Aging Gracefully -- Photograph for 11.17.11
At a service’s auction years back Helen Kaar, a member of the congregation, offered people daily photos that she would email to them, photos taken in New Jersey in real time. The bidding would secure folks a year’s worth of photos of nature, alive, right now. That year came and went and the practice continued for Helen and for the folks who stayed on her list, and others got added. At some point I asked to be added.
I must confess, I am someone who finds email a constant reminder of my failure to keep up with life. More often I try to get off as many email lists I can, often feeling even as I do so like the woman with the bucket trying to toss water off the Titanic. So adding a daily email could seem mad, but I was curious what it would be like to get these photos. I assumed I would try it for a month and then ask to be removed, having experienced it for thirty days.
The photos come, you should know, with a title, but nothing else. Every day when you open it you get a bright photograph that fills the screen and a title. It is simple and at first lovely. It is particularly lovely to know that what you see is happening right now, right near you, in your own proverbial back yard. And the title is often provocative too, adding a layer to the processing you do to the image – sometimes ironic, sometimes underlining one aspect of the image, always thought provoking. It is simple and lovely at first. This was the part I expected.
What I didn’t expect, however, was the effect over time. I did not expect how, over time, every day, there would be this cumulative effect. How each day the image would yank me out of my computer and into the world, the natural world, and not some world half a world away, but MY world, here and now. Every day it said, “This is the day you are given – THIS – this beauty, this unfolding, this mystery of growth and blossoming and death.” Every day it reminded you of a bigger connected world outside and what it was doing while you were typing away. It beckoned. It recalled. It blessed you. It woke you up for a moment.
I didn’t expect any of that. So, with 1300 emails currently in my in-box, I still am subscribed for Helen’s image and she still generously goes out into the world to gather them up and share them. It is a kind of Visio Divina (or practice of sacred looking) you might consider adding to your daily rituals.
If you want to sign up, go to the Adult Education: Spirit in Practice Page. You will see a button for signing up to receive Helen’s images. And you can unsubscribe anytime, but my bet is you won’t.
In faith, Vanessa
About Vanessa Rush Southern