One of the things I love about Phoebe is that she's tuned in to natural phenomena. If the phone rings around 7, I know it's her, calling from the bus, which she rides for over an hour each morning. I know it's a Sunrise Alert. "Mama! Go look at the sunrise!"
And we did. The only thing to do for a sunrise like this one is to run to the tower room. Still on the phone with Phoebe, we compared notes on the colors and the fabulous gill-like clouds. Just one of the many reasons I'm happy Bill sprang for a cell phone for our girl. My predictions were all wrong. She hasn't lost it, ever, and she doesn't waste much time talking on it. It's more like a mobile texting umbilical cord for both of us.
Watching it change. There's not much you can say about a heavenly phenomenon like this, other than to look and marvel at your luck at being able to see it.
Of course, we cannot go up to the tower room without bringing Chet Baker. And if Mether and Daddeh are looking at something, well, Chet Baker needs a peek, too.I refuse to believe that dogs see only in black and white. I think they see a lot more color than people believe. Chet Baker sure seems to.
I am also looking for morning bunnehs.
Liam, Bill, Chet and I walked out the driveway, awash in morning glow.
Molten puddles, ever my favorite. I live to photograph them, little pieces of perfect sky under our feet.
Look out, Liam! Don't step in the lava!
And the sun burnt it all gold, our huge sentinel pin oak revealed. I never look at that tree without hoping it outlives us all.
I have to think that being brought up and bathed each day in beauty helps make our kids who they are. They notice and appreciate, and are grateful.
16 comments:
Waaaaaay too pretty.
And I love the lava puddles...
That pix of Chet Baker at the window really made me smile.
Even if Chet can't see in color, I'm sure he smells in it.
I often phone my friends Ellen and Patty with gorgeous sunset alerts. (I'm seldom up at the start of the sun's shift.) I love that kind of beauty's perishable nature -- the play of colors and their gradations, the changing textures, the intense glow that's slowly smothered. It's sacramental.
Not often being awake for the start of the sunrise, either, I send out moonrise alerts (for especially full or beautifully-tinted moons) to my friends via text or phone calls...much as I resent cell phones sometimes, they really can be indispensable when you have to contact someone to witness a fleeting natural phenomenon. It is wonderful beyond words that you've taught your kids to be part of the nature alert grapevine! I am intensely envious of them, growing up with two naturalist parents in what looks like a heavenly place to live (still can't believe it's Ohio! Hehehe...)
I love a sunrise.
Such an ordinary occasion, yet able to be in a moment, wonderful.
Each morning, I wait for it, hoping.
Love the color you've caught in the puddles!
Perfect!
That picture of Chet is the best gift ever. He looks like a little old man with bow legs. Love and kisses to the Bacon!
My oldest son still remembers a sunset we saw the winter I was pregnant with my younger son. He was only 4 1/2 at the time, yet will bring it up from time to time (he's 22 now).
I like moonrise too. Every summer when we're in Maine I sit on our wharf at night at watch the moonrise. It creates a gold-sparkle trail across the lake. I so much know what it looks like that when I was doing massage in a room with a dark purple door, I painted the lake, mountains, moon and moonpath from heart-memory, on the back of the door. I even put touches of glitter paint on the moonpath. My clients loved it.
Mesmerized. Beautiful. I get wild when a sunrise calls me - the scenery changes so quickly and you can't blink an eye...
I've heard that dogs see shades of blue and green above all others.
How wonderful. I like it that Phoebe calls to give you a sunrise alert. The best gifts we ever get (as parents) are our children giving back to us the wonder we gave them in the first place.
I love how you treasure your kids. And your dog :o) You've got your priorities right I think. Phoebe sure has a long bus ride!
That's stunning. I think that sunrises and sunsets are about the most difficult thing to capture, but you got this one. I feel it and I feel the peace.
I mentioned the above-mentioned sunset to my son last night and he said "I remember that! The sky was redder than I've ever seen it." He also remembered that the DJ on the local radio station was talking about it at the same time, urging people to go outside and look. I thought that was pretty cool of the DJ.
I remember reading somewhere that we should take time each day to watch the sun rise and set, to appreciate the beginning and ending of each day. I love the sunrise best, when the world is cool and fresh and quiet, and the day is full of possibilities.
Great shot of Chet, though he could use a step stool!
Beautiful sunrise! That was one of the great things about doing fieldwork and having to be up before dawn every day - you were always there to see the sunrise, and it was something different and lovely and often stunning every day. I expect Phoebe experiences the same thing.
It was my understanding that dogs are able to detect short-wavelength colours, blue and violet, but that the cone cells in their retinas can't detect longer wavelengths, the red/orange/yellow end of the spectrum. I think they also have a much better ability than humans to detect differences in shades of gray, so perhaps Chet sees and appreciates the sunrise, but just his own version of it.
"One of the things I love about Phoebe is that she's tuned in to natural phenomena."
Seems to me that she had some help with this... *lol*
I met you and BOTB at The Wetlands Institute in the late '90's. While watching you with a very newly-fledged Phoebe, I was thinking, "This is the luckiest kid on earth, to have parents like these."
How marvelous to see fulfilled the promise of a child steeped in nature.
Congratulations on both of your successes, and thank you for sharing them with us!
(Lovely photos, too.)
It has been just too long since I've checked in here, Julie. It's Christmas Eve relaxing in front of the fire counting my blesssings when I thought of you and your family. Sure enough....these sunrise pictures were so worth the view. Regards to Bill of the Birds. Have a wonderful Christmas.
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