I find myself pondering how this time of Solstice, the time of the standing still of the sun in its northward journey, has meaning for me in my life and in my photo taking. This is the time of darkness on the cusp of our return into the light. This year I’ve felt the ‘darkness’ more than other years I think because we haven’t had snowfall to distract me with its beauty. So, it’s been interesting to see how I define ‘beauty’ and in turn, what I find attractive to capture in photos. It’s clear that while I connect with the barren landscape of this dark time I don’t feel drawn to photograph it. Yet there is a beauty in the starkness as it lays bare to view all that is hidden in other seasons. Without the snow, this dark season demands of me a certain stillness that left to my own devices I resist. I wonder how I can learn to take this stillness with me into our advancing season of light.
A few days before the Winter Solstice Kody and were walking along Chelsea Creek not far from Hendrick’s Farm. We had had a dusting of snow overnight and I was energized by the possibility of snow covering the landscape. Yet there was hardly any coverage. It was only a hint of winter to come and I had to overcome my disappointment. How often this happens – rather than simply being with the stillness and the ‘isness’ of what nature is offering me I dream of what it could be. It was a beautiful morning with hard ground under our feet, the sun sliding in and out from behind clouds and crispness in the air.
These couple of photos do not do justice to this beauty as the uneven lighting was challenging. The starkness here, a few days before Solstice, has a beauty and is a reminder to me of stillness in the dark time.
