(I have blogged before about some of these: see the Jesus rock, an alien spaceship, and quite a few more.)
A couple of weeks ago, I almost stepped on this figure on the beach. I see a pilgrim; hooded, bearded, in a long traveler's robe, leaning on a sturdy walking stick.
A sign? A talisman for the long road ahead? A visitation? A wandering monk? A Saint of some stripe? A wizard strayed from the LOTR? A figure for a Nativity scene? Good old Joseph himself? Or a Buddhist arhat?
Should I put him on a high shelf and light candles to him, bring him fruit and flowers, or just rub his hood for luck?
Ah, me! For those actions to bring any benefit, one must believe. And I don't. I think it's a piece of driftwood, molded by waves and rocks, turned into a pattern by my meddling brain. Pareidolia, they call it. I'm out of luck.
So I'm happy to have met him, and he can sit on my table for a while and later go to join the oddities on my shelves. But I won't light candles for him.
Here's another face I found. This one, I couldn't bring home. It was a water stain on the ceiling tiles of a coffee shop washroom. Luckily, my camera rides comfortably in my purse.
A girls face in pink and brown. Lots of hair floating in the breeze. Just the thing for a ladies' washroom!
It's not a pilgrim, it's an evil duck in a long robe. One arm (wing?) is bringing a drape of robe across to cover its face as it contemplates ill doings.
ReplyDeleteI don't see the girl, either. I'd say they're goldfish - I see at least two.
Christopher,
ReplyDeleteI can't see the duck. The wing, sure, but where's the rest? And how do you know it's evil?
:D
Laurie doesn't see the girl, either. To me, it's obvious. Proof that the images are generated in our individual brains, I guess.
I forgot to photograph the back of the "pilgrim"; I see it as a reptile head.
I love your beach figure. I think it's an old petrified monk!
ReplyDeleteI can't see the duck. The wing, sure, but where's the rest? And how do you know it's evil?
ReplyDeleteAbove the "arm" there's what looks like a broad flat area that I'm guessing you're probably seeing as the pilgrim's beard, but looks to me like a duck's beak. There's two knobs on either side of the top that look a bit like eyes. And it's the expression in those eyes that's evil :-P (that and the holding of the cape across the face in Dracula or Bela-Lugosi-is-dead-and-Ed-Wood-is-trying-to-pass-off-someone-else-as-him style).
This Rorschach stuff is fun, isn't it? I'm reminded of the old joke about the psychiatrist giving a patient a Rorschach test. He shows him the first blot, and the patient says "Two pigs screwing in the back of a car". The doctor shows a second picture, and the patient replies "Two pigs feeling each other up". The third picture - "Two pigs engaged in a bit of 'how's your father?' with a third pig watching". The doctor puts aside the blots and tells the patient that he feels the patient has some serious issues. To which the patient replies, "What do you mean, I've got issues? you're the one with all the filthy pictures of pigs!"
Ah, I kind of see the duck now. If I step back far enough and squint. :)
ReplyDeleteThat's a new twist on the old joke. The pigs, I mean. :D