Recently I was looking through old photographs, trying to find something worth posting that I had not already put on gab. When I got all the way back to the photographs that I took with my first digital camera, a Canon S95 point-and-shoot, I immediately saw the difference in the quality of the photographs. Much of the loss of quality came from my inexperience with photography. But a great deal of it came from the fact that my camera had a tiny sensor with a somewhat inferior lens attached. Today’s photograph is one of those old photos. I spent a lot of time trying to get to look halfway decent, not because I would ever be able to make it into a great photograph, but because of what this particular scene means to me.
Read MoreOut-Of-State Trip, Hooker Falls
Over the past 20 years I have found a number of different places to hike and take photos, most of them in South Carolina. One of the last places I found was DuPont State Recreational Forest in North Carolina. I had heard of it for number of years but had never visited. It was a more than two-hour drive, a long way just to spend an hour or so in the woods, but the online information seemed interesting, and so on an early morning I set out in that direction.
Read MoreGetting Better
I walked the trails at Paris Mountain State Park for a number of years, starting back in 2001 after I left my career, trying to out-run the anxiety that plagued me, trying to find some peace of mind out in nature. Some of those walks lasted over four hours, up and down wooded hillsides and mountainsides, alongside creeks, around lakes. And I admit I did occasionally find some peace there. I also found some things that triggered old memories of war trauma.
Read MoreMy Three Friends
Sometimes the trauma of war or the trauma of life can lead to a dark place. If the mind is weak, as it often is, that dark place may beckon to you in perverse but appealing ways. In a day-to-day life where anxiety is hell and depression is heaven, slipping into the darkness, where nothing matters at all, seems as natural as a puppy's wagging tail.
Read MoreFlood Alert
The hard rain had stopped, at least for a while. Reedy River was flooding the forest at the park. I had never seen that. As I got in my car, camera at my side, I mostly just wanted to take a look, to see what I could see from the middle of the pedestrian bridge, high over those flooding waters. At least, I hoped it was high over those flooding waters.
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