THE SECOND DAY OF THE YEAR OF EMERGENCE

"THE YEAR OF EMERGENCE"

It is the second of January in the year of 2011,  the year of "emergence!"

 

It took me a couple of days to find an image worthy of a new year.  A year where I hope we don't drag old misfortunes into the new.  A year of promise and perhaps a time to become a bit more optimistic as things begin to "emerge".

This morning the fog on the Riverwalk, along the Congaree River, was a little heavier than that of the first day.  I wanted to depict emergence, like a Phoenix rising?  Well, this morning the weather cooperated and one could actually watch the fog rolling up the river from some marsh in the lowlands.  A marsh previously heated by warmer weather, followed snow a week ago, and now warmer again.  Yesterday we broached seventy degrees, but the water and ground temperatures must have been cooler, because the conditions favored a deep fog.

Early in my walk of about three miles this morning, everything was quiet.  Nothing moving on the river nor in the short woods along each shoreline.  Then the fog began to move and things started to get going.  Emerging if you will.

The lonely and haunting call of a Canada goose in flight has part north woods and part panic hidden within the sound.  But the deep "Craaaaaaaaaaaaaank, Craaaaank ",  the sound of Michner's Chesapeake Bay blue heron, is perhaps in answer to the geese.........."Silly geese, my food is right here!"

Once I slipped from the woods, the sight of the Gervais Street bridge between West Columbia and downtown Columbia rose slowly above the fog.

With all this emerging going on, I decided that I had better get back to work.

  There are 363 days left for this old worm to emerge into a beautiful butterfly!  What chya think the chances of that are?  The Lottery is at 290 million too.  Yep!

I took 96 photos this morning and it was an utter delight to be alone, in the fog, and working at perfecting my art.  I can only wish  the same moments of solitude for you in the coming year.