Lately - they're the details I'm drawn to. The bits and pieces of ordinary life. The things that - without meaning or intention - tell stories.
A broom idly....sitting. An old chair....waiting. A pot of plants...growing.
They remind me of the moments in between. The quiet ones. The ones that would otherwise be forgotten. A comma in the middle of a sentence. The question marks at the end. The distractions. All the little things that too often are over-looked and un-noticed.
A pair of chairs - and I imagine a couple sitting quietly rocking. He - with his newspaper spread out before him. She - with her knitting. Days pass with the hours. As they sit in the silent acknowledgement and comfort of one another's presence. I imagine the life they've shared.
Or - sometimes it's an old broom. A task interrupted. In the middle of the day's chores - I imagine - the sound of the phone ringing....pulling the broom-master away from her task. The broom - simply abandoned and left. Waiting for its next turn.
There is - on occasion - a mess of potted plants. Immediately - I see the gardener. The one who seeds and waters and watches. Who patiently waits. Who knows that the prize is in the process.. Who has learned the fine art of cultivated patience. As you sow...you shall reap.
Unexpected color - and I dream up stories of the artist who dwells there. The one who paints their life in magic. Maybe - it's a dreamer who lives there. A one who sees thru rose-colored glasses. And maybe - it's a personal expression of their own creative art.
These little bits and pieces of domestic life. As I get older - there is something about these unaccounted snippets that intrigues me. These stories we tell that are without words. The things we do - that are passed from one generation to another. Without knowing that we've done so...we find that we have.
A line filled with towels drying.
Summers spent at summer camps..at summer cottages..at summer oceans. Hot days. Cool nights. Summers that were long and slow and oh-so-sweet.
My mother hung them out at the end of each day..as her mother did before her. I hung those towels of mine - because that's what I knew. When recently I visited my daughter in her new home and found that same familiar line of hanging - I understood how and why and where it came.
So - I poke and peek. I peer into the crevices and corners of ordinary lives. I imagine stories. And - all of what we take with us..and all that is left behind.
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Cross-posted over at Vision and Verb - where a group of like-minded women from all over the world share their passion for photography and the written word.