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Tag Archives: photographs


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an endless list. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

he says that one day we must go on a trip that is specifically about photography. that we will slowwwwly stroll – wherever it is we are – and i can stop and linger – at any time – and take a picture – or twenty – of any single thing along the way. i am excited about that and we have a really, really long list of the places we might choose as destinations. an endless list, actually.

the funny thing is – this is pretty much how i do every day. on the trail, in our backyard, at the garden center, at our potting stand, in the antique shoppe, at the grocery store, in our ‘hood, in the mountains, on the beach – anywhere.

i have always loved taking photographs. even a dear old friend, who i hadn’t spoken with in about four decades, remembered that i always had a camera in my hand whenever she and i were together. it goes way back…for me, to those pocket instamatic cameras and the cameras with the square bulbs on the top that rotated for the next shot. in college i did photo shoots with my new 35mm manual camera for extra money. i climbed fences to take sunrise shots on beaches. i hiked in rivers to capture the fauna along the edges. i adored being the photography editor of my college paper, toting my camera to disco parties, softball games, campus events, college-sponsored ski trips, lunch with paul simon. if there were no pictures of something or someone from back then, there were good reasons.

there have also been times – along the way – when i have realized that taking photographs would take away from the moment – and, in those times, i have chosen to put the camera away – to simply memorize the moment instead. but this thready heart of mine loves to scroll back through images that place life and time.

it feels somewhat like cheating when you take photographs at a nursery such as i did for today’s image. i wandered about the aisles and aisles, greenhouses and gardens of nearby milaegers, entranced by the vast opportunity to capture color, texture, utter beauty. there is no end to it. even the flowers that are wilting are absolutely divine. i walk, arm in arm with david, and i feel fortunate to see so much that touches so many senses. it is impossible to not feel it. we are surrounded by the glorious.

and so we plan – one day – to take a trip sheerly about photography. i will be excited to plan it, to choose idyllic places and vistas that offer moments like the shimmer of sun on iridescent raindrops.

in the meanwhile, i will carry my iphone and its remarkable camera everywhere i go, capturing everything else that is beautiful, that is evocative, that means something, that will be a source of joy or heart or memory, that is life.

it is an endless list.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED WEDNESDAY

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peonies in the sky. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

i have sixty-three recent photos of our peonies. to say i love them would be an understatement. they have endeared themselves to me and i’m craaazy about them.

the other photos are more “normal” – they are taken at eye level with the peony or a photo of their generous flower – they are moments capturing raindrops on fragile hot pink petals. they are pictures of tightly-wound buds and sunlight escaping from an early blossom. they are peonies in full regalia.

because i have so many photographs of them it seems obvious to look for a new perspective. “the real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” (marcel proust)

so i knelt down and put my iphone on selfie mode, held the camera under the peony flowers and clicked peonies in the sky. because our world tends to be a from-the-top-down, house-stage world, it seems prudent to look from the bottom-up sometimes. it changes things.

the juxtaposition of color is intense. it takes away the denseness – and the greenness – of the whole plant. it focuses on the individual flowers, on their stems.

i’m not really fond of this photo shoot so much. i prefer the other 57 i took up-close-and-personal with my precious peonies. but it’s a good reminder to step back and look at peonies from many aspects. they will look a tad bit different depending on the surroundings, depending on the background. they will blend in and they will stand out. they will be one-of-many and they will be the star-of-the-show. each peony may be appreciated in different ways, in different contexts, for different reasons. with new eyes.

not unlike people.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

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for you. not about you. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

“99% of people wouldn’t notice that”, he said, “and they’d just keep walking.”

the stranger had stopped where we were. i was off-trail, taking a picture of sun as it glinted off cattails. i was precariously close to the water’s edge, hidden by dried leaves and twigs in the marshy area, but worth it for the photo. d had just given me a hand-up back onto the trail when the stranger stopped.

he asked to see my photographs and i complied. and we all started talking. george spoke from the wisdom of someone close-to-80 as he recounted stories of trails he had recently taken, of people going too fast to SEE anything at all. he told us he was happy we noticed the glowing cattails, happy that we were looking – really looking – as we hiked. he told us that “it” (life) is all about looking and learning, researching, wondering, thinking and looking some more. we agree.

i’m not sure there’s ever been a hike – anywhere – when i haven’t taken at least a few photographs. there’s just so much to see. sometimes, in the middle of our not-knowing, we’ll look things up right away. sometimes, we save that for later.

just a couple days ago – in a truly magical moment – we stopped on the trail, separated from a pond by a bit of woods and grasses.

the red-tailed hawk was still. in the air – suspended on a current, wings curled up – it was absolutely still, hovering in place. though i know hawks are apt to do this as they hunt, this hawk just stayed still as we watched. then it flew a little lower and hovered a little bit more. it never dove down for any prey; it just hovered and then landed in a tree nearby as if to say, “there! that was for you.” it was a gorgeous and spiritual moment. i won’t forget it.

the trail – in both its simplicity and complexity – is a constant reminder for us.

“it’s not about you,” it whispers. “look around. there’s so much to see. it’s all here FOR you.”

we most-always listen.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED WEDNESDAY

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lace in the snow. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

it is in much the same way that arvo pärt appeals to me that this photograph is a win for me. it’s simple – a stem of queen anne’s lace, fallen on the side of the trail, iced in. i felt lucky to come upon such a shot.

one of these days we are going to take a trip – later than sooner, i suspect.  it will be solely for the opportunity to take photographs. we haven’t yet decided on a place, but it doesn’t matter too much – there are photographs everywhere just waiting. like this lace in the snow.

taking photographs reminds us to slow down. it’s impossible to trek fast if i have a camera in my hand. in the rare times i have left it in my bag ahead of time, planning to get a better workout, i inevitably stop and extract it – something has captured my attention, something needs to be on film.

ever since my first 35mm yashica i’ve been the one with the camera. there are big chunks of life where it looks like i wasn’t there. those are the times i was taking the pictures. very much there, just not in the frame. now i wish i had handed off the camera to someone else more – asking for a few more pictures in which i was present.

selfies have taken over today’s social media world. i must say, a selfie at 25 or 35 or even 45 looks waaay different than a selfie at almost-65. i am not a fan. unless of course it can be soft-focus, backlit, and overexposed. in that case, i’m in. otherwise, i want a photo to be taken from a bit further away than the end of my arm.

i continue to wander around with my camera…stopping often on the trail, pulling off to the side of the road in littlebabyscion or big red, grabbing photos of ideas in antique shoppes and boutiques, annoyingly taking candids and posed shots of my grown children when i am near them. i have about 35,000 photos on two iphones, but that doesn’t touch the grand total. 

some photos are obvious – all the tourists gather there, every visitor taking a picture of the iconic whatever-it-is. some photos are obvious – we want remembrances of times spent together, celebrations, festive occasions. some photos are obvious – we portrait our families, we feature our growing children, we capture our pets in everything silly or heartstrung. we photograph the beautiful, the magnificent, the moment-in-time.

and some photos…well, some are a bit more subtle. they are the shadows of the tall trees. they are the tiny birdfeet prints. they are the curl of the petal, about to fall. they are the dew on the grass, the horizon lost in fog, the patterns of an old brick wall. they are the nurselog, the feather, the breaking wave, the caterpillar. and they are lace in the snow. all just waiting to be seen.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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the number line. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

i think it was $250. that is the number that sticks in my mind. the amount of money my sweet poppo spent on the family’s very first calculator. way back when.

now, $250 was a lot back then. it still is. but my dad wanted us to have this newfangled device with which we could add, subtract, multiply and divide to our heart’s content, sans paper and pencil. it was a pretty exciting time and we all felt inordinately lucky to be living in such a technological world. wow.

my big brother was the one who made an abacus for me. in searching through bins in the basement and the attic i was hoping to stumble upon it. but no abacus to be found. amazingly enough, i even knew how to use the abacus.

and then, it was, again, my brother who showed me how to use a slide-rule. he was a surveyor for a time, so it was a tool of his trade. and anything my brother used, i wanted to use. he was that kind of idolized big brother. i’ve come across several slide rules in boxes and pencil cases. i’d have to refresh to figure out how to use them. i’m just certain that my treasured high school math teacher would be proud were he to know how attached i still am to these pre-calculator devices.

the stick on the trail somehow brought all of this to mind. linking-thinking, my dear friend heidi calls it. as we approached it, it just simply screamed “number line” to me. it appeared that each little branch nub was placed exactly the same distance apart. it immediately brought me back to number lines i’ve created in the past…for history classes or for math or for one of those “describe your life” timeline projects that have you looking back and then looking ahead. plotting on the line the ponderous things that have happened in your life that have in turn impacted your life.

i stopped to take photographs of the stick and got lost in plot-my-life-on-the-number-line thoughts. i’ve been doing a lot of looking-back and this stick would come in handy as a visual.

somewhere on that stick it would show our first calculator. somewhere before that it would show the abacus and the slide-rules. somewhere later it would show a first computer. and then, subsequent computers, laptops, ipads, cellphones. it’s easy to place stuff on the number line.

what’s much harder to place is the impact of moments in your life. but for one decision, one meeting, one event, the rest of the number line would be entirely different. it’s profound.

in the way that – in elementary school – you would draw a curved line – to the right – under the number line to show addition or a curved line – to the left – under the number line to show subtraction, it is much harder to reflect – with a simple curved line – the entire impact one nub on the stick might have had on you. though one might try to reflect the way one nub informed the rest, it is nearly impossible to wrap all impact into a few curved lines.

in fact, the number line, the abacus, the slide-rule, the early-bird calculator – none of them can calculate all that.

standing on the trail, mid-photo-shoot with the stick, i realize that it is likely we cannot actually portray ourselves – our lives – on a number line. it occurs to me that – because life and heart and soul are like this – we are living many nubs concurrently – backward and forward – all at the same time. no nub stands alone. each is altered and informed by all the others.

*****

BLUEPRINT FOR MY SOUL ©️ 1996 kerri sherwood

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read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

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the face on the door. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

we are clearly the three musketeers together…20, d and me.

our discussions range from ridiculous kidding to profound artistic center to current events. we cook together and spoil dogdog together. he has been a constant – for thirty years – and our friendship is cherished. he is my brother; after my own big brother was on the other side, he chose 20 to be so.

he has a thing about faces. and so, because he sees them everywhere, so do we. happy faces, silly faces, sad faces, worried faces, upside down faces. i have stopped in my tracks to snap a photo of a face – regardless of the place – just to send to him.

and then, at the coffeehouse in madison, there was this face on the door. 😐 d was engrossed in something else, but 20 and i went off into fits of laughter – talking as if we were the face on the door. it doesn’t take much to entertain us.

it’s a good learning.

because – really – isn’t that the point? to see the tiniest thing with someone you care about and laugh the biggest guffawing-snorting-tears-running laugh. to admire the tiniest thing with someone you care about and be awestruck with the biggest swelling heart. to share the tiniest things – and the biggest things – with someone you care about and know – deep in your soul – they are standing there with you, every fiber.

i’ll always stop for faces now.

well, faces and hearts.

because they’re important. 🙂

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED WEDNESDAY

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all the angles. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

i grew up loving protractors and mechanical pencils, slide rules and really good erasers. it’s a wonder i didn’t pursue a career where these were valued or necessary. digging through bins recently, i came across a pencil case with yet-another protractor, yet-another slide rule, a very sturdy compass, some fine-point drafting pencils. a treasure! from long ago i can feel the slide rule in my hand and the circly swirl of the compass. even without a specific purpose for these (save for the pencils) i am planning on keeping them. and the pencil case as well. because who doesn’t love pencil cases?

and so, it was without hesitation i immediately eye-measured the angles in this photograph. the north side of our house, rooflines as they meet the sky. this old house is filled with angles – crown molding meeting crown molding, wood floors as they run an expanse of a room to partner with another room, ceilings over a reversing stairwell, ceilings in bedrooms that long ago housed matchbox cars and barbies.

there are photographs in the bins-in-the-basement as well. i study them for a bit. it’s obvious i was always looking for a different angle – a different way to view what everyone else was looking at, to compose my image. closer-up, upside-down, the horizon on a deliberate tilt. but, most always, tighter-in, to feature some subject matter.

it was when i was in the canyonlands sharing precious time with my daughter that i learned a lesson. we were both snapping pictures – the expanse, the red rock, the sky, the immensity, the 90 degree angles to the canyon floor – it was all overwhelmingly take-your-breath-away. we took photographs of each other in this incredible terrain. her images were a teaching.

there, taking up barely any space in the middle third of the left side of the photo, i stood on the top of the cliffside. the sun was almost down, the deep chasm below dark, the red rock upon which i stood still lit orange. i am the smallest percentage of this photograph and, yet, it is one of my favorite photos of myself – ever.

it was that day i learned little bit more about perspective – through my daughter’s brilliant creative instinct to give the visceral gift of seeing tiny in vast. to back up, to wide-angle the view. i remind myself of these amazing moments with her often.

i hold my camera ready – to consider all the angles of what i’m seeing. and, most especially, what i might see, what i might be aware of, from a distance. the bigger picture.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

from a distance. acrylic 53″ x 29″

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picture-of-the-day. [d.r. thursday]

i haven’t stopped. since march 2020 when my son – at the beginning of the pandemic – in an effort to help me feel connected to him and my daughter – suggested we have a shared text with photos taken in our day. a picture-of-the-day. and every day, not-failing, i have sent one since. i am in absolute delight when they now share a photograph on this thread; i know busy-ness and work and life have picked back up some time ago and picture-of-the-day is no longer on their radar. but, because i am a mom – and i know moms everywhere can relate – it’s still on mine. i look for something that somehow represents my day, every single day.

i have to say – this has been a good thing, this intention to seek and snap the picture-of-the-day. i take lots of photos, so some days this is easy. but there are others when my photo is of mashed potatoes or chicken soup or the accuweather tornado watch or glasses of wine at the end of the day. some days are just life. normal, regular, not supersized, life.

the trillium placed itself in front of the fallen log, clearly, on purpose. ready for its photo shoot, its bud profile at this stage resembling a mighty tulip, the toadshade waited for someone to come along and take its picture. and there i was.

that very day i ended up using a graceful fern in our backyard as my picture-of-the-day. the composition was just a little better, the curve of the fern beautiful. but the trillium knew it would end up featured. i had whispered thank you to it after my baker’s dozen shoot. it stood proudly as we hiked away, knowing.

paying attention – to the littlest details of a day – requires intention. i know i could get lost in the other details of our life, the more pressing, the more complex, the minutiae and nuances of moment-to-moment adulting.

but one text from my son changed that and offered me a continuing reminder to find something – any thing – big or little, positive or disconcerting, dreamy or a little bit scary – that was a real piece of my day. it also offered me a chance to physically let them know i was – at that very moment of sending – thinking of them.

i know there are days – i don’t want to think about how many – that my grown children look at their phones and – in unison from 1400 miles apart – roll their eyes as my picture-of-the-day drops in.

i just want to thank them. ❤️❤️

and this trillium.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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blurry from here. [d.r. thursday]

it’s all blurry, isn’t it?

we are mutually reading a book – the measure – in which every person in the world over 22 years old is gifted a box. in that box is a string which represents the length of one’s life. we are about a third of the way through so making our way along the trail of this story. we can’t help but wonder if we would open the box.

it’s all blurry from here – the future. no matter what, we do not have any idea what’s out there, what is to come, what will or will not happen. even with the best of planning, the field of vision is not crystal clear.

our video of choice on-pillows was a pct hike. no surprise there. but the youtube we watched was extraordinary. an “older” couple – 61 and 60 – backpacking this thru-hike, exquisite photography, even more exquisite narration. more than a few times we wished we had jotted down his words, wisdoms from the trail, wisdoms from blurry life. they called their hike “a pacific crest trail coddiwomple documentary” and he explained that “coddiwomple” means “to travel in a purposeful manner towards a vague destination, ” to “keep moving forward even when you’re not quite sure where you’re going”.

blurry. life.

we could seriously relate. even without being on trail, we pay attention to just how blurry things really are. the rearview mirror can give you hints, but never quite enough information and, besides, it’s not the direction any of us are headed in our timelines. they keep going and going. focused, unfocused.

i have found myself peering at the future…as if through those tiny opera glass binoculars…trying to see what is out there in front of us. the aperture is narrow in diameter, the focus is not all-consuming. anything outside of the zone is out of focus. blurry from here.

i went through photographs the other day. i take hundreds each week. the unintentional rothko showed up in my camera feed. studying what came before and what came after gave me clues as to what it was a picture of. i now know what it is. but it doesn’t change the feeling the photograph evoked. the painting of color fields, blurry and without clear lines of distinction. a rothko created by accident.

life is kind of like that, i guess. you are out there, coddiwompling around, living life, breathing in and out, never really sure of the destination, always surprised along the way. you paint what you think will be the future. and then, in any given moment, it all gets blurry. blurry, but nevertheless – surprisingly – beautiful.

i’m not sure i’d open the box.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


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flowers of the forest. [d.r. thursday]

as we were walking into costco the other day, there was a man briskly walking out. he was balancing a a box of items in his right hand. but in his left was a bundle of flowers. i don’t think he was aware of my brief stare, for outside costco it is windier than most places and we were scurrying to get inside.

but i did stare.

it wasn’t because of the man – i wouldn’t be able to identify him in any way. it was because of the bundle of cellophane-wrapped flowers in his hand. he made me think of my sweet poppo who would purchase grocery store flowers for my momma to put in the center of their coffeesitting table or maybe on the side table in their foyer. my momma loved those flowers. inexpensive, and often on sale – she was ever budget-mindful – but she really loved them.

in these days of a bit more challenge we have taken to a new practice. it’s: pretend-i’m-giving-this-to-you. next to a display of valentine cards sweet-topped in love language with $5.99 printed on the back, we held one out to the other – “pretend i’m giving this to you.” we stopped by the floral cooler and he pointed to a bundle of red roses (with buds and petals actually attached, i might mention) and said, “pretend i’m giving these to you.” the “pretend-i-got-you-this” is far-reaching and much more satisfying than you might imagine.

for it is an intention of love and, in our lighter-weighted and budget-minded world, not stuff.

as we drove home from hiking we contemplated what we might do for the rest of the saturday. it was wide open and we had vowed to hold it as our own. we needed this day on the trail, this time outside, this time together sans angsts. we ran ideas in littlebabyscion.

revisiting frugality is not unfamiliar for us. it is, in fact, much more familiar than extravagance. and so, it is much easier for us to be prudent and thrifty when considering the ‘what’s next’ category. off-trail, our legs were tired from hiking in snow and, though refreshed, we were a little weary from being out in the windy cold.

we considered our options. what to do with the rest of saturday. it was getting later.

back home, we made a little charcuterie board, poured a little wine. we decided to stay home – with our happy dogga. we talked about our trail covered in snow, we read a book together, we played one of favorite cds. kind of a gentle end to our day.

i scrolled through my photo stream then reached out to d with my phone, pulling up one the photographs i’ve taken on the trail we love – this photo of stunning blooms of wildflowers in the winter forest – and said, “pretend i’m giving these to you.”

i’ve noticed lately that my eyes look a lot like my poppo’s.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY