Figure 1 – Scoria at the Thai Garden in the Olbrich Botanical Gardens, Madison, WI. (c) DE Wolf 2014

I am sitting in my dining room at my computer and listening to a cold rain falling on the roof.  It is a washout for the first Saturday in November, although I did venture out with my camera for a short walk through the woods.  Nothing grabbed me photographically, but I was content to watch the raindrops and the leaves fall into Sudbury’s Cricket Pond.  There is something really special about leaf covered paths on a rainy day  There is an inner peace to the dampness and the muted colors..

But now I am back home, warm, and happy to have some unfinished photographs to “work up.”  I am reasonably pleased by the image of Figure 1 of some scoria in the Thai Garden at the Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison, WI. Scoria is a volcanic rock, filled with cavities from gaseous bubbles.  There is something wonderful about it – something that binds us to an ancient, growling Earth. Although our Hawaiian friends staring in the face of home-threatening lava fields may not agree.

Tonight is the time change and last night I thought nostalgically about the fading light.  I will not drive home from work in the light again until the first week of February.  The light of September that I spoke so fondly about is now long past, and I found myself wondering about night photography.  That is much more accessible and doable than it was in the days of film. On the other side of cycles, I may again enjoy the light of dawn illuminating fog enshrouded cows on my drives in. I guess that it is time to take down Hati and Skoll’s Halloween Gallery.