“Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world, receiving the gifts with open eyes and open heart.” Robin Wall Kimmerer Braiding Sweetgrass.

Pityrogramma triangularis, Goldback Fern, or Pentagramma triangularis ssp. triangularis fronds unfolding in spring.

A photographer has the gift of a camera with which to study nature, and there’s nothing quite like intense looking and paying attention to receive the gift of beauty that nature gives us. The camera is a tool that helps us see, the mere act of using the camera consciously allows careful study. The camera should slow us down to look at the frame what we really want to see.

Pityrogramma triangularis, Goldback Fern, or Pentagramma triangularis ssp. triangularis fronds unfolding in spring, California native plant in summer-dry garden
Pityrogramma triangularis, Goldback Fern, or Pentagramma triangularis ssp. triangularis fronds unfolding in spring.

Spring is the time of plants emerging, of the freshest most innocent rebirth, of angels unfolding. I walk by these native Goldback ferns every morning and recently they’ve been calling out, “Look at me!”, waving to me as they shoot up from last year’s dried out remnants. When I want to look closely, I grab my camera because it forces me to slow down – it’s forces me to pay attention because the plants asked me to do so.

Pityrogramma triangularis, Goldback Fern, or Pentagramma triangularis ssp. triangularis fronds unfolding in spring, California native plant in summer-dry garden

I get down to their level, a point of view that feels like a one o one interaction. “Plants tell their stories not by what they say, but by what they do.” Robin Wall Kimmerer Braiding Sweetgrass.

I am listening; and I see; and I am thrilled that spring is unfolding. Thank you Mother Earth.