Slowing Down, Seeing Clear: The Joy of Being Here

      So…the broken bone is healing well (see Friday the 13th post for that story), although between it and the sprained ankle, I have slowed down. Just this past week, I've able to walk my dog, which has been quite a joy, as I really haven't been getting out much.

    And on one particular day, okay, it wasn't just any day, it was my 35th birthday, I decided I would take along my camera and see the world through the eyes of a photographer whose senses are keen and sharp. Between the sprained ankle, the sniffing dog, and the picture-taking, my walk was very slow and leisurely, indeed. I returned home feeling happy, light, and refreshed.
  
    This is not how I usually feel when I walk my dog. I will acknowledge that I sometimes hurry my dog along, rushing him to stop sniffing the oak trees and march along our usual route. But this time, the sprained ankle and the camera really helped me take it easy.

     I realized that while intend to be mindful during my day, many times I am not. I still struggle with a mind that focuses on all the things I have to do next, even though I want to pay attention to what I am doing now.
     But in order to take good pictures, one must be paying attention and so pay attention, I did. When on vacation and living abroad, I carried my camera every where, always on the look-out for the perfect shot. I saw the world with eyes of wonder and awe, appreciating every small detail, from the sand-box labelled "Dog Toilet" in London, to the children playing in the street in Cambodia, to the temples of Bangkok. Living there, I believed I lived in a majestic world, a world of richness, wonder, and delight, both beauty and pain, a bittersweet fairy tale. And yet, I seemed to think that this majestic, sacred world was elsewhere and not in my own backyard.

    But the camera, it reminded me of the beauty all around me that I never see. Living in a city that I believe I know well, I take for granted my opinions of how things look, rather than actually stopping to see how they really are.

    So now when I walk, with camera or not, I look, I see, I see beauty, for the fairy tale I thought was off afar, really is in my backyard. I look around as if I had a camera in my hand, looking for the best shot in the land. I see how things change so quickly, the mushrooms that sprouted the day before, were now squashed down into the grass and more.

    And so I thank the art of photography for helping me to see clear and just to be.

© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, Angela Dawn MacKay 

www.knottedwordscelticart.com, Twitter: @AngelaDMac, www.angelamackay.com