Then the eyes of the blind will be opened,
and the ears of the deaf will be cleared.
Then the lame will leap like the deer,
and the tongue of the speechless will sing.
Waters will spring up in the desert,
and streams in the wilderness. – Isaiah 35:5-6
Sunday afternoon, walking Max with Rebekah, I could not help but notice how much all the trees and shrubs etcetera have grown. The neighborhood looks completely different to the version we were first introduced to back in the beginning of December.
So, after we arrived back home, I went out again for a short reconnoiter with my camera. Interestingly, they still don’t make a lens that can come anywhere close to replicating the way we see with our own eyes. We can simultaneously focus, crop, zoom in and otherwise edit simply while walking along.
But I did manage to capture a few images that tell a little of the story. It’s the story of what it is possible to see just within one block of our house. It is a story you would miss if you drove through, or even walked through inattentively, focused on some kind of a device.
It reminds me a little of what used to happen when I interviewed people for the Tampa Tribune. If I didn’t pay attention, if I didn’t ask the right questions, if I didn’t listen well then I would have missed the color the light the beauty that everyone carries within their story.
Same with this neighborhood. I have to ask the right questions when I am taking photographs, or I am going to miss so much of the color and the light and the beauty.
Take a look at your immediate neighborhood, and also the people in your immediate circle. Are we listening? Are we looking? Are we asking the right questions? Do we know the deep parts of the story?
Do we see the light and the beauty and the color and the rich narratives that surround us?
Life is good. Life is beautiful. But sometimes we have to take the trouble to discover and uncover – especially when the negative voices are so loud, so insistent, so strident and so intrusive as they are today… – DEREK.
