Where there is nothing...there I am

[val]

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/786/1114.jpg

Dear LiSe...

I hope you will forgive me for posting your image again. I can't access the original thread anymore...grrrrrr.

I thought the style was very reminiscent of the work of Anton's I have seen online. I just didn't want to make any assumptions.

Please forgive me my creative license with his work. Although I understand it meant something different to the artist when he created it, I "boarded" Anton's fishing trawler and found myself with my soul's desire there. All was peaceful and quietly joyful.

I believe that is one of the purposes of creating art. Besides a means of self-expression for me, the artist, when released...liberated from my hand, the art becomes a means of self-expression for the viewer as well.

Love always,

Val

[heylise]

You are right, and I was wrong: he may have made it with one person in his mind (if there was anything one could give a name to), but you joined him (or a creative soul) there. So of course there is more than one.

LiSe

[heylise]

I finally became friends with my negative-scanner. So now I can scan all those old negatives, more than 9000 or so.
I found a picture of myself at age 33, and I could not resist . .
So for one week it will be on my profile.
LiSe

[yellowblue]

LiSe,

It's a great picture... a lot of expression--light and happiness it seems : )

Naturally curly hair??

Deb

[val]

Now I have seen positive proof that Anton does indeed have an eye for beauty.

Thanks for posting your picture.

Love,

Val

[martin]

Lovely picture LiSe!

[tashiiij]

LiSe;

The Instant

Where are the centuries, where is the dream
of sword-strife that the Tartars entertained,
where are the massive ramparts that they flattened?
Where is the wood of the Cross, the Tree of Adam?

The present is singular. It is memory
that sets up time. Both succession and error
come with the routine of the clock. A year
is no less vanity than is history.

Between dawn and nightfall is an abyss
of agonies, felicites, and cares.
The face that looks back from wasted mirrors,
the mirrors of night, is not the same face.
The fleeting day is frail and is eternal;
expect no other Heaven, no other Hell.

Jorges Luis Borges

here is to your beauty: eternal and present.

tash.

[shelley]

Wow LiSe! You are SO BEAUTIFUL!!

I already thought you were, without knowing what your outside looks like.

Love,

Shelley

[heylise]

Beautiful Tash!

Tash said 'eternal', and inside it does feel that way. It is as if you add to the inside what you take away from the outside. "The face that looks back is not the same face", but you don't lose anything.

And all thanks for the great compliments. But beware!, I will post one of these days a picture of 'me now'. Almost twice as old.

Yes, the curls are natural, but the sheep's-wool look was not. Some time after this picture I found the right shampoo, and suddenly I had very different hair (nice surprise for the next 30 years). Well, this is open space, so even shampoo can be mentioned.

LiSe

[hilary]

Absolutely. I just bought some shampoo based on goat's milk and chamomile, and it's very good.

Put the recent photo up without telling anyone, LiSe, and see if anyone notices! You haven't changed much, you know - except maybe the smile's grown...

[yellowblue]

Yes Tash,

That was beautiful... I will save it in my quotation folder.

LiSe, tell me more about that shampoo .....

Deb

[candid]

LiSe, having seen your image then and now, you are still lovely, inside and out.

Whimsical thought - to have two images on the profile, then and now. After all, this site is largely about change.. and the unchanging.

[hilary]

Next time I'm at Mum's, I'll try to scan in some 29-year-old photos...

It all goes well with LiSe's personal quote, anyway.

[tashiiij]

Deb,

Will you get unemployment? Maybe you can catch up on some lit-er-a-chure!!!

Candid,.

speaking of 'pi-chures' -

check out yers!

dude!!!!

[yellowblue]

Tash,

Yes I will, but want to move forward asap... : )

Deb

[joang]

LiSe, what a lovely face!

Candid, I like your idea... then and now pics. Cool.

[heylise]

It was what I wanted to do, but it took too much time, so I put up just one. I will, soon. Hope other will too.
LiSe

[hilary]

Speaking of profile photos - I think Tash is the black one with blue eyes. Am I right?

[tashiiij]

I'm the one who had too much gin!
y'know, that one lurching a little....
slouching towards bethlehem, er, so to speak....

(wink!)

[candid]

Tash, check out mine, dude? I just put it up there recently. Why would I check it out?

I guess we could merge a then and now into one image. I am SO not a graphic artist!

[candid]

Ok, I did a really shlocky job in Paint (don't laugh! heh heh) and put up a then/now image.

Anyone else?

[heylise]

Hah! Candid then and now, did not really change, except in wisdom. Love your pictures.

I will hurry with the then-nows, looks like fun. Sure gives more insight into people.

(Oh, and the shampoo is Redken, no idea if it is available anywhere. Here only at hairdressers)

LiSe

[candid]

LiSe - You're right. When I was young, I was very wise (in my own eyes). Now, I'm just a fool. But the older I get the wiser my Father has become.

[tashiiij]

gulp. so sorry candid.

[heylise]

Have been searching for more pictures (here), and only just saw Shelley. You look NICE! And like a lot of fun.
LiSe

[shelley]

Aww... thanks, LiSe.

I'm very lucky - I do have a lot of fun! And I try to be nice most of the time.

I hope more of the team will add their picture - it really adds something to know what people look like.


BTW, Val - 'NICE and like a lot of fun' is pretty much what I thought when I saw your picture (which matches so well what comes through in your posts)

Love,

Shelley

[yellowblue]

LiSe, yes Redken is available here-- I'll have to try it and see if it can tame my unruley mane.

Candid, LiSe is right-- still the same, but more hat and shorter hair : ) and still playing!

Deb

[sparhawk]

Hi all,

On sunday Tash shared with us a poem by Borges that was very nice, but did you know that he actually wrote a poem dedicated to the I Ching? It is called "Para una version del I Ching" (For a version of the I Ching)

The poem is included in the Spanish translation of Richard Wilhelm's original german I Ching version.

Here it is.

<BLOCKQUOTE><HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT>

PARA UNA VERSION DEL I CHING

El porvenir es tan irrevocable
como el rigido ayer.
No hay una cosa que no sea una letra silenciosa
de la eterna escritura indescifrable
cuyo libro es el tiempo.Quien se aleja
de su casa ya ha vuelto.Nuestra vida es la senda futura y recorrida.
El rigor ha tejido la madeja.
No te arredres .La ergastula es oscura,
la firme trama de incesante hierro,
pero en algun recodo de tu encierro
puede haber una luz,una hendidura.
El camino es fatal como la flecha.
Pero en las grietas,esta Dios que acecha.

Jorge Luis Borges<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0></BLOCKQUOTE>

I translated it for you, is not the same (I think is a horrible translation), but it would give you an idea of what the beautiful poem says.

==========
The future is as irrevocable
as the rigid yesterday.
There's not a thing that is not a silent letter
of the eternal undecipherable writing
whose book is time. Who withdraws
from home has already returned. Our life is the future and wandered path.
The austerity has woven the skein.
Do not fear. The prison is dark,
the firm weft of unending iron,
but in some turn of your confinement
there could be a light, a small opening.
The path is as fatal as an arrow.
But in its cracks, God is stalking.

Jorge Luis Borges
==========

Cheers,

Luis

[sparhawk]

Val, I just saw your picture... (speechless....) http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif

But I should have known from the time when you shared the picture of your daughter and grandson.

Contrary to what Shelley said about you matching her mental image, mine was completely different (men...): a dark haired, mature and handsome lady, with the hair tied up in a bun and holding a pencil between her teeth while typing away in the computer... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/biggrin.gif Go figure... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/footinmouth.gif Nicely surprised here...

As for LiSe, what can I say? I've seen her more actual pictures from her website as well as Anton's, but that picture from her early thirties really shows the child in her, a somewhat mischievous one... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif

Cheers,

Luis

[candid]

beautiful

[val]

Shelley, Luis...

Thank you...*grin*

Luis, please tell me your kidding about the mental image. And here I thought I was so wysiwyg.

Candid...

I'm going to naturally assume you're talking about LiSe's picture...or Shelley's...or Tash's. Either that, or you're having an acid flashback...*still grinning*

Here's my "before"... http://home.earthlink.net/~lakatz/images/valbaby.jpg

Okay...so here's one at age 20 years...on the Santa Monica pier. http://home.earthlink.net/~lakatz/cottoncandy.jpg

Hey this is FUN! Who's next?

Love to you all,

Val

[yellowblue]

Wow Val !!!

I love all three of you... Pretty consistant and your a darlin' in all of them.

Love you,
Deb

[candid]

Val, no, I was referring to Luis' post with, ?beautiful?.

You?... smiles... better I should hold my compliment lest I sound flattering.

[sparhawk]

<BLOCKQUOTE><HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT>

Luis, please tell me your kidding about the mental image. And here I thought I was so wysiwyg.<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0></BLOCKQUOTE>

That's exactly the problem: I wasn't seeing... Now I see, and I get. http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif You are quite beautiful (with all due respect)

Just to be fair, since we are sharing old pictures in this forum, here is a picture of my brother and me around the age of six and five for my brother. Of course, he is the really cute one. http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif The place is in another hemisphere...

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/your_image.gif


Luis

[yellowblue]

Luis,

Where are you??? No pic : (

Deb

[sparhawk]

Oops! I messed that one up...

Here it is,

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/786/1125.jpg

Luis

[yellowblue]

Ahhh... two charmers : )

I love this!!!

Deb

[yellowblue]

Suppose I'll share too...
This was taken about 20 years ago, fishing off some local islands

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/786/1130.jpg


And a current picture of me with my daughter

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/786/1131.jpg


Fun!

Deb

[davidl]

Dear Deb,

Thought you might like to see this photo of me from a couple of thousand years ago.

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/786/1132.jpg

[yellowblue]

Ah ha.... I loved that Davidl. LOL!!!!!!

I thought you might look just like this!

Thank you for your great sense of humor, and for forgiving me : )

This was supreme ; )
Deb

[candid]

laughing here.. David that's priceless!

[candid]

Deb, thanks for stepping up and sharing your images with the rest of us.

These are gifts, each and every one. It feels like Christmas. If their is a heaven we'll at least recognize one another!

[heylise]

This is the top-fun thread of all! I love all of you. And Luis: I had the same idea about Val: black hair, intense face - and then this fair angel! I would have liked the black one too, maybe it is the Lakatz part which sounds like a shiny black cat. And Deb like a summer-goddess. Well, seems she and David come from the same spheres. And Val too, flying around up there from cloud to cloud.

LiSe

[tashiiij]

dont know how to make the damn thing smaller. i hate computers. (SORRY CHRIS LOFTING BUT YOU KNEW THAT DIDNT YOU) so for a limited time only then the kittens go back. hey val i hope this does not kill your computer. if it does, come and get me.

im waiting! (wink!)

[heylise]

WOW, beautiful eyes.

LiSe

[heylise]

Val, put a message at the bottom of every thread which is too long or wide:
"This thread continuous here (link to new thread), don't post here anymore (in capitals!)"
Give the new thread the SAME name, with -2 at the end added, or something like that. Even when the thread is only two mails long. I think that solves the entire problem.
Hope you can reach the bottom of a too-long one, but maybe you will manage.

LiSe

[heylise]

If the bottom cannot be reached, make a new thread and ask someone else to put the message at the bottom of the old thread
LiSe

[sparhawk]

Geeze Tash!!

But, you already knew I am a flirt (not that it did me any good yesterday, with subtle threats of loss of limbs and miscellaneous embarrassments, but, perseverance furthers, or so the Yi, sometimes, says...) http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/footinmouth.gif http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif

What the heck, let's blame it on the Latin blood drumming in my fingertips.

[uh?
Did you call me?
What is it honey?
Oh...nothing at all. Just chatting with my Yi friends here... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/biggrin.gif

Luis

[hilary]

Luis, Tash, I've shrunk you. Please understand, it's nothing personal. http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif If you have lost your originals, they're sitting on my desktop for now.

You may have missed the thread where Val offered to shrink and optimise any images you want to post here, if you just send them to her first. Or send them to me, if Val is too scary. http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/wink.gif

New faces - great! Deb is lovely... Tash is lovely... Shelley, tell me if you're ever near Oxford!

Luis, very cute, but which brother is you?

I think there must be something about divination that keeps people young. (Mirian looks about 10 years younger than she claims to be, too.) Perhaps slipping through the interstices of time like that Daoist butcher's cleaver, that was never blunted because it never encountered resistance. Encouraging thought, anyway...

[hilary]

Ah - sorry, Luis, just read back a bit. Big brother. Quite a charmer ;)

[sparhawk]

Don't worry Hilary. I've known for a while that I seriously needed a shrink... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif

BTW Hilary, there should be a way to edit one's own messages for a longer period of time. I tried to change the picture myself but could not because I was not prompted to upload a new image once the message edition was finished and saved (which is why my first try didn't have a picture attached after editing it and taking out the even bigger picture I uploaded by mistake in the first place)

And Val, I do know how to resize images. But, you were right, I use a higher resolution, 1280x1024 as a matter of fact, and have for a long time. This is something that has been available for years. The unwritten standard of 800x600 for web design is quite outdated and perhaps was a real and necessary standard in 1995 when I started playing with html and web design. Nowadays is just a comfort zone for what is assumed to be a vast majority of outdated hardware out there browsing the web without realizing that if a computer cannot display a higher availabe resolution it cannot also use most of the snazzy features being coded in todays' sites by very inspired web designers.

Dixit

Luis

[val]

Well Luis...

Why don't you just take a little tour around all the big commercial sites...they're ALL designed for 800x600.

Love,

Val

[yellowblue]

Anyone have suggestions for a moderate photo editor... rather than photoshop? As you can see I don't have a way to correct color-- just brightness and contrast.

Deb

PS Thank you for the nice compliments. It has been a joy to see all of you and the then and then some and nows : )

[martin]

Hi Deb,

Perhaps the free Irfanview (http://www.irfanview.com/) will do.
Shelley suggested it in another thread.
Thanks Shelley!

[yellowblue]

Thank you Martin and Shelley,

I'll check it out.

Deb

[yellowblue]

Hey Martin,

I like your after much better... must just be the visual... : ) or species level....????

Deb

[hilary]

Argh - computer just crashed before I could send a long post. Never mind, it was all technical and uninspired.

Luis, Val - the difference is between people interested in exploring the latest wonders of technology, and those interested in making it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to find what they're looking for, and hopefully spend money on it. I'm in the latter category. The site definitely has to be within the comfort zone if it's to be a commercial proposition. (Unless your intended audience are all computer wizards, of course.) I agree it is hard to understand why people don't update (at least when it's free) - but remember that chat session, where we had someone who couldn't get it to work, because she was using IE 3?

Luis... did the girls form an orderly queue during your teenage years? http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/biggrin.gif

Deb - the two main Photoshop alternatives for micro-budgets are Paintshop Pro (http://www.jasc.com/download_4.asp) and Ulead Photoimpact (http://www.ulead.com/pi/trial.htm). You can download free trials of both from those links (hope you have a fast connection!) and see which suits. (I opted for Photoimpact in the end, but there's not much to choose.)

Or if those are a bit much, have a look at Webattack's freeware image editors (http://www.webattack.com/freeware/gmm/fwgraphicedit.html). Be warned that neither Pixia nor the Gimp is for the faint-hearted. (In this I am definitely faint-hearted.)

There - that was shorter than the pre-crash version. Wonderful computer that this is, it even crashes at the right moments.

[yellowblue]

Well Hilary,

To every season, turn turn turn,...

There is a purpose...


And such etc....

Where is YOUR BEFORE and AFTER???? : )

Thanks for the info... I'll check it.... I actually prefer photoshop OF COURSE, but it is pricey to justify the dabbling that I do.

Well I'm sure you couldn't go back that far... thirty years would probably show your birth.

But do post, we'd all love to see....

Deb

[tashiiij]

Hilary,

Thanks for making the picture smaller. It was freaky big!!! Luis, thanks for the Borges I Ching poem. He practiced his own kind of Stichtomancy, have you ever read that stuff? Well everyone on Hilary's forum is incredibly gorgeous. Guess megabobby had that one right. Hilary, thanks for this forum.

lov
tash

[heylise]

Deb, I have Paintshop-pro, so if you get that one, you can always ask me questions. It took me several years to find my way in (any) picture editor, so I am dumb enough to understand someone who does not understand.
Trying to find something in the manual, when one does not know the name of what one searches . . .
Often I have been yelling at the PC, the picture, Paintshop, everything.
There is a lot I still don't know (last week I spent two afternoons trying to figure out how to draw a blue line and not making the previous red line turn blue too), but making a photo smaller or optimize it works fine now. Also changing colors, or making them from real white all the way up to real black instead of something dull in between.

LiSe

[hilary]

ROFL! Oh LiSe, have I ever been there. Hour upon hour of trying to get some totally simple, intuitively obvious effect. I *hate* image editing. The worst of it is, everything looked beautiful on my old monitor, but the new one is so much better that I can see all the rough edges, and where I clipped the last pixel off the 's' in 'I Ching readings', at the top of the page.

Crawling weakly back into my chair... just to say I have changed the settings so you can edit posts for 360 minutes after posting instead of just 60.

[martin]

Hi Deb,

Glad that you like the after better. Perhaps I have evolved a bit since I was .. eh .. young.
But I don't see much difference when I look in a mirror. http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/biggrin.gif

[hilary]

So, message archiving is working - do we like it like this?

Deb, all my infant photos are with Mum. Remind me again round about Christmas (by which time I'll be 31), and I'll see what we can find.

[sparhawk]

Val,
<BLOCKQUOTE><HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT>

Well Luis...

Why don't you just take a little tour around all the big commercial sites...they're ALL designed for 800x600.<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0></BLOCKQUOTE>

Alas, you are correct (which leaves out the issue of the other stuff in web design being coded in commercial sites for which you need better hardware and software for rendering). Does that makes it right or even acceptable? IMHO, it does not. And is an issue that should be addressed at the level of the designers themselves. If the current mentality for web design was applied to hardware and software development, that world would have ended with Windows 3.1 and the Intel 486 chip... Am I going to make a change in that mentality? I seriously doubt it (who the heck is Luis Andrade, anyway?). On the other hand, I'll be long ready and waiting for when they decide to wake up.

Hilary,
<BLOCKQUOTE><HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT>

Luis... did the girls form an orderly queue during your teenage years?<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sigh.... I wish!! I was a very shy and awkward teenager. A tech-less and unpopular book geek. A Clark Kent, sans the superpowers, who had the very stupid tendency for a young man to completely fall in love with the first girl that would flash him a smile. Something that would flick ON my monogamous button for long periods of time. An awfully boring life for a teenager. Perhaps an attitude proper for my current age but not for a teenager, for God's sake!! But, don't worry. I am working hard on my Time Machine prototype... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/biggrin.gif

On another subject, I would certainly recommend PaintShop Pro for those people with an interest in photography and image editing and are in a tight budget. Until about two years ago, when I started using Photoshop, I have used PSP and had since version 3.0. It is a great photo editor with very little to envy Photoshop in features, for about an eighth of the price.

Did I miss anyone? OK. Back to my lurking mode... http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif

Cheers,

Luis

[sparhawk]

Hilary,

<BLOCKQUOTE><HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT>

Crawling weakly back into my chair... just to say I have changed the settings so you can edit posts for 360 minutes after posting instead of just 60<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0></BLOCKQUOTE>

Did I ever mention that you are my favorite host in the whole wide world?? Before anyone of us blinks out I wanted to have that stated.

Thanks!

Luis

[pedro]

Hey gals, and guys,
Just wanna let you know that I had a lot of fun reading this thread and checking your lovely pictures. I never realised there were so many CUTIES in this forum http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/happy.gif I think Im in LUV!!
http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/clipart/heart.gif
Gotta put a picture of myself as well, Im just trying to find a decent one (fully clothed and all... its gonna be hard)

Gotta go back up my tree now

[shelley]

Hey Pedro,

Quote: "Im just trying to find a decent one (fully clothed and all... its gonna be hard)"

Was that a deliberate double entendre? Bad Pedro!

Hey All,

As we seem to be turning into a mutual admiration society, lets just agree with Tash that we're ALL GORGEOUS! Hilary must be right - along with all the other amazing powers of the I Ching, it can also bestow loveliness on its students.

Love,

Shelley

[shelley]

Hi Hilary

In answer to your question about whether I'm ever in the Oxford area, here's a story:

I've been consulting the I Ching for about four years. For the last two I'd been using Kim-Anh Lim's A Practical guide to the I Ching and had always received very clear answers but early in September I felt a strong urge to learn how to access a less interpreted version - to learn to read the ancient symbolism more intuitively. It was this urge that led me to search the net for help and so I found you.

I didn't know what had triggered this but it started after I'd done a reading for a friend (who'd been very happy with it) at a gathering over the first weekend of September at the Crawley Inn near Whitney! Did you, by any chance, get a strange feeling that Sunday morning that there was someone nearby who needed your help?

You - and all the wonderful people you've drawn to this forum - have been so much help already. It's all very exciting!

That was the only time I've been near Oxford for many years but there's a good chance I'll be visiting Crawley again occasionally. Next time, I'll let you know.

Love and thanks,

Shelley