Imagine

About twenty minutes ago, as I am walking back up my driveway pulling the empty trash can back to its duly assigned resting spot by the pump house, I looked off through the trees at the rising sun and just paused.

The most magical colors of orange, yellow, and every shade in between, were playing out between the leaves of the old oak tree that keeps my yard in the shade.

Inside my head the regular battle played out … whether to grab my camera and try to capture something before the morning swallowed up all the colors, or to avoid distraction and sort out the trash can like I should have done yesterday.

In the presence of such morning magic, I would have had to be in a really poor mood to choose option number 2, so I abandoned the trash can mid-driveway and ran in to get my camera.

Here are four of the images that I got and I hope you enjoy.

A camera is a camera and (even with a full sensor, Daria) is never likely to come close to the range of soft colors that our eyes detect. So even though I really love these, you will have to take my word that in person, the sunrise was even better.

As I quickly pulled them off the camera to stick in this blog, I noticed one thing that gives rise to this morning’s thought. And it arises from this image here:

So when I look at this image, I immediately see a monster on the right of the shot about to eat a large berry from a branch on the left. Can you see it?

If you can’t, then you probably still have your sanity and likely always will.

For the poets, artists and loonies among us, images like this always have hidden shapes and wonders. We can stare at a seemingly random collection of shapes and colors and see things that others cannot.

Whether it is an act of lunacy or simply having an open mind and interpreting things differently, I will never know for sure. I mean, do lunatics even know they are crazy?

So, I will go the route of this being down to an open mind. Why not?

Seeing the obvious in any aspect of life is a simple task. When we are young, we are taught shapes and colors and names are assigned to what we are seeing … names that we repeat robotically for the rest of our lives.

If on seeing your first airplane, you had been taught to call it a banana, you would forever be the one person on earth that believed that bananas could fly.

So the ability, even at an old age like mine, to stare inquisitively into a random image and pick out things that are not cleanly labeled is probably a sign of a childish mind. And to me, that is a good thing.

So much of our childish imagination is quenched by life that many of us wearily approach its end by no longer experiencing anything new that intrigues or excites us.

But imagine a world where you continually learned. Where you continually explored and stretched your mind into new avenues. This is the real secret to life.

It gives you a reason to get out of bed, go for a walk, or maybe even abandon a trash can in the middle of the driveway.

Never lose your imagination. It is a precious gift that we are born with and we should never let it slip away.

When all is said and done, we will be gone a hell of a lot longer than we are here. So let’s make the most of our time here and allow the child in us to run free.

OK, gotta go now … there’s a trash can that need moving!

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