| Sunday, September 25, 2022 | | Seasons Change... | I think my gallery staff, and probably many of my long-time customers, have many of my “elevator speeches” memorized by now. You know what I mean—those sentences that summarize who you are and why you do what you do in a short amount of time. Elevator-speak can be a challenge for me, since I love to share a backstory, and sometimes, just as in a wonderful book, the details really do make for best reading (or listening). As I posted recently on FB, synchronicity and serendipity are both handy shorthand terms for my whole photographic Practice, which is both a livelihood and a cornerstone of my spiritual life.
So this blog is full of serendipitous and synchronistic moments.
While driving around with a fellow photographer friend from VA, Tish Underwood, in Alligator River refuge in early August (yes, I am still galavanting over there as often as I can), we were startled when the mother Red Wolf emerged suddenly from the brush beside the road, trotted ahead of us a short distance, leapt the canal and then paused, walking back and forth and looking at us from the soybean fields. Thanks to my 600mm lens, I had a lifetime experience of meeting her eyes, giving my thanks, and rejoicing over the chance to photograph her. Seeing a Red Wolf has been a longtime wish, and you can bet she made my nightly gratitude list that evening! That same night, we saw what others believe is an orphaned young bear cub, that also crossed the road in front of us and paused to sniff the flowers before going into the bean fields to eat. A banner evening for sure. Three or four minutes earlier or later and we would have missed both of these. I’ve also had several more encounters with “Mister Bear” – my favorite big Papa Bear of this summer season – most of which included a dip in or a drink from the roadside canal.
I’ve been dazzled by our beautiful cloud shows for the past two months. Many of these have also included vibrant iridescence, or slices of rainbow without any discernible rain or moisture in the sky – as well as more traditionally timed and placed rainbows and sundogs. I receive these, as I do many other nature signs, as signs of a larger, beautiful reality just beyond my earthly sight, where so many I love have entered before me. My own belief is that what we call Heaven, that fuller awareness of God’s presence and love, without the limitations of space and time and an earthly bodily shell, sometimes manifests itself to our sight, or hearing, or even sense of smell, and in those moments, my own faith and hope and peace and joy and love—all the good stuff—is made larger. Even after the experience, often fleeting, is over, the increase of what Paul calls Fruits of the Spirit remain. And yes, I am so grateful for all of these. So you will see that kind of light show, all of which came either in answer to my heart’s longing, or my more specific asking and seeking. I have become even more “light sensitive” in these past months and weeks, meaning, paying even more attention as the light and clouds change. I have had the time to be more intentionally aware.
Lately, that awareness has led me to the dunes. This time of year is my favorite to wander around looking for seascapes. The dunes are their loveliest now, in my opinion, as the sea oat seedheads turn golden and bow in the breeze. I am always on the lookout for stands of sea oats where the beach access is an older sand path “up and over” – you can find that at Coquina Beach, for instance – as those remind me of my earlier years here before many of the wooden overwalks and stairs were built. You’ll see a couple images from my recent seaside wanderings too. For one of these, I stayed by the ocean all the way through sunset—the clouds had been magnificent—and the vibrant sky in the west over the dunes offered the prettiest show of the summer, I think.
Autumn came in like March, the ocean roaring with storm force winds, but the clouds blew out as quickly as they blew in, the rain squall ahead of the cold front was brief and by dusk on the first full day of fall (which officially began at 9:03 pm on Thursday, September 22, 2022, so Friday was the first 24-hour day of autumn), the winds were beginning to shift although the ocean was still running high and mighty.
Now we enter another season. Osprey and purple martins have flown south; ducks have begun to arrive on their wintering grounds; migrating warblers and the year’s last generation of monarchs and swallowtails pass through. The days are suddenly noticeably shorter now.
I hope you enjoy some of summer’s last offerings here on the Outer Banks.
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click for larger image | That same night, this small cub paused to sniff the roadside flowers before heading into the soybean fields. |
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click for larger image | This little family was way out in the field, and it was nearly dark! But I couldn't resist trying to make a picture. |
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click for larger image | The iridescence this summer has been more vibrant and abundant than I have ever seen it. |
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click for larger image | You couldn't go wrong on this particular evening! The views were spectacular east and west. |
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click for larger image | I call this, Prelude to Sunset. As I said in the blog, the clouds all summer long have been magnificent. |
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posted by eturek at 9:54 PM |
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