Happy Sunday!

Wet sticky snow fell most of the day Friday, with some light rain following…just enough rain, and light enough, to really set the snow on the branches of trees, bushes, and power lines, and to increase its weight about 4 fold. For a wonder (and a blessing) there were no power outages locally. Saturday morning came up sunny and cold, with little to no wind, so I managed to get out early enough to catch the accentuated winter scenery.

This is Roger’s Park, a tiny little parcel on the Mousam River, with a skating pond and fishing access, just a few blocks from Main Street in Kennebunk. It is one the few spots on the lower Mousam where the public has access to the river, and I check in there frequently for photo ops. The tangles of vine covered shrubs and trees back from the river, between the river and a marshy area behind the park, are also a wonderful spot for warblers and other song-birds in spring.

In this shot the attraction is clearly the dark water, almost metallic, in sharp contrast to the filigree of snow coated trees…and the clarity of the winter light. It adds up to a postcard view of Maine winter…a scene not often seen, in fact, but easily imagined as what Maine should look like in winter. And occasionally it does.

🙂

Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent field of view, f4 @ 1/500th @ ISO 80. Snow mode. Because of the dark water filling a good deal of the frame, I tipped the camera up so the meter read more of the snow covered bank, locked exposure and focus by half-pressing the shutter release, and then reframed for composition.

Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.

There are several Sunday thoughts possible here: Beginning with the gratitude I always feel for the foresight of public officials (the town fathers in this case) who preserved a little pocket park like this, or something as grand as the Grand Canyon, for the public…for me…so that I can enjoy it, and find inspiration and revelation in it. Then, on a completely different track, there is the dangerous beauty aspect of the scene. A snow fall like this is indeed beautiful, but the potential for damage to the trees, and power lines, is very real. Branches fell, trees cracked, and if was only God’s grace that the power lines were not under any of them when they fell…this time. And maybe it is, in part, at least a little, that dangerous beauty that speaks to our sense of wonder. I know that a scene like this fills me with a kind of wild joy…I have to take deep breaths of the cold air and I feel a surge of energy. I know my face is fixed in a silly grin of enjoyment. And I enjoy being able to enjoy it as much as the experience itself. That I can see the beauty in this postcard from the Maine winter…that is a thing of wonder, and deep gratitude, in itself. Happy Sunday.