Huginn-Muninn was started in March 2009 as a means to a number of ends. After nearly ten years at home with children and another few years working with 3rd and 4th graders I felt I had lost the ability to communicate. Although I spent a great deal of time thinking about “stuff”, when I sent my mental runners out, they came back tired and lacking the right vocabulary. I had a lot in my head but it was stuck there. I wanted to be writing more than I had been (which was rarely; in my case the flesh was willing, but there was some residual weakness of spirit) and knew that putting pressure on myself was the best way to do it. Knowing my mom or a friend or two would be checking the blog for updates meant I couldn’t ignore it completely. My posts are less frequent four months into the endeavor than they were at its inception, but that is partly because there is more to do outside and partly because, reading over the posts of the last few months, I realize I am too verbose and don’t want to bore the hell out of everyone. Balance is a problem for me.
I have had requests from friends and others to offer photographs for sale. I thought about this for a long time, made preparations to take some prints to a local shop, and promptly ended the thoughts/actions there. I can’t sell stuff. I don’t feel good about it so I post my pictures here as the only way I am comfortable showing them off. I give them to a few close friends but that’s about it. Actually putting a price tag on them and selling them to regular people is something I don’t know if I will ever work up to. For now, the Through the Lens page is where I add new stuff.
Finally, a note on Huginn and Muninn…..they are dream birds. Both are ravens. Huginn is translated as thought and Muninn as memory, but the implications of each encompass the entirety (as I view it, anyway) of the human psyche. Huginn is will, cognition, perception, intent, desire, and consciousness. Muninn, on the other hand, is subconscious, collective memory, genetic memory, unintended, and the contemplative. Each is his own particular brand of wisdom perched on the shoulders of Odin, who gave up a lot (an eye, namely) in the pursuit of knowledge. They are sent each morning on information gathering missions and called back each night to whisper their discoveries into his ear. The way I see it, we each have our own Huginn and Muninn, but don’t always remember to listen to them. Or possibly we listen more to one than the other. Balance.
This blog is my balancing act, my bridge, and the assembly of everything from the natural world which has been whispered into my ear. My ravens are busy indeed.
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