A snapshot in time ...





It's Sunday morning and I'm sick of watching Westerns—my husban'ds first choice, always.  And now, it's also my mother's favorite.  Thanks, David.

Fortunately, after a weekend filled with Westerns, my husband shows mercy and flips the remote my way. "Pick what you want to watch." I scroll the guide and land on "Wild France."
We watch romancing swans and their subsequent family of two white chicks and one grey. The grey was born an hour later than the whites. He is marginalized, perhaps because of his late arrival; perhaps because of his different appearance, but Grey sticks with the family like a blood-sucking nat. When it comes time to take flight, the whites are airborne on their first attempt. Grey is not as adept. Two, three attempts and he decides he'll just hang with the parents the rest of his life. Not so fast. Dad aggressively chases him away from home. Airborne. Success.
Next segment: crows and foxes fight like the Hatfields and McCoys, wildfires threaten turtles, and a castle cat chases out the invading Genet (small wild cat).
The next sequence captures elegant cranes during their slow seductive dance. The difference between shooting motion picture and still life jumps at me. I like motion pictures; I love still life. Still life forever captures a precise moment in time.
I was probably nine or ten years old when the impact of how time rolls hit me between the eyes like a fast-moving spitball. Time moves faster than the rapids on the Colorado River. The impression left me with regret that we cannot "freeze frame" life. I made a mental note, a snapshot in time.
Yes, unexpected thoughts for a young girl.
Picture it: a young girl sitting on a cold metal folding chair in an old stone church during a meeting of young fledglings. I look down at my feet resting on the rung of the chair in front of me and resolve to mark the moment. Freeze the frame. Hold the memory of that precise point in time. It's a still life, so to speak. Why that scene; why that moment? Could I not have found a more lovely frame or exciting scene. It wasn't exactly planned. Decades later I hold that frozen moment.
Still life remains my favorite: sitting quietly, introspecting, wishing special moments in life could be captured like fireflies in a jar.

~ LowTide explorer, Carolyn Fjeran

[LowTide is an eclectic collection of discoveries and reflective writings. ]

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