My great-grandparents came to the Monterey Bay Area in Northern California in 1906. My Nana worked in the canneries my Nano was an Italian fisherman. They were Sicilian. Photos of some of my relatives can be found at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I consider the town of Monterey and Pacific Grove my home. I was raised here for many of my childhood years and graduated high school in this area. Here are some photos I took of Pacific Grove during my recent trip in July 2012. I was able to see a good friend and two of my aunts during the visit. I had a joyous time. Very healing. Thankful for photos, as I am all talked out, after staying up until about 1:30 am every night of my trip, chatting it up with relatives.
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We stayed in this 1915 house that has been converted into a hotel.
Along Lover’s Point
Very friendly and trusting gull
I walked all three days for an hour around the sea.
Sea lions basking in the fog.
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I like this photo of the seagull.
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Tree outside out hotel. How old, I wonder?
Pacific Grove 2012
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me taking a photo of me in the hotel room Happy Face
And the song I cried to often when I had to leave Pacific Grove and move to the East Coast…..only to return some eight months later…had I only known…
“When I say to you, ‘You are lovely’, you do not believe me, because of the blemishes you know so intimately; but those blemishes are the scars of your sufferings and they shine out of your soul, radiating beauty, the way the daisies do in the long summer grasses. So when I say to you. ‘Even with closed eyes, I still see how beautiful you are’, it is true. Believe it. Believe it.” ~ Rumi
I am a sculptor, a molder of form.
In every moment I shape an idol.
But then, in front of you, I melt them down
I can rouse a hundred forms
and fill them with spirit,
but when I look into your face,
I want to throw them in the fire.
My soul spills into yours and is blended.
Because my soul has absorbed your fragrance,
I cherish it.
Every drop of blood I spill
informs the earth,
I merge with my Beloved
when I participate in love.
In this house of mud and water,
my heart has fallen to ruins.
Enter this house, my Love, or let me leave.
~ Rumi
“Your inner teacher says: ‘Come closer. Be faithful to the tree that you are. Like last year’s leaves, shed the old stories, the ache of unfulfilment, the pain of separation from yourself. Follow the fool’s tracks. He turns himself inside out and upside down and all for smiles, all for laughter, that splits paradigms and shakes you to your roots. Come inside. Summer is a wild rose, though only for a little while, but your heart is a rose for all seasons and wild for love. Do not be afraid to be heart to heart with yourself.”’ ~ Rumi
“The Master sees things as they are, Without trying to control them. He lets them go their own way, And resides at the center of the circle. He or She understands that the Universe is forever out of control, And that trying to dominate events Goes against the current of the Tao. Be content with what you have; Rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, The whole world belongs to you.” ~ Tao Te Ching
A summer’s walk in the Great Northwest photos by Sam Craft
He sailed most of the year up the Pacific Ocean from Central California (Monterey) to Alaska.
He was the designated cook on the ship, because of his talent for creating a scrumptious meal from the gifts of the sea.
I thought of him today, as I walked along the docks.
I thought of him today, and his journeys; how I wish I could speak to him now—hear his rough Italian dialect weave the ocean tales of sea monsters, mermaids, and giant jellyfish.
The sea is in my blood.
I know this now.
I can never live away from the ocean again.
The salt water is my refuge.
The seagulls my angels.
And the waves, as they move, confirmation that I am just as source intended.
Whether I wash ashore, retreat, break, or beckon onlookers, I am exactly as I was made to be—an endless ocean of mystery harboring the secrets of generations.
Everyday Asperger's 
