For this issue of Picture to Ponder I am simply combining images reflecting decor and reflections with one photograph of nature.

Today’s Photos –
The top photo is looking inside a lamp in a restaurant in Delray Beach. I love the contrast of the sharp vertical lines of light with the softness of the reflections in the glass.

The middle photo is the pedestal of a glass sink in a small bathroom in the home of one of our subscribers whom I had the pleasure of visiting a few months ago. I was captivated by the reflections in it. Thank you Beth for allowing us in your home. You can see the sink by clicking on the photo or clicking BETH’S SINK.

The bottom photo is, I’m thinking, of leaves from one of the varieties of palm plant.

Today’s Photo Story –
There is no particular “story” around today’s photos. The lower two have been cropping up for a while as ones wanting to be shared and the top one “surfaced” today.

Although quite a contrast between man-made and Nature, they hold together in presentation through similar colors, light and shadows and linear movement.

I will say, as I consider the third photo, I think of Peggy one of our subscribers who has written to me about my featuring “dead” flowers. I now wonder at her response to these leaves. See Last Issue COMMENTS.

For me, generally the first thing that catches my eye is texture, then whatever form of movement there is relative to line and/or repetition of patterns and colors.

I’d love to hear from you in the COMMENTS section at the end of today’s post on the blog, what your responses are when I feature photos of items that are “past their prime.”

Self-Reflecting Queries –
Today, I invite you to look at the contrasts in your life, be they in the physical world, in your activities and/or in your interpersonal relations.

Are there one or more commonalities that hold them together? If you start noticing this for the first time, can you what you find as threads for other situations?

I also invite you to simply be more open than usual this week to seeing things that you do not ordinarily see or pay attention to. What is it that attracts your eye? In noticing, can you relate that to anything else in your life?

With regard to paying attention, I suggest that you remind yourself a couple of times a day to simply open your eyes and look. Sitting in a chair, this morning, I glanced out into my backyard and noticed the brilliance of the lights and shadows on the wall of high plants. There was nothing different than usual AND by my looking only in that direction for a moment or two I experienced an unexpected pleasure.

As always have fun with these queries and looking/seeing. Also, please post your responses in the COMMENTS section below.

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This weekend, I was feeling sad, a little lonely and slightly depressed. Though I was functioning and had completed an interesting interview, I couldn’t get past a feeling of lethargy.  I finally decided that a walk in nature would “pick me up.”  So I went to Green Cay Wetlands with my camera in its bag on my shoulder and walked for a while.

Nothing was happening. My mood was not shifing, no elevation. (In retrospect I’m noticing how we think “it” will take place outside of ourselves.) Finally, I remembered, once again, “Sheila, it’s not the walk that you tell people to do.  It’s taking the camera out of the bag and starting to photograph WHATEVER catches your eye.  So I “snapped” the first thing in the distance that caught me eye.

I didn’t even realize that it was a palm leaf in the distance. All I saw was some texture in what seemed to be a light-colored “wall” of something.  Didn’t matter.  Focusing on something other than my disparate thoughts was starting to work.

Next came a couple of shots of this Roseate Spoonbill in the distance. Already, I was feeling better. The purple gallinule and black-necked stilts were simply a bonus.

The final image that grabbed my attention and really pulled me in was the warmth and light, the brilliance, of the afternoon sunlight reflected off the boards on the side of the boardwalk path at Green Cay.  In the distance, I was able to pull it close with my telephoto lens and capture the image in the top photo shown above.

And, to give the full picture I also photographed the railing shadows cast by the sun.

I could continue to spell out analogies and metaphors for life, for representations of mood shifting, AND I’ll leave all that to you, letting the photos speak for themselves.

Bottom line for me, I experienced once again, the power of the camera as my best friend, my energizer, my re-focuser, the transformer in my life.

I invite you to partner with your camera as a friend and mood stabilizer and expander in your life. To read more on how to do this for yourself, as well as seeing how others have experienced photography as transformation, simply fill in your name and email address under the Little Blue Heron photo and SUBSCRIBE at the top of the column on the right. Once you confirm your interest, you will get, by return email, EXPAND YOUR VISION, the 15 page report that includes 7 Tips for getting unstuck.

Happy shifting.

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For today’s post I am delighted to present the photography of 8-year old Toby Garver, breaking from my tradition of featuring solely my photography, or my deceased husband Sam Finkelstein’s wonderful black and white photography,  in Picture to Ponder and on my blogs.

Close to two years ago Julie Gabrielli, Toby’s mother, and I met in a teleclass. A friendship developed and at one point about a year and a half ago she mentioned her son sitting in her lap discussing his interpretation of one of my Picture to Ponder photos. I had an immediate visualization of the scene and found that picturing the love between mother and child, and the freedom of communication between them, instantly warmed my heart.  I’ve had a “soft spot” for Toby (and Julie) ever since.

Then a year ago, when Julie was a participant in one of my Through and From the Lens Point and Shoot Photo courses, I started hearing more about Toby. In the course, Julie quickly took on one of my main recommendations, “Have your camera with you at all times.”  As we discussed her experiences during the four weeks of the class, she very often mentioned Toby’s going with her and wanting to use the camera. She usually did hand it over and allow to him to use it.  Again, the hand on my appreciation meter went way up and added warmth filled my being.

Responding to a recent one-question survey of Picture to Ponder subscribers, Julie wrote, “I love the practice of taking my camera out for a walk. I’m always delighted and surprised by the inspirations, ideas, and answers that come .”  Then, yesterday she sent me a “Spring” note with the top tulips photo attached.

She wrote, “Went on a walk w/ Toby, our dog, and the camera the other day. I just kept thinking of you, b/c he took the camera from me most of the time and took some great photos!” This gave me a clue that the photo attached was one of Toby’s. I thought the photo so striking and well-composed, especially for an eight-year old,  that I wrote to make sure it was.  “If so,” I asked for permission to publish it.

This morning I was delighted to receive another email from Julie stating:
“Toby is looking at his pictures w/ me and wanted to send a few more to you! I forgot to mention before. . . .As he was taking the pictures, he kept saying, ‘This is just like a painting!’

It’s really cool that we both like the same ones — and often had immediate reactions to the ones we liked the best. Somehow we just ‘knew.'”

It is my privilege to be allowed to share with you here my selection from the nine new ones sent in that email.

Titled “Funky Tulip” by Julie and Toby, the above certainly looks like a painting. I’m wondering if some of the painter-like quality in the photo resulted from Toby’s thoughts being projected onto them.

This next photo gives us the overall feel of a piece of the “landscape” that Toby saw.

I love the way Toby went right into the flower above and how he used the space. It has me wondering if he knows about, and used, the Macro setting on the camera.

Although compositionally, we might look right past the last photo, I’ve included it here because, for me, it exudes drama and mystery and a perfect photo/scene to open up creative dialogue. There appear to be so many stories that could be created from this one.

“Is the yellow tulip calling out to the red?  What might it be saying?  Has the red tulip purposefully turned its ‘back’ on the yellow, or is it simply in a different world?”

Parent and child could make up a combined story, or the parent, or teacher, might simply encourage the child to “spin” a story.

And, if you are an adult, with no child available, you could play with your own inner child, or look at the imaginary questions that come up for you, as mine did for me above. Then explore where in your life you might be experiencing analogous situations.

As I finish here with my initial intent to encourage using photography for opening up and expanding parent/child or general communication, I see I’ve come full circle.  Once again queries surfaced as access to a greater understanding of ourselves.

I invite you to share your experience of this post in the comment section below.  You can also check out Julie’s professional work on her Go for Change blog.  A professional architect, she is passionately committed to Greening our Environment and using many of these principles in effectively forwarding business growth and transformation.

Should you be intrigued and wish to experience expanding your own “seeing” and communication through the use of your camera, I will be opening another Through and From the Lens Course next month.  See COURSE for more information and to add yourself to the keep-me-informed list.

Lastly, you can see the black and white photography of Sam Finkelstein on b&w photography and you can weekly experience Photography and Self-Reflecting Queries in your inbox by subscribing to Picture to Ponder through the link on the right or the RSS feed.

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