Sunday, November 15, 2009

Coffee and Contemplating

It’s not often I wake to an empty house, but today when I crawled out of bed the house was quiet, except for a whisper of a meow at my door. Manda is off with two friends searching for a wedding gown and bride’s maid dresses in Cincinnati and Redding spent the night with Grandpa leaving me home alone for an evening and a morning.
Miss AddieAnime in Profile
Noodle

After feeding an insistent Miss Adventure, along with her cat-horts, Anime and Mr. Noodle, I started coffee and then jumped in the shower. I sat at the table, sipping on coffee with a spanking new notebook and pen at my fingertips. I don’t know if it was the quiet or the rumbling in my stomach that diverted my plan to journal, but I never wrote a word. Instead, I scrambled an egg, buttered a slice of toast, and ate breakfast contemplating a new and exciting discovery.
Mug and Notebook
While sipping milky coffee in my favorite Chicago mug, I came to realize that this blog has brought something new and wonderful to my life. The Cottage on the Corner gave me a gift, a passion that until the last few months I didn’t know existed. Taking photographs exhilarates me.

Art has always been near and dear to my heart. Through the masterpieces of others, I’ve peered into the world of drawing, painting, sculpting, and photography. I cannot draw with charcoal…I cannot paint with oils…flowers and herbs have been my medium. I painted gardens, borders, and beds with soft petals, jagged-edged leaves, and flowing branches. I conjured up stories using flowers in traditional, modern, and abstract floral design. Now I am adding one more medium to my artistic palette, photography. It combines two passions into one…story telling and painting with the world as my muse. It’s wordless storytelling captured in a moment. Blink and the moment escapes. My perspective on the world opened like a flower when I looked through the lens, my heart beating a little faster, and snapped the picture. I’m a novice for sure. I have no fancy equipment, no wide-angle lenses, filters, or expensive photo manipulation programs. I just have two green eyes that view the world in a brand new way…through a point and shoot, digital Fuji camera.

Photography has eased the hurt of not having my own garden. Yes, I am a gardenless gardener and like Mary in the Secret Garden, I long for a bit of earth to plant flowers. Because my next garden plot exists somewhere in the future, I followed my brother and his wife as they took a giant step into the world of gardening; I visit gardens, search for nature everywhere and take photos along the way, offering my viewpoint as tiny treasures that enhance my blog. After six months of grabbing moments out of thin air, I’ve embraced photography like a new lover…shy, with a quivering hand, yet flush with excitement threatening to spill over into a full-blown love affair.

As I take my last sip of coffee, I contemplate all the wonderful gifts The Cottage on the Corner has brought to me…exchanging ideas with people from faraway places, viewing the perspectives of so many other gardeners who share their worlds through the camera lens, reading opinions, heart-felt musings from kindred spirits, and this joyous new-found love, photography. I have no idea where this little blog will take me next, but I’m overwhelmed by where it’s taken me thus far.

“When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.”

~Ansel Adams

8 comments:

  1. Uh oh, the camera bug has bitten you, you will never be the same. It is so fun! It changes how you see the world.

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  2. Hi Teresa,

    I have been bitten by the camera bug! It's strange how in six months, I've started viewing the word in a brand new way, always wondering if what I'm seeing would make a great photo.

    Thanks for visiting!

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  3. What a beautiful post...I am glad you found a passion in photography..and look forwrad to your future garden.it is sure to be magical indeed!Wonderful post!!And by the way..those kitties are awesome and cute!

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  4. oh being behind the lens, is just the best.
    i do love that mug of yours.
    xoxo

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  5. I loved reading this tonight and thought to myself how much I too have found a new lover--although I had not exactly thought of it in those terms:) , but with my little point and click, I take pictures of everything, something even a year ago, I rarely did .. and then post them on my blog, another something I rarely if ever did, in fact, it took some time for me to work up the nerve to do it at all as well as my art... but now, my life feels so much richer, wider and more full of the universe because of seeing through that little lens!

    this is a lovely blog I am longing to read more of ... I am so glad you happened by mine today and left such kind words for me...they were my first of the day and so much appreciated, so thank you deeply for them and also for signing on to the boat that is plowing through uncharted seas :)

    blessings upon your week!

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  6. Kiki...thank you, once again, for your encouragement through kind words. I garden in containers these days, but for me, it's limiting.

    Those three cute kitties are indeed adorable, but my are they ornery! The sure know how to entertain.

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  7. I came upon two wonderful blogs yesterday through Bee Drunken and I'm smitten with Christina's blog, Soul Aperture.

    Christina...thank you for visting the Cottage. I found that mug in a little shop at the Navy Pier on my first trip to Chicago a year ago. It brings back wonderful memories of a weekend trip to the big city with my sisters.

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  8. Oh my Linda...thank you for stopping by and leaving such a grand comment.

    I started taking photos a year ago when I website I was writing for asked me include a photo, but the excitement didn't take off until this spring and now I'm constantly itching to get out there and snap pictures.

    You're welcome. I know what it is to forge through murky waters chasing a dream. I'll be back for more...right after I relax in a bubble bath.

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