Store Shed – Smoky River, Alberta

At our house, we have needed a shed, or so I think, for a couple of years. We’re needing a place, separate from our home and garage to store and organize things we use seasonally and non-regularly so the squeeze of their possession does not limit action, nor become obstacles to intention. We have space to reclaim because the state of our space is beginning to shape our actions (and quite possibly is limiting possibility).

David Allen, in his book ‘Getting Things Done,’ calls what our awareness has before it our psychic RAM (Random Access Memory drawing from computers as analogy). And, cluttered psychic RAM slows us down because it becomes more and more difficult to take-on new information, ideas and actions – a limitation to imagination and possibility. So, in a sense a shed would allow us a place for long-term storage (like a hard drive) and allow us to direct psychic RAM to its contents on an as needed basis.

Perhaps there is still time for this to happen – build and locate a storage shed on our property to handle those things in our way from snow tires, bicycles, lawn care machines and tools; furniture and unused fitness equipment could be stored until needed. The exercise would be about de-cluttering, about organizing and about determining what needs keeping and what can be given or thrown away. It does seem worth it. But, in three or four weeks snow will be on the ground. We’ll have to get to it.

Another Shed – Along the road home, travelling north, homeward from Edmonton, I looked in on these two sheds just beyond Valleyview on the last bit of farmland crammed atop the Smoky River valley that cuts into the land, the road descending to the Smoky River and the bridge crossing it. Retro-teal, a bright energizing colour from Canada’s fifties and sixties draws the eye to the shed door’s post and lintel, reminding of another post and lintel painted in lamb’s blood as protection from an Egyptian death all those years ago. This shed, now in dis-use, has once been a structure thought-of and to be built, then a building allowing a farmer to store and shelter equipment and supplies, and, it’s been a place people have worked in, a place allowing possibility.

Listening to – a song from last year first heard of the Sirius Coffee House station on a Sunday morning, Shawn Colvin’s ‘All Fall Down,’ a song about many things including humility’s stumbles and tumbles and the grace involved in picking ourselves up, dusting ourselves off and taking next steps.

Quote to Inspire – “The idea of photography seemed to come together with the idea that this is how I could be – someone who could have one step in the world while at the same time being one step removed from it.” – Donovan Wylie