It was another early morning start and the lake was calling.
I took the weather app on the phone at face value. It said “clear skies” and from the stars overhead as I stood on my driveway, that seemed about right.
With the cats all fed and free and the hour hand still not at five, I grabbed my trustee camera, took off the wide angle and threw on the zoom lens, and then I headed off.
Where I was heading off to, I hadn’t figured out yet. I just knew I wanted to be somewhere that I could enjoy the coffee and maybe catch some colors.
At that time of the morning, the world was my oyster. There was no time pressure and everywhere was within reach before twilight just after six.
I figured that I would go down walker road to the gas station and buy myself some time in the decision process, while I filled up the car with gas.
As I passed the ball field, I noticed some soft slivers of low cloud drifting across the lights, so I did an about turn and for a few minutes, took some aimless shots as the soft trails of vapors drifted past each light.
The first shot below is from that moment.
By the time my car was filled up, I had talked myself in and out of several destinations. Until finally, I determined that trusty ol’ Lake Parker was where I really wanted to be.
I know I have been there a million times already, but the truth is, I find an awful lot of peace there. Particularly at the little pier and boat dock where I poured some of my Mam and Dad’s ashes as I drifted unwillingly into orphanhood.
I argued that the change of lens would give me a different feel photo-wise, so I wasn’t really repeating something I had just recently done.
When we seek to convince ourselves, we often find the most willing of audiences.
Anyway, it was still quite dark when I first got to the lake, so I went to the farthest point on the south shore so that I could watch some of the light reflections from buildings and such nearby.
Most of the time there in all honesty was spent chatting to a Great Blue Heron who was standing knee-deep in the nearby waters. As conversations go, it was pretty one-side and eventually he had enough of my idle chatter and flew away.
That’s when I decided I would head back up along the shoreline to where the little pier is. Whoever opens the gate, was early and even though it was only 5:40, I was able to drive right in no problem.
The horizon was as yet colorless (unless you count “dark” as a color) and so I took the first ten or fifteen minutes just sipping the last of my coffee and breathing in the morning noises.
As a tinge of red/orange began to define the horizon and accentuated the early morning blue skies I pointed the camera east and began taking shots.
I’ve assembled a few of what I got at the bottom of this blog and hope you get to enjoy them.
An older guy with a fishing rod appeared while I was taking them and he became a main feature of my shots from the morning.
As I drove away, the sun still had not risen, but I wanted to get home to the furry babies and was satisfied that my work here was done.
The thoughts running around my head were not just related to my belief that I had gotten some decent shots, but how certain variables had played out. Firstly in my decision process and secondly in the actual end product that I had produced.
You see, there was no way that I could have known those traces of cloud were there, but their presence played an important part in my decision to head to the lake. I wanted to see if there were some over the water and what they might look like to the camera. But there weren’t any there.
And there was no way I could have counted on that guy with the rod deciding to pick that moment to head to the pier.
These were variables that affected my morning without any input from me … other than just being there, that is.
The only constants in my morning were the clear skies and the impending approach of sun to the horizon. Even the early arrival of the guy opening the gate was something well out of my control. But if the gate wasn’t open 20 minutes ahead of schedule, where would I have gone?
These kinds of variables happen all around us almost every day of our life.
When we open our eyes in bed and begin to think about the day ahead, there is always the unknown, the variable, that can alter our plans or present us with something unexpected that we have additionally to deal with.
Variables have the wonderful aspect of adding originality to each of our days and in many ways they make our life interesting.
Some variables are disasters and can alter our days in miserable ways. Some are wonderful and enhance our experiences in ways we had no right to expect.
But either way, being variables, we cannot count on them … we can only react to them.
Yesterday evening as I finished work, my AC failed and as everyone living in Florida knows, that is quite a disaster. It completely altered my plans and made for a miserable night in stifling heat and a costly (and time-consuming) morning getting it fixed.
As adults, we get used to responding to such instances and they are very much just a part of our lives.
Similarly I took a booking for an unexpected shoot in two or three weeks that will not just be interesting but will provide a nice financial windfall that was nowhere in my immediate plans.
So when we encounter variables it is not just important that we deal with the negative but that we acknowledge the positive. Together they form the intricacies of life’s journey.
The constants are very important. They form the basis of our life’s plan and they give us the direction and the means to progress through life’s end.
Constants can be a place we live, a work we do, family and friends that fill our lives and give us purpose.
Without constants, life is without direction and overly spontaneous. We experience a reactionary journey that is oftentimes wild and unmanageable.
Without variables, life travels its path in a droll and steady pace. It can be boring and predictable and while in many ways, safe, creates fewer memories that we take with us as our life experience.
No, life is about balance in all ways. And having a balance of constants and variables is what makes the journey truly rewarding and rewardingly true.
… just a thought.
