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| Genus Euschistus on Lobelia cardinalus, Liberty Hill, Texas 24 July 2015 |
I'm really enjoying photographing bugs and plants at a macro
level lately, even just using my iPhone and the Olloclip. It's really
interesting how much more detail I can see when I get down really close. Things
I'd never have noticed before. Textures and designs and details. Even color
changes that I couldn't see with the naked eye. It is interesting to think
about why any particular living thing evolved in the way it did and it's also
interesting to think about how every single thing I see is different from every
single thing you see--because we each view things from our lens, our own
perspective, our own brain.
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| Male Texas Brown Tarantula, Aphonopelma hentzi, Cedar Park, Texas 7 May 2012 |
I'm not a huge spider fan but I understand their value in
our ecosystem. And a couple of years ago, I did rescue a tarantula from a group
of screaming boys and grown men who were trying to chase it off a baseball
field. It was really neat to hold him. I still get a bit anxious, though, when I
see a wolf spider in the carpet where it blends in quite well or a large
fishing spider down at the creek. And I still sometimes worry about walking
into a garden orbweaver's web in the middle of the night. I've been thinking
that there is a lesson there somewhere...That it takes conscious thought and
effort to outgrow years of conditioning to be frightened of something.
I never really imagined being thirty-eight years old, you
know? Did you? When you played make believe as a child and imagined yourself as
a grown up somewhere--did you think about being thirty-eight? Or forty? Or eighty?
What will I be like in two years? Or twenty-two?
Do you ever think about what it will be like to die? Do you
wonder if it will hurt or if you will be frightened? I sometimes have those
thoughts in the night, when I am in bed, ready for sleep. And I don’t just
wonder about myself, I wonder about my children and loved ones. Will they hurt?
Will they be frightened?
That’s a terrifying thought to me sometimes. My heart
quickens and my breath, as well. And then I have to concentrate on calming
myself, slowing my breathing, reaching peace with the notion of death.
Remembering that nothing I do will stop it from coming eventually for me and for everyone else and that all I can do is just try to
make whatever time I have beautiful for myself and those around me. Whether or not there is anything else out there after we die, no one really knows. One can have all the faith in the world in any one particular belief system, but still, it may be that we'll just really never know for certain. I think
about all the other people in the world who die in pain and fear and I feel
broken for them and for the family members they leave behind. I realize that I believe that we
as a collective have the knowledge, the creativity, the curiosity, and the
power to begin to make things better for all people on a global level and then
I feel anger and frustration because of all that is done by people every day to
thwart our progress as a collective, as fellow citizens of a single planet.
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| Closeup of Pink Turkscap, Malvaviscus arboreus Liberty Hill, Texas 24 July 2015 |
And then, I feel inspired.