This is our twentieth MM—it certainly doesn’t feel like that long since we started! Since we’ve begun, I find I’m noticing more around me, the little details, and I’m always on the lookout for something interesting, or seeing it in a different way. It’s also helped me get to know my camera and I feel my photography has improved since we started.
My photo comes from Margaret River last week, where the fringe lilies (Thysanotus patersonii) were in abundance. They never fail to captivate me, with their rich colour and, of course, their fringed petals. I find it difficult to believe it’s naturally occurring—the fringe looks like frayed cotton, as if someone’s deliberately pulled the threads at the edges to give it a grunge look! But it proves to me, once again, how intricate and wonderful nature is.
Monique’s veggie garden has been taken over by pumpkins—she may or may not have thrown some seeds in there a few months ago. A patch of strawberries has also seeded under the pumpkins, protected by the bigger leaves of the pumpkin plant. The strawberries there are better than the ones growing in her dedicated strawberry plot, which is a target for slaters. It reminds her of parenthood, and the way we protect our children as they are growing up, and well into adulthood.
Later, Monique’s strawberry contributed to a delicious dessert: meringues topped with mango gelato, and home-grown strawberries, nectarines and blueberries.
I just love the simplicity of the shot.
Midweek Moment is a weekly photographic project in which Monique Mulligan and I team up to share our favourite photos on our websites. It’s a way of stretching ourselves creatively and a nice distraction from writing. Click here for more of our Moments.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. This has been an excellent exercise in helping you to really look at the world around you. I suppose in a way, writing my blog for the last 3 years has helped me to always look for the amusing side of things, even whilst bringing up 5 teenagers! Blogging is therapeutic! The flower is so amazing it doesn’t even look real. I love it.
I completely agree that blogging is therapeutic, and studies have shown it! It’s our piece of cyber-realestate, a space for our stories, and that’s important. All of my writing—blogging, fiction, journalling, essays, light-hearted anecdotes—all of it helps me work through things, understand the people around me and, most of all, understand myself. I can see how it would have been beneficial to you, too, Pinky, especially as you’re so good at it!
My approach to photography is much lighter and very amateur. It helps me to notice the nice things around me, to look for something beautiful, or how I can capture it in a beautiful way. I use the hashtag #seeingthebeautyaroundme on Instagram for that reason. It’s therapy, but in a seek-the-positive way. I know there are professional photographers who go way beyond this and tell deeply moving stories with their photos. I have the utmost respect for their work as that’s what I try to do through my writing.
Stunning colours and such a mouth-watering strawberry!
Thanks, Gulara. Monique said it was rather delicious! x
Wow, MWM #20! And it’s another lovely pair of images 🙂 Like you, I can’t believe that fringing is part of nature – I recently saw some close up photos of snowflakes and they didn’t look real either, their precise lines and geometric angles seeming too ‘perfect’ to occur naturally. But then I guess that it the marvel of nature, and I love how you say this post has made you look more closely at the world around you. I’ve been doing the Thursday Doors challenge and now I’m all about doorways (which I was before, actually, so this is just feeding my obsession). I’m amazed at how blogging has opened up the world for me in a whole new way.
Nature never ceases to amaze me for the beauty she creates, and for how perfectly adapted everything is for its environment (until we try to alter it …). The fringes on this lily would give it some advantage—maybe the ability to absorb more water in our dry climate, or to keep cooler—but there would be a reason.
Snowflakes are the most perfect and beautiful things. I remember when I learnt that they really had those patterns inside them—I thought someone had just made it up for pretty drawings!
I can understand your obsession with doors as some are truly beautiful, especially old ones. There are so many wonderful photographic projects on at the moment—I could spend my day photographing just for them!
Yes, I think my blog could just turn into a photography one if I let it 🙂 It’s been fun going through my older shots as well, seeing if there are any that fit. It’s one thing about using a phone to take photos – I don’t tend to get them printed out any more. I really must do something about that in the New Year…
How YUMMO does that strawberry look! Isn’t it wonderful when a bit of serendipity brings something so lovely. My tomato farming is far more contrived, but hopefully I’ll be able to chomp up a couple all the same.
Thanks for commenting, Sue! Serendipity can be the nicest pleasure, partly because of the surprise. I’m looking forward to hearing more about your tomato farming …