What Pictures Can't Show

Today, I muse about the quiet things I have noticed, quiet things that "called" to me and that I tried to capture on film. Like the scene below taken in a local park near my home.



It was, obviously, a cool and foggy day, and I was the only person in the park (at least, as far as I could see). The image doesns't, and can't, entirely capture the feeling of calm I felt as I walked the park. Nor can it reveal the strange pleasure the setting gave me.


Same with the finch outside my window. He (or she) never shouted (I don't think it even chirped), yet I was rivited by its beauty and agility. And this, too, gave me quiet pleasure. And I wondered if the finch knew how it had touched me.

During both of these experience there was essential silence. No shouting, just visual pleasure and a sense of serenity that I could never capture with a camera.

Then, there was the morning on a lake near Rhinelander, Wisconsin (yes, yes, yes, I was in a kayak). Launching before sunrise, I had let myself get lost in the fog and undulating shoreline. As I glided along, I felt a sense of connection with something greater than myself and, again, a wonderful calmness. Later, I took this image from a hill next to the lake.

This image, like the others, cannot totally capture the moment and, in this instance, the incredible sounds of the loons.

DS