Figure 1 – Fallen trees in the morning sunlight, Assabet River National Wildlife Refuge, (c) DE Wolf 2017.

It is a long story, but today I ventured back into the woods for the first time since December. It was an opportunity to survey the damage of winter, the fallen and snapped off trees as well as to explore the consistency of where certain bird species frequent. Of course, the second is largely a matter of habitat. I saw no great blue herons on the ponds, though I have seen many high up in their nests in the rookeries. The canadian geese were there with their newly hatched goslings. The towhees still tormented and teased my camera in the same spot. And the blue jays squawked loudly in all the same places.

The woods never disappoint, even if I fail to get good bird pictures. There is a kind of timelessness present and I quickly revert to the sense of my youth, where the world seems both timeless and young, where your own age evaporates. It is rejuvenating. I took the picture of Figure 1 in the pine barren, trees snapped off and intertwined captured in an intense beam of warm morning sunlight. The rich ochre shades were compelling; so I chose to keep the image in color. Ochre is the color of the Earth. Mixed with sunlight it suggests that out of the carnage there will be renewal.

“There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who with the help of their art transform a yellow spot into sun.”

Pablo Picasso