entity from the id – the subconscious, constructed out of the need of expression in that form and the experience of it.

The ‘Photographer’ is the one that picks the equipment I will take with me today, according to the prevailing and anticipated conditions for the predictable nature. It decides where to go for the best possibility of something to shoot according to what is known. It’s the one that is always looking out for the elusive Dragonfly, and when one shows up it’s the ‘Photographer’ that checks exposure and tries all sorts of settings and positions to capture the image – beautifully.

The photographer is a part of what I am when I am that but if given too much time or space it stresses about the process, a wanting gets in, and the pure sense of nature gets left out of it. It’s a matter of balance – isn’t it all.

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I have found it of great benefit lately to leave the photographer behind when I go walking in the nearby bush. Now I often leave it in the boot of the car and only when I have done being in the purity of nature do I let it out, to keep it in its place – always secondary.

I began this practice in earnest recently and it was lovely not having it sitting on my shoulder looking for the shot. I laughed once more at the simple pleasure simply being in nature is. At the contrast of one to the other, fresh in my experience.

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A little way down the track I saw the colourful Dragon I – the photographer – have wanted to get a good shot of. No camera, what a relief. Just the sense of it all.

I stopped to look at the creature where it had perched and it moved a couple of times but came back to a spot I could easily approach. I got down on my hunkers and sat looking at her for a while, seeing the detail of what I could see. Then it occurred to me to offer the working end of my walking stick for a perch. I put it within a few inches of the Dragon and after a few seconds she came and sat on the end of the stick. Amazing.

She sat there a while and slowly I drew her close so I could see better – I had my looking glasses on. I brought her to within five or six inches of my eye and saw her as never before. This beautiful wild life had come to say hello. Hello lady Dragonfly.

That’s what happens when I leave the id-entity behind, nature acknowledges her own – being nature.

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What do you call your id-entity? The identity – the form I am attached to – will always try to put an image first – as some thought or emotion. I just leave it in the boot a lot of the time now. And if it climbs out as thought about something I don’t need to think about back in it goes – by focusing on the sense-ation.

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When I got back to the car I got the ‘Photographer’ out of the boot and took it for a short walk down another track into the bush. The first thing that happened was three Dragons appeared in the space before me and danced in the air, as they do, chasing one another around. Two of them took off and the third patrolled the area and frequently came to check me out, within two feet of me many times, hovering there, directly facing me.

A faster focusing camera with wing-beat speed and rhythm sensing and good low light performance, programmable for point of focus relative to the beat sensed and dof, could have caught some terrific photos. That’s the ‘Photographer’ talking, a wishful one.

I stood looking at her flying around, and around me, and planted my stick in the soft sandy ground and stepped away from it in case she would land on it as one has done before. She didn’t and I walked on as she went about her business.

Ten metres down the trail she, or another just like her, came and perched on a branch at about head height and just a few feet away. The position was easy on the back but wasn’t the best for lighting so the photographer had to work at it. But what the heck, that’s what ‘Photographers’ are supposed to do.

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I left the photographer in the boot again today and came across a lone dragonfly, nothing else in sight. He was perched in the gum bush as the sun was going down and he was a beauty. A larger Dragon than I have seen before this year, looking mature in colour, and robust. His sandy stone-grey eyes unusual in my experience.

I approached with customary care but he didn’t seem to mind me at all. I got within a few inches to admire the magnificent design and reflect on the simple intelligence behind. A perfect Dragon, undamaged and in his prime I would say.

When I reached out with my finger to within an inch he made no move, so I touched his wing and he still didn’t move. The material of the wing was almost invisible to my touch it was that soft and giving. Then he flew away.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

Violet Angel

I stopped being one recently, a school bus driver.

And the birds are travelling with me now. At the last stop on the last day of me being a school bus driver an Ibis took flight from the kerbside and led the bus down the road for a bit. I eased off the pedal to give it some space. Young Max was delighted too. Goodbye bus driving. Goodbye kids.

It was a discipline driving the school bus, for me and some of the kids, particularly some of the older boys – one is the reciprocal of the other. But, eventually, the dark entity that was in the back of the bus when I took over the run either gave up or was kicked off, rightly so. Not with aggression or indifference but with understanding and knowing what I don’t want – won’t tolerate. And with a view to demonstrating you don’t get away with bad attitude in this world, it has consequences and it can be given up – while they are still young enough to be able to do it relatively easily. I also had angelic helpers in the form of the little ones, mostly the girls but significantly some younger boys, if only in their presence.

That’s what I call the spiritual life. The ordinary everyday work done properly – without giving in to any negativity of mind – mine or anyone else’s – the best I can. And acknowledging the simple good in one way or another.

I left the bus in order and peace – as within – more or less. Right on time. A significant job done, for now.
 
Copyright reserved / Mark Berkery
 

Rosella at Sunset

I got home the other afternoon and that’s what I saw on my computer screen four days before I was to give my first public talk, system failure. The modem had burnt out. I tried for a while to fix it but soon got the message; it really is dead. But it’s just the old system and in the death of the old the new is born.

I had been thinking about getting a new system anyway, mine is too old, too slow for the latest size files for uploading and processing. Then I remembered recently saying to life; “Take whatever is necessary to make me more pure.” I let it go – the modem and thoughts of fixing the system – next week is soon enough.

That’s a prayer that was once suggested to me by a man who cared enough to know the power of it, he cared enough to love. When I am sincere enough life will take whatever is necessary, whenever it is necessary.

I needed to slow down a bit, obviously. 56kbs was travelling too fast, at the time. The birds had been telling me for a week.

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The birds have been crossing my path at every turn, while driving the bus or car or just walking along, slowing me down. Saying; look at me, take heed. Birds, the messengers of the gods, go anywhere, see everything birds. Beautiful characterful birds. Red, yellow and blue Rosellas, boisterous Galahs, screeching Rainbow Lorikeets, sweet and swift soft speaking House Martins, beautiful black – white eyed Crows, groups of red cheeked Finches, neon blue Tits and family, and Birds of Prey.

Birds of prayer, to me. Born of the divine. I love Thee.

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The reflection of the sun on the windshields of the cars was exceptionally beautiful yesterday as I drove the school bus into Mullumbimby for the last time. A blazing sparkle of a silver white beauty with maybe just a hint of gold. And no glare, extraordinary.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

 
To successfully stalk and capture anything it is necessary to know something about its behaviour, its habits or predispositions. To know anything about a Dragonfly’s ways I observe – the best I can without the distraction of unnecessary thought.

A relaxation of the eyes, a pulling back inside, is also necessary since they usually move too fast and unpredictably to actually track against the often cluttered and matching coloured backgrounds they move in. At least where I find them, in the coastal wetland forest of Billinudgel NR.

There are a few locations I know now where the Dragonfly favours hunting and basking in the sun. At different times of the day they can be found at one place or another. It’s not entirely predictable when they have so many suitable places to be. The time of day also seems to determine how active or relaxed they are, not unlike people.

At one of these places I was quietly and slowly approaching a perched Dragon when off into the darkness of the bush he went. It helps that they have a habit of favouring a perch but when there are many suitable perches the habit disappears. They do that. Land, sit a few seconds or minutes – as long as it takes for me to get in position, then off to another spot, near or far. It tests me for any wanting, trying or disappointment.

As soon as the Dragon took off though a robust looking butterfly landed in almost the exact same spot – in the forest. You couldn’t ask for it. I got a few good shots of it before it too took flight, but before it did another bigger butterfly landed just a few inches in front of it.

It stopped just long enough for me to focus and shoot twice. And both shots came out ok. As I said, you couldn’t ask for it.

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Back to Dragons though. None of these creatures stand still for long when the sun is high, that’s feeding time and they seem to spend it high in the air – as high as twenty feet that I’ve seen – about as high as the treetops – feeding height? It’s also mating time. And basking time. But when isn’t? Night time?

Seemingly they only stop to rest and sense what’s around them, or be, being a dragonfly.

Somehow I just can’t see them thinking; ‘Jeez, that bird nearly got me that time, gotta be more careful crossing that creek in future.’ – or – ‘Damn, missed it, what am I going to eat now, if I’m hungry I’ll be weak and distracted and might fly into a web or tree, or something – could be fatal – I don’t want to die!’ Or thinking anything at all!

I’d say experience is directly imprinted on their psyche, no conscious evaluation, no reflection – spontaneous absorption and integration according to an unknowable – to the thinker – intelligence. Certainly no complicating emotional or mental consideration – no suffering. In my observation.

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Sometimes the small creatures just don’t mind me, an increasingly large and strange object in their view, getting closer – as close as five to twenty inches a lot of the time due to the lenses I use.

The impact of my appearance is minimised by me lowering myself closer to the ground the closer I get to the creature, so I don’t necessarily appear to get much bigger and loom over them and so perhaps threaten them. Bowing to them you could say, bowing to their sensibilities.

I have often observed the Dragon preening itself with the two most forward legs or arms that it has tucked up most of the time against the back of its huge eyes. Have you ever seen how clean a Dragon keeps the back of its head? Pristine clean behind the ears! Almost. And the robotically rapid turn of the head as potential prey passes by just too fast for it to do anything about. Magnificent creatures.

In flight they often glide after a quick flutter of the wings, especially if there is a breeze to support them – conserving energy. And they are quick to chase one another, the bigger ones have their own territory which they guard very effectively. The smaller ones have to tussle over it, but briefly – no harm done – none I can see.

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Photographing small creatures can be a real effort at times. Once they have been tracked to their favoured places, which isn’t always possible, the real work begins. They just don’t pose that often in the wild, where I mostly shoot. So it is necessary to get in position for the angle of shot and stealthily – with minimum noise and discernible movement or presence – approach them, sometimes directly, sometimes roundabouts.

It’s not unlike a game of hide and seek, except insects are much smaller than anything I ever had to find when I played that. Often the only clue to their position is a slight movement in the corner of my eye, rarely a sound. Or it’s a game of patience – absence of impatience really – being easy inside and just seeing what is there. It’s a surrender of anything inside that disturbs or intrudes on the actual purpose – being where I am. Photo’s are secondary, always, that’s the perception.

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Once I get to know my equipment, and keep it ready and clean – inside and out, then it’s just a matter of being. Being within the fact of things. Like how the camera functions, fast or slow, low light or not, set for the situation or not.

And how the body functions – the body is equipment too – steady hand or not, lie with the ants or strain the back, go into the mud and mozzies after the shot, or not – Not often!

Eventually, the integration of knowing and being becomes an intuition. A fluidity of action or observation – action in itself.

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In the end it really is just a matter of being where I am and seeing what is there – here. The only question is can I do it? Get the shot without disturbance – to body or mind – the creatures and mine.

I tend to focus on the sensation inside as the situation allows, and return to it rather than think useless thoughts. And focus on the sense, the fact of things ‘outside’. When I’m ‘in’ action I’m being that. Then no disturbance arises, or at least doesn’t get ‘in’.

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‘‘ ’I’ am not here, this is only another appearance in your sense that will soon pass without incident.” – describes the message being transmitted, if there is one.

Most of the time, now I know more or less where to look, the Dragons present themselves or they don’t – and that’s it – more or less.

And where there is least disturbance, of mind, there is the most pleasing result. With mind-ing out of the way creativity is free to work and stalking is a pleasure.

As long as the body is up to it.

*

And if ever I come to dream to ‘know’ it all, wake me Life – surely, from my vain slumber.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

 
When I go into the garage and the swallows are there, as soon as they see me one gives a small whistling sound as it dives from the nest and in a smooth and graceful arc exits through the open door at the other end. Beautiful to watch. The other one now remains at the nest, perhaps there are eggs there now. I have heard swallows, they could be swifts or martins, will return year after year to a successful nest site. They are welcome as long as I am here.

It is a pleasure to watch the pair of them circling the space at the front of the house, swooping and dodging, talking as they go. Every now and then I surprise them by the front door next to the open door of the garage. A quick whistle and they’re away into the air. Strong, streamlined, fast and accurate hunters. Beautiful nature. I am pleased they are living next to me.

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A big fly got in to the house with the cat, the big buzzing kind of fly. I can’t have such creatures living and laying in the house and I can’t leave the door open for it to exit since more, or something else, would probably enter. After following it around for a while I was able to swat it down and it lay there unconscious for long enough for me to shoot it, with the camera. Then it started moving again, got up on its feet and wandered in circles for a few seconds. I put it outside before it started flying again. Tough little fellows.

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The Damselfly is smaller than the Dragonfly. Accordingly it appears to patrol a smaller territory. It doesn’t seem to have a favoured perch but easily moves to and from the available vantage points.

I watched one today as it moved around and saw it chase a few possibilities from one particular perch. I was quick enough of eye to see at least two small moths rise from the grass below the occupied perch and pass within reach of the Damsel. But the damsel was not quick or relentless enough to catch them. Realising, perhaps, it was a waste of valuable energy.

It returned to this perch four or five times, probably because the opportunities for feeding presented themselves here and not somewhere else. And then it was away to another perch, an opportunist rather than a hunter like the Dragonfly

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The Bugs Are Back in strength. At the light outside that I have on to attract them away from the lights of the house they are spinning around. Orbiting the light as the planets orbit the sun. I’m not going out to see what they are yet. I know there will be mozzies and probably other delightful creatures – when I get close enough with the camera.

The little black biters are swarming in the Billinudgel NR. Midges I think they are. They have a very sharp bite, or whatever it is. It has been suggested they are actually inserting an egg or some such beneath the surface of the skin that some days later hatches and causes a terrible itch.

They are too small to see if it is so but some days later there is a terrible itch. It’s an odd thing but the itching seems to reach a crescendo when I go back into the bush, as if the newly hatched can tell when they are home and it’s time to jump ship.

The mozzies are back too with the warmer weather and the abundant wet of the nearby forest, but they’re not a problem yet. As long as I stay out of the darker places it’s ok. They don’t go out on the trails before the sun gets low either. So, from an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset it is relatively mozzie free. As long as the sun shines.

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I was driving to the shop and I saw a python crossing the road in broad daylight. It was about five foot long. I stopped to get a closer look and it was unmoved by my presence. Unhurried, quietly, gracefully making its way up the hillside and into the trees. Seeking its way through the foliage, reaching out from a sturdy branch to the wisps of new growth that looked too flexible to give the long heavy snake any traction. A crossing requiring consummate balance, a clearly focused presence.

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When I was taking pictures in the NR the other day, standing waiting for the Dragonfly to land, I felt something on my leg. I looked immediately – such things can’t be ignored when there are so many creatures with mechanical and chemical weaponry – and invasive reproductive systems. It was a jumping ant with its long and threatening jaws or mandibles – long pointy defensive and offensive tools at the front of the head.

I haven’t been bitten by one yet but have been told it is painful. This one was carrying a packet of something yellow which, when cropped, looks like a tiny caterpillar. This jumping ant wasn’t doing any jumping. In fact it was having great difficulty navigating over the hairs on my leg – its struggles getting it nowhere fast. So I knocked it off, back to traversable territory.

*

Another fly got into the house, and got whacked like the first one. This one got up again too.

Instinctive life, it just never gives up.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery
 

 
At first this post may seem off theme for my site but someone recently mentioned to me an article he was writing on ridding the world of tyrants. This post was inspired by that – amongst other things.

It is an analogy of how difficult living can be at times. And of the untold and often untellable story of those in the trenches and the cockpits of daily living doing their best to get through, and of those that get through. The ordinary people doing it right and getting back up after the inevitable fall.

We all have a tyrant in us. Some more than others. And in different forms of expression but always first through thought and emotion. Nobody can deny it.

If the world is ever to be rid of tyrants it has to start where I find it first, in the tyranny of emotion and thinking, in me – whoever I may be.

This post is for those that recognise it, as is this site, so read it to the end if you will.

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FBTSOMP, it’s the acronym for ‘flying by the seat of my pants’. It’s a euphemism for how close to the ground pilots sometimes had to fly in order to see anything – maybe even feel it, on the seat of their pants. It probably comes from the First World War – the second one too, when there was no radar or none reliable. Often the pilots of crippled English fighter planes from the famous dogfights (aerial battles) with the Germans over the English Channel, especially in the historic Battle of Britain, were trying to find their way home to land.

No radar, the plane was probably damaged from battle and that infamous English fog effectively blinded the pilot. With the occasional encouragement from a distant radio operator – if the radio was still working, and maybe some chance sighting of a landmark in a break in the fog, the pilots often made it home.

Then, when they were fit enough – or even when they weren’t – out they went again. More often than not to die in battle. And the pilots were not only British, they were from all over the world. They didn’t feel heroic or noble, they knew fear until the moment of engagement with the enemy, and exhaustion. They knew loss, suffering of another kind. And no doubt they were always glad to get back home, those that did.

I have seen the movies and I don’t think it was all propaganda. The war was thrust upon the British people by a tyrant with a will to conquer his neighbours, who had at his command a far superior, ready and highly disciplined military machine. And though many battles were lost I believe the British were able to endure because they were ‘right’.

The time was right. The cause was right. And the right man to lead was available for the duration. I was never a student of history but Winston Churchill made some great speeches. One in particular comes to mind. “We shall fight on the beaches..We shall never surrender”. Inspiring stuff.

*

However.

Walking down a track today through a stand of paperbark trees rising out of a field of reeds, I came to an opening in the woods where a creek ran through. The creek was broad and shallow and the reeds that grew from it were much smaller than in the surrounding field.

Standing there in the shadow of a tree, looking out into the bright sunlit glade that formed about the creek, I could see the shiny threads of silk left by the spiders at the tops of the tall reeds to either side waving freely in the breeze. There was much traffic up to head height, much too-ing and fro-ing of various small flying insects, this way and that at different speeds, patterns and shades of colour. Indications of a certain character.

The occasional dry leaves falling from the treetops, twisting, spiralling, tumbling, flopping and plumb straight down. A large Dragonfly entered my view at speed and so easily took one of these fallings on the wing then, in an instant, released it as he flew, finding nothing of sustenance there. And on his way he went.

I watched him patrolling the clear space above the creek of reeds, to and fro, hovering here and there. Only six feet from me I saw him skim the calm surface of the clear water and leave a wake in it where he took a sup, or a bite.

Then I saw a second Dragonfly enter the stage and join the first in a high speed aerial duet that was dazzling to the eye. It lasted a few seconds before they gracefully parted to go about their solitary Dragonfly business.

A wonderful place. Inside.
 
Copyright Reserved / Mark Berkery