Oncatography: Shadow and Light

It's In His Nature...To Be Patient and Careful

Toad on a Log, McKeldin Area of Patapsco Valley State Park, Maryland, May 2016

A scorpion and a frog meet on the bank of a stream and the scorpion asks the frog to carry him across on its back. The frog asks, “How do I know you won’t sting me?”  The scorpion says, “Because if I do, I will die too.”

The frog is satisfied, and they set out.  But in midstream, the scorpion stings the frog. The frog feels the onset of paralysis and starts to sink, knowing they both will drown, but has just enough time to gasp “Why?”

Replies the scorpion: “It’s in my nature…”

Fortunately there are no scorpions in the wild in the area where this image was taken. Woods and a rushing river, complete with small rapids, were some few feet away from this patient little creature and from my daughter and I. We were engaged in an afternoon walkabout in the Patapsco Valley. The toad was perched on a log and amazingly still given the commotion of hikers and picnickers in the area.

I do not often see frogs and toads without that Parable of the Scorpion and the Frog passing through my head. It is inseparable from my psyche. Perhaps it is...in my nature.

The toad offered no counsel. Even as I hovered about clicking away with my camera, it held still, silent, seemingly unperturbed. Perhaps that calmness is in its nature; and I must confess, I wish it were in mine.

Stories from the Wire

Homies, East Bottoms, Kansas City Missouri, 11 January 2013

I don't know what it is with me and cameras, other than I often feel I have a long way to go when it comes to storytelling. So often, the viewfinder leads me to believe that I know what I am doing. Later, the results seem to indicate otherwise. It is not unlike my hand at writing. The idea in my head sometimes seems better than the end product.

The opposite is also true. So many times that something amazing is discovered upon a review of works after weeks, months or even years have passed. This continual rediscovery of bured treasure, as it were. Whether graphic or written, it is a trial and a delight to re-read a story or consider a photograph long set aside. To find inspiration or renewal of creative desire, this is the genius of art.

To find inspiration anywhere, to be sure, is the genius of art. Of creation. The photograph above I took nearly two years ago. It was a scene just outside a butcher shop at which I had just completed a free (to me) training session, or stage (to get all technical) in hopes of finding employment. The setting was right, the light was good, and the birds on the wire were telling me stories.

They didn't tell me I wasn't going to get the job, but I did get the shot. That is the heart of the matter. This a true story.

Devil in the West

"Old Scratch", sundown near Ft. Robinson, Nebraska, June 2014

We met on the trail, just below the summit of the bluff. The sun was on its way down. Curiously, he did not want to shake my hand. But that is okay. I'm not sure you can shake hands with the devil and say you were only kidding. 

I guess neither of us knew who was the Devil here.

 

Bison Dream in the Tall Grass

Road to Cheyenne Butte, Ft. Robinson NE, June 29 2014

Sun setting over the rolling hills, prairie sea washing up against butte bluffs. They were out there, I know. I sensed them. In fleet passing, I glimpsed them hunkered down in green-gold grass hammered against the cerulean dome of the sky.

They became part of me. I hope I became a part of them. We left them to their own imaginings out there on the plain, and returned to our own beds. That night, I dreamed I wandered on a sea of grass illuminated by the pale milk of distant suns. On my skin, I felt the warm breath of the herd and was not afraid.

Didn't See It Coming

Victim: Rail line, Patapsco River Valley, Afternoon of February 2, 2012

Afternoon Nap

Sleepytime at Home

Aliens, Man!

Its watching you...

Patapsco River Stories No.1

Scenes from a walk, on a sunny day along the Patapsco:

 

The scent led me upriver, and there stood the vulture feasting on a deer carcass stranded in the middle of the river.  Cue "Circle of Life"...

Good Name for a Bar

Thoughtful Goat

Clark's Farm, Ellicott City, MD - April 5, 2010

Dem Bones

Whale Skeleton, National Aquarium, Baltimore:

I walked by and under this many times, before it dawned on me: good photo to be had. Lookit the bones!