It’s interesting how 100 people can look at the same picture and walk away with 100 different impressions. When we see a photograph, it invokes some kind of emotion. I took this photo as part of this year’s Maplewood Photowalk. It looked like the firemen had gotten back from a call to duty and one of them decided to air out his gear outside the firehouse. When I look at this picture, however, I think of the events on 9/11/01. I was in Manhattan that day, at work in midtown, while my husband worked downtown in a building next to Tower 2. That day became one of those days in history like the day JFK was shot, or when the space shuttle exploded, in which everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news.  My memories of that day are never pleasant ones, but it’s a day that should be remembered, if for no other reason than to take a moment to remember those who didn’t make it.

To this day, the sound of a fire truck on its way to an emergency in NYC invokes memories of 9/11. In midtown, I saw many of them on their way downtown. I saw police from NJ make their way into NY to help, and I remember images on TV of hospital personnel waiting to help the wounded, and their confusion when no one arrived. But, it’s the fire trucks that invoke my emotions and thoughts about how so many rushed in to help without knowing how grave it all was. When I look at this photo, I don’t think of the actual context in which it was taken. Seeing the empty uniform reminds me of the lives of those who used to fill a uniform just like this one, but lost their chance to wear it again after 9/11. And of course, they lost so much more than that.

Tragedy is a terrible thing; no matter how much time passes, it never gets any less tragic.

Even though New York City has been unbearably hot and humid this summer, I’ve enjoyed my walks to work. It’s about a mile each way between my train station and my office building and each day I notice more and more detail around me. I feel like a deer in the headlights when I spot something interesting. I have realized that it’s the texture of things that stands out – so much of it…everywhere. Once you notice it, you can’t stop noticing it – it’s distracting, but in a very good way. So, I brought my camera with me one day last week and photographed some of the interesting details I see.

The texture is so beautiful. The detail put into building design makes for a rich landscape. We often take these details for granted, but they’re so beautiful to look at. It’s worth taking the time to be distracted by their texture.

My father loved the outdoors and loved to garden. So naturally, when he and my mother retired and moved to a new place, he not only turned the entire backyard into a garden, but he also installed a koi pond. He lovingly cared for the fish – making sure they were fed, the pond was clean, and the heater was working during the tough upstate New York winters.

When he died two years ago, my mother took on the responsibility of caring for the fish. She found a professional to clean the pond as needed, and kept up with feeding them and hooking up the heater in the winter.  But, it’s expensive and a bit much to care for, and she’s been hoping to find a good home for the fish. I found out this weekend during my visit, that she has, in fact, found a new home for them, and the new owners will be coming this week to take them. I am happy that she found a place – it’s the best thing for her and it’s good to know the fish will be taken care of.

While I was there, I decided to take the last pictures we’d have of the fish. They really are sweet and fun to watch. It’s difficult to say good-bye to these lovely creatures because I know how much they meant to my father, but he would have understood the need to find them a new home.  I suppose there are many transitions we have to go through after we say good-bye to someone at the end of his life…and sometimes it means saying good-bye to those things that he loved during his lifetime.

While taking pictures of the koi fish in my parent’s pond this weekend, I managed to notice two toads mating. Really amazing to watch. Yes, I felt like a Peeping Tom, but it’s no different from watching a program on the Nature channel. They laid many, many strings of eggs. This is the female toad after their morning romp. She looks exhausted….

This was also the photo I submitted to the NY Times Lens Blog’s “Moment in Time” project. This project asked people – anywhere in the world -  to take a picture at the exact same time. There were some amazing photos (which I saw on Facebook), and the Lens Bloggers are still compiling all of them (they received between 10,000 and 15,000 photo submissions). What an interesting project.

Last week was National Parks Week. A visit to one of the national parks is really an inspiring experience. Visiting Yellowstone and Grand Tetons last year refreshed me in a way that many trips wouldn’t.  I couldn’t help but think about how saving these grand parcels of land was almost jeopardized on so many occasions and I am glad that some had the foresight to preserve and the power to protect these lands.

On a daily basis though, it is some of our smaller parks that make such a difference for us. I am thankful that the planners of my town had the foresight to preserve areas of land for parks. We have a few of them, and they’re large enough to house sports fields and courts alongside playgrounds and areas for just sitting on a bench to watch the ducks on a pond. Memorial Park in Maplewood, NJ is one of my favorites. It was designed by the sons of Frederick Olmstead (who designed Central Park in NYC). We have several others in Maplewood and a neighboring town that are also quite beautiful. Meadowlands Park in South Orange, NJ was featured in the NY Times recently showing off the amazing Flood’s Hill that offers great sledding in an idyllic setting for kids and adults. Parks serve a purpose for all of us – for me, they are a refuge of sorts.

I love to photograph the transitions in nature often found in our local parks.  I observe the trees that bloom at various stages of the seasons, then watch the petals fall from the trees in a snow-like pattern, forming piles of petals below. As the weather warms up, the level of activity increases and the ice cream truck is never far away.

The other day I was taking pictures in the park when a man stopped nearby and proceeded to tell me that he’s seen little green birds in the park. I have heard this from others too, and I saw one while waiting for the train one day. We happen to be a favorite spot for Monk Parakeets. I’m not sure how they decided to settle in our little spot of the globe, but they have. He then said, “Follow Me…I’ll show you where they hang out.” So, I followed the man who held a newspaper under one arm and a cigar in his hand to the trees where he has spotted the parakeets. A few days later, I went out in the morning to look for them, and unfortunately didn’t have any luck finding them. But, no matter, I found so many other things like this robin perched on a bench and the sun coming up and shining through the trees that my parakeet spotting will have to take place another time.

Naturally, I always find so much to take pictures of. Lately, the dogwood trees have been providing much of my focus, but of course, so much peaks my interest in the parks. How could it not?

When I look back at one of my earlier posts about how New Jersey doesn’t get much snow anymore, I have to laugh. This winter was a killer….lots of snow this year. I can’t really complain, but after a while, I’m happy to usher out winter in favor for spring. By the time the snow melts, I’m eager for the renewal of life that spring offers. Unfortunately, our overabundance of snow was followed by an overabundance of rain (setting records for March, in fact). It feels like it’s been years since I’ve seen the sun.

So, today was so enjoyable, when the sun decided to shine, and the forecast calls for sunny warm days for the next week. I feel life returning.

I recently stopped off at a part of South Mountain Reservation that I usually drive right by without noticing many details. With a little extra time on my hands, I pulled off to the side of the road and had a look around. I’m glad I took a closer look because I saw how the structures built, used, and later abandoned, were now being overrun by natural and man-made decay. A decaying shelter covered with graffiti, a tree that is seemingly growing from inside the house, an unused well that still stands by the water, and tree branches that have grown to resemble the barbed wire that surrounds it.

I look at these scenes with a touch of sadness and wonderment of what was – a lamenting of sorts. Were there scout troops who used that shelter or was it a concession stand for times when that part of the reservation was filled with families enjoying an escape from the city? Whenever it was built, it had a reason for being and now it projects sadness in its loss of purpose. Although it is disheartening to see what happens when things suffer from neglect, I am glad the structures still remain. They serve as reflections of the past.

I came across this poem, Lament for the Guild, written by Bary Fraser in his blog post about another structure that had fallen into disrepair and his sentiment echoes my thoughts on the structures at South Mountain.

What will future generations wonder about the structures left to neglect by my generation?

Lament for the Guild

Neglected now for decades
And left to rot
She was once proud
And new.
Her halls recall
The laughter of children,
The earnest discussion of women,
The plans of men.
Her halls rang with the prayers
Of Priests and Nuns
And dreams of salvation
In Foreign lands.
Her halls sheltered heroes
With severed limbs
No eyes to see
Or feet to walk.
Her halls gloried in
The Dreams of artists
And sculptors
Writers and Poets
Her lands provided
Sanctuary for the discards
Of progress
And gave them home.
The great of the world
And the mighty
The humble and the ordinary
Visited her and marveled.
Then left her to rot
From the inside,
Bashed out her eyes
And boarded them up.
She dies.

I recently took a winter vacation in upstate NY, and visited Ausable Chasm. When I think about this place, I think of “family fun” in the summertime. In fact, I went there when I was about 4 or 5 years old with my family. My one memory of the place was that we took a boat ride and the person in charge of the boat told me to come up front and he made me “Captain of the boat.” That memory stuck with me (although I wasn’t quite sure where it happened until I checked with my mother, whose memory is better than mine).

So, when I went to Ausable now, during the winter, it was QUITE a different experience. It was so dramatic and we were, quite literally, almost the only people there. During the winter, they require that walking tours into the chasm are guided, and they had us wear ice cleats because the trek is icy and slightly dangerous….

A few weeks ago, I took some pictures of a very small waterfall in a nearby park. I used it as practice in shutter speeds, and it was interesting. But, photographing waterfalls that are frozen, is really amazing. I wasn’t worried about shutter speeds this time. I just stared in awe of the way that motion was frozen in time.

Such a beautiful place. So quiet…so peaceful…nature, at its best.

Related photos:  Ausable 1,  Ausable 2,  Fisherman on Lake Champlain

Sometimes, timing is everything. I often think about this when taking action shots, but I realize that this also applies to those pictures that are completely lacking in action. Yesterday morning, the snowfall that happened overnight stopped in the morning as the sun came up. Although it was a weekday, I was lucky enough that this was a morning that I didn’t have to rush off to work. My luck in timing was that the snow fell when it was convenient for me – I was able to take the stroll through the freshly fallen snow as I wanted to. The vision of snow that has barely been touched is calming. With a hectic day ahead, I had the fortunate timing of having nothing better to do for 30 minutes or so than just go for a walk in the snow.

I took this picture of a big beautiful tree in Memorial Park in Maplewood, NJ. It’s one of my favorite trees….so old and majestic as it towers over the beautiful park around it.

Now, I just have to work on my timing when I go pick up the dry cleaning. Yesterday, as I pulled into the parking lot of my dry cleaner, I saw a hawk swoop down and up to a tree, carrying its latest soon-to-be meal. Of course, I didn’t have my camera with me. I’ll have to work on that.

This picture, along with a few others from yesterday morning, were published in Maplewood Patch, a hyperlocal site.

My husband and I took a trip to Wyoming in August 2009. It was one of those “perfect” trips – one that seemed to be just what we needed. We made sure to see as much as we could have of Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park. The scenery was breathtaking, but I think what I loved the most was the wildlife there. We saw moose, bison, mule deer, elk, and bears during our trip.

This picture was taken along a part of Grand Teton National Park known as “Mormon Row.” We found ourselves in the middle of a moving herd of bison. They didn’t seem to notice us much – no more than they would have noticed a tree stump (although our tree stump was a rental car). They just went about their business, and we went about ours – as observers of something unfamiliar to those of us who live in New Jersey.

We took a trip to Vermont the year prior and went snow shoeing in Middlebury, Vermont. We found signs on the trails warning us about bison sightings. I was completely gullible and thought, “My gosh! I didn’t know they had bison in Vermont!” My husband knew right away the signs were meant to be a joke – they don’t have bison in Vermont. I do wish they would migrate out east though, so I could see them more often….

Related photos: Bison1,   Bison2,   Moose,   Yellowstone,    Grand Teton1,    Grand Teton2