Category: Photography

September Is…

…the sound of dry leaves.
… a glorious time to be a weed.
..mums dressing for their debut.
..time to thin the iris bed.
…always abundant, sometimes hot.
…when shadows begin to lengthen.

For me September is always a time of reflection on time. This is especially true now that I am older. Some things wither and fade, while others are just coming into their glory. The strawberries and the cherries are long gone, but the apples and pears are just beginning to bear. The flowers that blossomed in spring have put down their seeds and spread out their roots, already prepared to winter over and grace us again next year. The zinnias and golden rod are dressed in their finest while the mums are just getting ready for their debut.

It is also a time when squirrel gather and geese fly. “A time to seek and a time to lose; a time to keep and a time to cast away; a time to rend and a time to sew; a time to keep silent and a time to speak” (Eccles 3:6-7) all in a single day.

What do you see when the shadows begin to lengthen?

I see the meeting place of time and eternity. As the Preacher said, “He has made everything beautiful in its time; also he has put eternity into man’s mind, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end” (Eccles 3:11). There is no time that I hear the echo of eternity more clearly than in the passing of a brief autumn day.

September has slipped away.

The End of a Dry Summer

It’s been a summer of nothing: No Blog posts. No writing. No artwork. Little photography. Little cooking. Little rain. Little human contact. The garden did poorly. The weeds are wilting. Nothing is in focus. Yet at the end of the evening I am drawn out into the dim splendor of the waning daylight and the waxing moon. All is bathed in mysterious light. I instinctively grab the camera and wander through an enchanted landscape singing praise in my heart.

Will you walk with me through my messy yard as I resume my journey down a moonlit path?

A giant ragweed silhouetted against the evening sky. This photo sums up my life for the past few months. Nothing has been in focus. Everything is weedy and wilting. Yet reality has more depth and beauty than attempts to capture it might imply. In person the sky is stunningly beautiful; the photo only hints at the reality. The ragweed, though wilted is tall and making its seeds. It provides me with inspiration! (… as long as I overlook the fact that I don’t want it to produce seeds.)
Lamb’s ears always find a way to grow. In this light, even the tomato cages I never got put up and an old broken rake look interesting.
I’d never see the beauty of my sleeping hibiscus if I never took a shot in the dark.
Though the moon wears a veil of clouds and only a crescent shines, the whole moon is there. You can see it if you look carefully enough.

The moon is now in the first quarter. The night is a little brighter than it was the night I took the photos, but there has been no rain.

It has been a rough year for all of us. Yet there is always hope.

Take a little time today to look at the good that is there.

Peace be with you.

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