A Winter's Tale

Like many feeling folk, I find myself strongly effected by the weather. Not just individual weather patterns … but by the overall seasons as well. Winter inevitably draws out the shadows within, and I slip into ‘hide from the world’ (and maybe myself too) mode. It is a lessening of motivation, combined with too much reflection of all that I perceive might be wrong with my life. Generally it does not truly slow me down all that much. This year I was already in a pretty dark place before the season even began creeping in. Questionable personal choices of late, combined with circumstances beyond my control (including humanity’s seeming determination to destroy itself), had me embracing my hermetic lifestyle to the point that I cut myself off completely from the world. This included avoiding even electronic social contact. Thus my collection of blogs have grown eerily silent for many a week now.

Ironically, considering the effect winter has on me, from a photographic perspective I find it one of the more beautiful seasons. I love to capture images right after a fresh snow fall. I storm or blizzard is artistic bliss. Even in the dark spiritual place I was sitting in did not overshadow the beauty to be found. There were several opportunities to pull the camera out, of which I readily took advantage. I was even using the creative energy that such activity releases to try to climb out of the darkness … starting with posting to this blog. Writing for my other blogs was still too much to ask for … that was way too much energy. I managed to get one post out, and just when I was preparing THIS post, my computer went and died on me. This proved to be the breaking straw, and I quickly withdrew back into my cave, any idea of rejoining the world too much to bear again. The following were a determined effort to experiment with monochrome photography.

I can only tolerate sitting in the shadows so long, though, so recently have been pushing myself to reemerge. First I dealt with the technical issues that were a good excuse not to do anything. Now that spring seems to be having the same though (finally), I FINALLY have the urge to actually start creating … and posting … again. I still want to share some of the pics I took during the winter (they are worth sharing). That is why I am posting some winter images just when spring seems to have finally arrived (at least in my part of the world). The following were a determined effort to play with monochrome photography.