Reflective Evening on Lake Erie
Friends, it’s been a while. The world has changed, for better or worse, I do not yet know. Turning on the TV or social media is exhausting. Wondering where fellow humanity went? Why can’t people treat people with care and dignity? Why are we putting money and corporations before the health and love of our neighbors? I’m sure many of us asking these hard questions and with seemingly nowhere to turn. Usually I would turn to the forest, she always has provided guidance in the past and nothing has changed … except I’m quarantined. No longer under the quarantine of my State, it’s still hard to go out and wonder if I’m going to get sick or get someone else sick?. I’ve been able and comfortable enough to visit the forest here and there, in those little more remote places that I know. I’ve been lucky enough to share in some amazing sunsets during this time and this one was no different.
About a month ago we decided it was okay to go camping up in Erie. We enjoy going to Presque Isle with it’s unique flora and fauna. Beaches around the edges with many little spots that the locals know. As luck would have it a local pointed me in the direction of this spot. I was hoping for a sunset, it had been raining all day, clouds were as dark as could be and the rain came down hard. It was almost like night in the middle of the afternoon. Afternoon turned into late afternoon and the clouds opened up just enough to where I thought it would be really beautiful. I made my way to this local spot along Lake Erie. Scouted it a few hours before the jetty didn’t look like much but the geometric patterns just jumped off the page in the low light of the sun. The reds and oranges shoot across them, illuminating them in the right spots.
There were other people there but it didn’t feel like it. I was able to sit there, compose my shot to hopefully time the water crashing against the jetty and spraying into the sky. It was easy to get lost in the crash of the waves and soft swish of the retreating water. Allowing myself to get lost in this process helped melt away all the anxious thoughts I had and brought about a calmness.