Nature
Yesterday's cold front blew through, bringing hail and gorgeous light. Good thing we had finished our hike in the Galisteo Basin and were in the car when it started. Have I mentioned how much I love my iPhone? Took this picture from a moving car.
Yesterday at sunrise, when my weather app said it was -6 degrees, staying under the covers seemed like a good idea...until I looked out the window and saw hundreds of plumes of mist rising off the ocean. Mist over the saltmarsh is pretty common, but not over open water like this. But then, it isn't everyday that the ocean here on the southcoast is 45 degrees warmer than the air.
Off I went to beach with only my iphone and tried to capture the magic until my fingers got numb - which wasn't long. The high tide line was a wall of cascading ice forms and little crystals of ice formed briefly as low tide laps of water hit the shore.
When I go into the studios of my painter friends, my eye always goes to those buckets, coffee cans and bins filled with paintbrushes. I love the many sizes, shapes and colors – the spatters of color on the handles hinting at the magic these brushes have been part of.
As a photographer, my "paintbrushes" are not nearly so sleek, seductive or varied. My tools are a black box of glass and plastic, a carbon fiber tripod that my serious photographer friends laugh at and call “cute” because it is so small, and a virtual paintbox, AKA my MacBook. But in the last few days of autumn’s glory I have been foraging in my yard collecting branches of vermillion colored Japanese maples, golden amber giant hosta leaves, miscanthus stocks and more. They are the paintbrushes for my winter portfolio project – a study of form and reflections in Destruction Brook.
Paintbrushes gathered from my garden .
Sitting alongside the brook I look a bit like a crazy woman as I make little rock weights and attach fishing line to my garden trove of branches. But it allows me to attempt to secure my leaves and branches in the middle of standing ripples or where the light is best without the current making off with them. For all the attempts that don't work, there are still a few moments of magic that make it worthwhile. Here is a sneak peek of what is to come.
Along the river's edge, a gift...
First frost
With an autumn blaze border.
When my son invited me to visit Salt Lake and see the aspens turning in the mountains I thought "OK- I can give up one weekend of New England's fall glory." What I didn't expect was to arrive just in time to see the yellow pop the autumn color against the backdrop of an early snow. I may a head full of gray hair, but that first snow still brings all the giddy excitement I felt as a kid.
Our Saturday our adventure started at 9,050 feet with the temperature somewhere between 27 and 32 degrees. Ben and I started climbing up the trail towards Mary's Lake at the end of Big Cottonwood Canyon. We didn't make it all that far, partly because my lungs are not used to that elevation, but also because the sun was coming up fast and I knew this little cluster of aspens would be soon be dramatically lit, or so I thought. On my turf I know the patterns and movement of light, but here I didn't realize that a peak I couldn't see meant we would be waiting... and waiting... and waiting. But all that foot stomping to stay warm was worth it. These pictures only give you a taste of the magic.
Day after day of glorious autumn weather has me out before sunrise
watching the complex interplay of light, mist and tides. Some days I come home with no
pictures, but always with a sense peace. This gift of time to observe, listen, and just "be" in the day's awakening lightens my heart and makes hope possible.
A week of September glory greeted us upon our return to the Southcoast. Almost every morning I have been up early watching the sunrise at favorite spots. The image below of the Slocum River bordered by ragweed and goldenrod made me think of color theory. The sky and the flowers were perfect complementary primary colors -- all that was missing was the red. It was there alright, just not in the photograph. It was my red, runny nose as I pushed the shutter button in between sneezes.
From the back yard of our house we can watch and hear the cows in the field next door. As the fast moving clouds and brisk wind added drama to this peaceful view of zigzagging lines, I tried to capture the feel in between the raindrops. When I looked at my images on the computer I found muted tones of blue, greys and golden wheat pleasing, but I think this sepia version captures the timeless feel of the scene.
The Greenwich Dune hike runs along Saint Peter's Bay, through woodland groves and then across the marsh and over a pond on a gracefully arching boardwalk to the dunes. A spectacular clear and breezy day for a walk through a world of blue, green and gold to the red sand.
Looking like they had come from Hogwarts, magic clouds filled the skies.
This is the view from the front yard of the house in Souris West, Prince Edward Island, where my dad, late in life, found time to sit still... time to enjoy the serenity of this landscape of gentle farms rolling down to the sea. That he loved the quiet peace of this place was a surprise to everyone, even him.
Walking on the sandy streets along the beach I have been pondering the joys and surprises that come unexpectedly later in life. I always thought that the love of the outdoors that I share with my brothers was something generational and had no connection to our parents. Appreciation for nature and outdoor activity simply weren’t an important part of our family life growing up. The pleasures of camping and hiking eluded my parents and, as for the white water rafting and rock climbing we loved, the less said the better. Yet in the autumn of life, my Dad came to appreciate the quiet grace of this landscape and I became an artist. I guess we are all a family of late bloomers.
It is August 25th in a summer that feels like it has just begun, yet the signs of the season's changing are here - the roadside wall of green is punctuated with small dots of yellow and occasionally a bit of red. Last night's fall-like coolness made for a glorious dawn of gently wafting river fog and grass tips set aglow by the rising sun.
The high winds that have brought Alberta floods and lots of rain here off the coast, have also blown Portuguese Men of War ashore. Yesterday I found three of them at Cherry & Webb beach. To have them here so early in the summer is yet another sign of climate change. They are miserable to come in contact with, but they sure make for interesting looking beach blobs....
In the salt marsh along the banks of the Connecticut River the evening mist is lit in a gentle warm glow.
When the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon it is the beginning of civil twilight. It is the time when shadows disappear. Combine it with pink tinged clouds and wind softened water and the ordinary becomes stunning.
North Harbor, Padanaram