Thursday Thoughts...

“Once I witnessed a windstorm so severe two 100-year-old trees were uprooted on the spot. The next day, walking among the wreckage, I found the friable nests of birds, completely intact and unharmed on the ground. That the featherweight survive the massive, that this reversal of fortune takes place among us — that is what haunts me. I don’t know what it means.” 

Mary Ruefle

Part of me loves that this thought gets explored, and then we are left with not knowing. There is something about the mysteries of nature which can be imponderable and impenetrable, and I like that that is still the way of some things. Not everything is known, assured or understood. Leaving room for uncertainty, ambiguity and not knowing is good for us I think.

I love the contradiction within this image and this exploration. How huge and solid and weighty things can be damaged and yet tiny, small and wispy things survive. Is it a story about bending with the forces around us, rather than resisting? Is it about taking ourselves lightly? Is it about random good fortune? Or is it a story about craftsmanship and excellence?

Whatever it may be, it leaves me smiling to think that the wee nest was intact; that it had weathered the storm; and whilst it was no longer where it started; it survived.

After the storm, 2015.