Over the years, a mature life will have had its difficulties, its share of pain and misery and grief. If your judgment is good and your understanding of individual responsibility is clear, then your life will almost certainly also include times of happiness and moments of joy.
But if you experience no pain, no misery, no grief, no responsibility; if, up till now, your life has been easy, handed to you by the efforts of someone else; then happiness and joy lose some, perhaps all, of their sweetness. The contrast of pleasure and pain makes life its most interesting. The bad gives more weight to the good.
Sometimes the plight of humans hit’s a little too close to home and we would rather not think about it. So, let us just consider the life of a tree, as though it had some human qualities. And let us pick the tree in the foreground of today’s photograph.
Read MoreCan you imagine if this building was not property of the park, but instead, your vacation home? Imagine waking up to nature’s display of swirling clouds, lifting fog, swaths of the mountain lit up by the morning sun as clouds roll past it. What a morning, what a life that would be.
Read MoreBack in 2014, on an early morning in late Spring, I, with my camera at my side, walked the trails at Lake Conestee. The sun was behind me as I parked my car. And it was bright. I had driven past the old dam and turned onto the narrow road through the large brick structures that used to be a working mill alongside the river. The parking area was empty. It looked out over the remnants of what once was a great and massive lake, or so I’ve heard. I never saw Lake Conestee in its heyday.
Read MoreI post a lot of photos from local nature parks, usually within an hour and ½ of driving time. But, as we all know, a lot of parks have been closed during the Covid-19 shutdowns. And so I find myself unable to do what I would normally be doing this time of year. The photos you see me post every day are all from previous years. In 2020 I’ve made one trip to a park, in 2019 I made none, in 2018 about 20 trips, and in 2017, after my August prostate surgery to remove an aggressive cancer, I made a half dozen trips. It’s hard for me to believe that, but when I look at my photo library in Lightroom, the evidence is clear.
Read MoreI had my camera with me, but my expectations were quite low on this cold December morning. As I climbed out of the car, I questioned whether I should put on a knit cap that I could pull down over my ears. I decided my hiking hat would be fine. I did take my gloves, stuffed in my pocket just in case; these old hands get cold. I wore a heavy gray jacket, with a dark cotton scarf around my neck.
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