Category Archives: portals

Has ANYTHING Changed?

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21Dec2022

The first day of winter.

Four days til Christmas.

And CJ posted four tales.

4.1–The Oval Garden experiences inspired me to address the things that were at the very heart of landscape architecture. In this tale, I talk about the sun and sunlight.

4.2–After my Oval Garden visits, I went over and over my portal experiences, trying to understand logically what happened. I, in this short tale, share my own conclusions.

4.3–I used my own forest experience to construct a short tale in which I talked about forests in the landscape, their life beyond the senses and salubrious exchanges.

4.4–I described what I was missing in Tangier. But I did have a rooftop garden terrace with a view over the Strait of Gibraltar.

Who is CJ and why is he writing these tales?

In June 2000, Christopher Janus, a senior studying landscape architecture at a mid-west America university, finds himself in Tangier on a term abroad design study. The strange culture, the North African landscape and Mediterranean gardens are not what he expected. CJ, as his friends called him, could not wait to be home for Christmas.

To complete his term abroad design study, CJ documented his strange culture, landscape and garden experiences in Morocco in a series of 43 short stories that are being released on Amazon Kindle Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve. The first 3 are FREE! You can find them here: Tales til Christmas Vella link ASIN: B0BNZDYKKC

Mediterranean Sun, Sand and Palm Trees

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La Baie de Tanger–the beach at Tangier with the medina and Kasbah in the background. No wonder CJ thought he had it made for his term-abroad design study.

What could possibly undo the beauty of this landscape, its plants, its gardens, its sun and sandy beaches?

Or is the question, rather, what could enhance this outstandingly beautiful landscape?

CJ had his hands full.

He tried to explain it in a series of short stories about his six months in northern Morocco. He called his very short stories tales. 

Tales? 

Tales because in Morocco, for the first time in his life CJ couldn’t distinguish between fiction and fact.

CJ’s tales are the reveal.

***

Those very short stories are, for the first time, being released on Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve.

The first three episodes are FREE and 16 tales have already been posted. Find them here=http://bit.ly/3B9rJXE

ENJOY!!

All 43 tales will be found under one ebook cover titled Curious Tales and via KDPselect will be offered for FREE on the day of launch likely in the first half of 2023. Sign up here to be notified of the launch date to get all 43 tales for free=https://bit.ly/3q5lcaq

***

If you wonder what actually happened during CJ’s six months in Tangier, pick up the eBook, Tangier Gardens–out of the classroom into the real world–via plant portals, FREE on Smashwords here: https://bit.ly/3SIAfma

ENJOY!!

Dragons’ Blood Trees

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Dracena cinnabari and Dracena draco, found on the islands of the Socotra and Cabo Verde archipelagos.

These dragons’ blood trees are found naturally in only two places, both in the Tropic of Cancer. These two places are separated by a continent and 8,000 kilometers.

The mature dragon’s blood trees regularly have four meters or more clear trunk before the branching and leaves. They are rare and unusual–magnificent trees to behold.

More surprisingly, different cultures, separated by oceans and thousands of kilometers, agree on the paranormal curative properties of the dragons’ blood trees.

***

In the La Montagne region of Tangier, CJ was on his way to visit the old residence of the Portuguese ambassador, now a private villa, named, “Loins du Monde Real”, (far from the real world), when he encountered not one but a forest of dragons’ blood trees. He was reaching his first plant portal—it was real but there was nothing normal about it.

CJ had no idea what was a plant portal until he visited with the Russian and British horticulturists now living in the “Loins du Monde Real” villa. The strange culture, the North African landscape and Mediterranean gardens were not what he expected.

CJ tells about his adventures in his short stories, his tales. Those tales are, for the first time, being released on Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve: find them here=http://bit.ly/3B9rJXE

***

The first three episodes are FREE and they include SIX tales. Find them here=http://bit.ly/3B9rJXE

ENJOY!!

***

All 43 tales will be found under one ebook cover titled Curious Tales and via KDPselect will be offered for FREE on the day of launch likely in the first half of 2023. Sign up here to be notified of the launch date to get all 43 tales for free=https://bit.ly/3q5lcaq

***

If you wonder what actually happened during CJ’s six months in Tangier, pick up the eBook, Tangier Gardens–out of the classroom into the real world–via plant portals, here: https://amzn.to/3HLrtyv

What do you have to lose?

Hope Landscape

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Find the hope.

The popularity of landscape photographs these days is the result of our lives being so turbulently fast-paced that we humans have an unquenchable existential thirst. We try to satisfy that thirst by absorbing in a one second glance at a landscape photo the peace and inspiration so essential to a fulfilling human existence. But we do not have the time to go out in the real life landscape to actually bathe our souls in it.

***

Do you agree?

If so, maybe you’d like to read the landscape stories I write.

Sign up to my email list: https://bit.ly/3q5lcaq

Read my ebook, Tangier Gardens, it’s free on Smashwords: https://bit.ly/3SIAfma

My Town of Birth

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Detroit

The great and prosperous 1950’s USA cities are now, 70 years later, looking more often like this.

Decaying, falling down, not habitable. The big tree of hard working people, families and jobs that supports great and prosperous cities–cut down in its prime. Sad.

***

But what about cities that still thrive after centuries–like Tangier, Morocco? Check out Tangier Gardens for an inside look–the ebook is free at Smashwords.

Thank you.

Mountain Stream

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The flow.

Mountain stream above the tree line, clear and white–straight flow to the pineal.

The stream takes advantage of the eyes and ears as paths to the pineal.

Words and talking get in the way–the stream continues; but the pineal flow stops.

~~~~~~

In Tangier Gardens, CJ discovered this flow.

He didn’t know what to call his experiences, paranormal, gnostic portals, or the answers to existential unknowns–but he knew the inputs were from nature, its landscapes and plants.

Want to learn more about these experiences in nature, in the landscape? Please join my email list.

Genres? Nature and Weird Fiction

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I am on a hunt.

For genre, for references.

You all know I write about landscape. In my own words, landscape that takes you to the foggy edge where normal transforms into paranormal.

I have only one writer who inspired me–Algernon Blackwood. He showed respect for the observable landscape. He also felt another side of landscape–its power. Its indefinable power that, in a fleeting second, can overwhelm.

I don’t copy him. But my experience in the landscape is similar. Tangier Gardens is about a young man just making his first discoveries beyond the foggy edge of normal. Nature is like that–if you let it.

If we look at nature, in a traditional sense, we see it as a source of human inspiration.

What about landscape? Landscape is the canvas upon which nature sits.

What about landscape architecture? Now that is confusing. It is a modern profession, that in my opinion, mistakenly moves natural elements around, often losing the traditional inspirational quality of nature. Failure.

So, in Tangier Gardens, the young man, CJ, tries to find how he, as a student of landscape architecture, can impart the inspiration of nature into his landscape design. Difficult. Tons of adminstrative regulations that bind nature into some kind of measurable pop experience. Not fun or helpful.

So I turn to a Algernon Blackwood aficionado, Eugene Thacker, who writes about Blackwood’s approach to nature and landscape:

If we are to call Blackwood a naturalist, then we must do so with caution, for his sublime awe before the mysteries of nature is always coupled with an acute awareness of the indifference of what we dutifully tag as “nature.” His novella, “The Willows”, suggests something different. Perhaps what we call the “supernatural” is simply the nature either we don’t see or don’t comprehend. It is the site of myth, religion, metaphysics—and perhaps of science as well. The strangest or “weirdest” understanding of nature is given to us not from ancient superstitions but from modern science. Perhaps the natural is supernatural, and vice-versa.

https://lithub.com/how-algernon-blackwood-turned-nature-into-sublime-horror/

If you would like to see my take on nature via the landscape, read Tangier Gardens.

Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE TODAY. Get it!!!

And if you know of contemporary authors in the same vein, please include them in your comment.

And lastly genre: after you have read Tangier Gardens, tell me what genre you think it fits.

Les Arômes du Maroc

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Mimosa and narcissus.

Balancing, cleansing, energising, relaxing, uplifting…we can all do with some of that.

Acacia dealbata–it grows like a native in the northern third of Morocco; and, in spring, you can always find its cut flowers, fresh from the bled (countryside), being sold by Rif ladies in Tangier.

But CJ had another take on mimosa when he got this close to it.

CJ reckoned when you get this close to a flower, it is because the flower has invited you. That invitation is the key that unlocks a portal–a paranormal portal.

Don’t believe me? Read his story, his take on plants in Tangier Gardens.

Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE TODAY.

Get it!!!

Find out about the magic of plants and their flowers at the Hibiscus House.

Moroccan medina water fountains

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I’m flogging my book.

The book? Tangier Gardens.

TANGIER GARDENS

This is a typical Moroccan medina water fountain that, in Tangier Gardens, CJ was planning to study. Why?

Because these beautifully tiled fountains were local community nodes for daily gathering of water to use at home. Everyone felt and knew the importance of water supplied by these beautiful fountains.

In Tangier Gardens CJ documents his attempt to study these community landmarks–and the strange challenges he faced.
Today, Tangier Gardens ebook is FREE!

Get it now!!