Three Clouds Sail By

Some days an early morning mist hangs in the valley and mingles with the steam from the dyeworks. Clouds of vapour rise above the houses and drift upwards, melting towards the sky.

Doing some Tai Chi the other morning I practised Hands Waving Clouds. Concentrating, after a minute or so as my body turned I glanced out of the window and saw three small clouds of steam from the chimney float calmly by across the rooftops from right to left, sailing a perfect horizontal line just as my hands had been describing.
I love Tai Chi.

‘As you get older, it really takes very little to provide a little excitement in your life.’

These words caught my attention recently as I was reading a post from one of my favourite blogs; Jim Work, photographer, celebrates ‘images of small things from the smallest county in Texas’. I love his pictures, gathered from the quiet corners of his life in the place that he knows; ordinary things made extraordinary through the eye of his lens and the quiet reflection of his thoughts. Here in Yorkshire people talk this way, without elaboration, getting straight to the heart of the matter in very few words, whereas I seem always to go the long way round and make everything too complicated.

Simplicity, stillness, focus. Less really is so much more.