This summer has been one of the loveliest summers I can remember. Maybe I’ve just become more appreciative of summers, green things growing, and warm sunny days. I am so grateful for the lush green that can be seen everywhere I go and for the lovely weather we have been having here in Minneapolis this summer. I hear of terrible storms and rain or drought north, south, east, and west of us, but so far, we have had a perfect amount of rain, few mosquitoes, and lots of mild sunny days.
Earlier this week I went to French Regional Park with a friend. It was a perfect day for wandering with a camera. The temperature was warm but not too hot, humidity low, and a slight breeze kept mosquitoes from being a problem. There were kids and families throughout the park enjoying the beautiful day.
I went without an expectation of making any exceptional photographs. It was enough just to be out in nature soaking in the beauty and playing with my camera a bit while I was there. Swallows swooped and dived over the marshy areas near Medicine Lake. Water lilies were in bloom and their leaves created a carpet of green across areas of the marsh. Cattails blew in the breeze. Kids and adults fished at the edge of the lake. Sailboats skimmed across the lake. Kids swam at the beach.
“We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects.”
― Herman Melville
At the end of a path down by the edge of Medicine Lake, we chatted with and watched a guy fishing in the lake. We got to admire his catch for the day and it was a fun, light connection with someone I’ll probably never meet again. Talking with him and seeing his catch that he was planning to eat for dinner reminded me of my mom who loved fishing. She would have loved spending the morning or afternoon fishing at this spot.
I enjoy how I have become more open to chatting with strangers since I took up photography. It is a small thing, these small person to person connections that I make when I’m doing street or park photography. I try never to photograph someone who is unaware of my presence, and usually ask, “Is it OK for me to make your photograph?” Sometimes I just use body language and gestures to ask and usually get a nod “Yes” in response to my wordless question. With kids, I smile at them and let them know with a gesture that I would like to photograph them. They seem to love the camera and beam at me with big grins and shiny eyes.
These small connections are gifts we give one another. They say, “I see you.”
Members of the northern Natal tribes of South African greet one another daily by saying “Sawa bona”, which literally means: “I see you.” The response is “Sikhona” which means: “I am here”. This exchange is important, for it denotes that ‘until you ‘see’ me, I do not exist; and when you ‘see’ me, you bring me into existence. Members of these tribes go about their day with this personal validation from everyone they encounter – seen for who they are.
— Dr. Elizabeth Taylor, Blog Post
This Fourth of July weekend, I hope you have lots of wonderful time out in nature and that you smile at someone you meet and share a moment of person to person connection. Think about the saying, “I see you,” to someone in your own words or gestures.
May you walk in beauty.
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