my dad as I would like, but as different as we are, as our interests are, all the time I do get with him, every second, every single one is time well spent.
N ow, his time with his dad is over. Completely. Finally. Forever. He will never again walk these woods with the god of his childhood. Never. Not ever.
And there’s a very real possibility that this will be his last night—in these woods or anywhere else. He tries to consider that, to really let it penetrate, but finds he’s incapable of contemplating his own end. He can think about it on a superficial, surface, intellectual level, but not on a deeper emotional, spiritual, or existential one.
R ust-colored facial discs around yellow eyes.
Dark brown feathers.
White throat.
Prominent ear tufts.
Bird of prey.
A great horned owl swoops down out of a loblolly pine, talons spread wide, and snatches up a small cotton mouse scurrying along the forest floor, its long tail whipping about as it’s hoisted into the air.
The squeals of the mouse are overpowered by the deep, resonant
hoo-hoo-hooooo
of the magnificent owl.
Small slope.
Very little vegetation.
Thick, broad leaves cover the ground.
Dense tree canopy above.
Layers and layers of light and dark green leaves.
He’s entered a beech-magnolia forest.
Thousands of years in the making.
Southern magnolias: Smooth, gray bark. Large, oblong leaves.
American beeches: Smooth, gray bark. Small, crinkly leaves.
The trees are so close together, the canopy they form so thick, very little sunlight ever reaches the forest floor. If not for the fallen leaves, there would be little more than dirt on the ground. Among the magnolia and beech are many other species, including the overstory trees of pine, oak, maple, sweetgum, walnut, ash, and the midstory holly, elm, palm, dogwood, and plum. So many trees in such close proximity survive by layering, shedding their leaves at different times, and by capturing sunlight in differing color wavelengths; green above, bluish beneath.
As he makes his way through the relative ease of the terrain, he wonders how his mom’s doing.
Please let her be okay. Let her sleep through the night or send someone to help her.
Because she was sick most of his life, he didn’t realize until young adulthood that he was much more like her than his dad. Or would have been if the MS hadn’t changed her.
She had given him his first camera.
It was his fourteenth birthday.
—Follow me, she says.
Easing down the hallway with the help of her creaking aluminum walker, she leads him to her bedroom and into her closet.
—Grab that for me.
He reaches up to the back shelf above her hanging clothes and pulls down a large shoe box and camera bag.
Backing over to the bed and leaning back onto it, she pats the comforter and he places the items next to her and sits down beside them.
—I want you to have this.
—Your camera?
—I won’t be able to use it again.
—Sure you will.
—Don’t be condescending.
—Sorry.
—Look at these.
She lifts the dusty lid from the shoe box to reveal a few hundred small black and white photos she had developed herself.
High contrast. Artistic. Moving. Powerful.
What might she have been if her disease hadn’t ended her life so early?
—They’re great, he says.
—You’ve got the eye for it. I can tell. Open the case.
He unzips the dusty old case to find a pristine Nikon F2A.
—Mom, I can’t take your camera.
—It’s not mine anymore. It’s yours. Get out there and do what I can’t. For me. Please.
—I will, he says. Thank you so much.
—Happy birthday.
For a while he had honored her requests, honored her art form, but it was too short-lived. In pleasing his practical father, he had not only betrayed himself, but his artistic mother. His ad work was creativity of a kind, but not this, not art.
Not that ads can’t be art. They can. Often are. But he had worked in a restrictive environment, forced to be fast—and far to crassly
N ow, his time with his dad is over. Completely. Finally. Forever. He will never again walk these woods with the god of his childhood. Never. Not ever.
And there’s a very real possibility that this will be his last night—in these woods or anywhere else. He tries to consider that, to really let it penetrate, but finds he’s incapable of contemplating his own end. He can think about it on a superficial, surface, intellectual level, but not on a deeper emotional, spiritual, or existential one.
R ust-colored facial discs around yellow eyes.
Dark brown feathers.
White throat.
Prominent ear tufts.
Bird of prey.
A great horned owl swoops down out of a loblolly pine, talons spread wide, and snatches up a small cotton mouse scurrying along the forest floor, its long tail whipping about as it’s hoisted into the air.
The squeals of the mouse are overpowered by the deep, resonant
hoo-hoo-hooooo
of the magnificent owl.
Small slope.
Very little vegetation.
Thick, broad leaves cover the ground.
Dense tree canopy above.
Layers and layers of light and dark green leaves.
He’s entered a beech-magnolia forest.
Thousands of years in the making.
Southern magnolias: Smooth, gray bark. Large, oblong leaves.
American beeches: Smooth, gray bark. Small, crinkly leaves.
The trees are so close together, the canopy they form so thick, very little sunlight ever reaches the forest floor. If not for the fallen leaves, there would be little more than dirt on the ground. Among the magnolia and beech are many other species, including the overstory trees of pine, oak, maple, sweetgum, walnut, ash, and the midstory holly, elm, palm, dogwood, and plum. So many trees in such close proximity survive by layering, shedding their leaves at different times, and by capturing sunlight in differing color wavelengths; green above, bluish beneath.
As he makes his way through the relative ease of the terrain, he wonders how his mom’s doing.
Please let her be okay. Let her sleep through the night or send someone to help her.
Because she was sick most of his life, he didn’t realize until young adulthood that he was much more like her than his dad. Or would have been if the MS hadn’t changed her.
She had given him his first camera.
It was his fourteenth birthday.
—Follow me, she says.
Easing down the hallway with the help of her creaking aluminum walker, she leads him to her bedroom and into her closet.
—Grab that for me.
He reaches up to the back shelf above her hanging clothes and pulls down a large shoe box and camera bag.
Backing over to the bed and leaning back onto it, she pats the comforter and he places the items next to her and sits down beside them.
—I want you to have this.
—Your camera?
—I won’t be able to use it again.
—Sure you will.
—Don’t be condescending.
—Sorry.
—Look at these.
She lifts the dusty lid from the shoe box to reveal a few hundred small black and white photos she had developed herself.
High contrast. Artistic. Moving. Powerful.
What might she have been if her disease hadn’t ended her life so early?
—They’re great, he says.
—You’ve got the eye for it. I can tell. Open the case.
He unzips the dusty old case to find a pristine Nikon F2A.
—Mom, I can’t take your camera.
—It’s not mine anymore. It’s yours. Get out there and do what I can’t. For me. Please.
—I will, he says. Thank you so much.
—Happy birthday.
For a while he had honored her requests, honored her art form, but it was too short-lived. In pleasing his practical father, he had not only betrayed himself, but his artistic mother. His ad work was creativity of a kind, but not this, not art.
Not that ads can’t be art. They can. Often are. But he had worked in a restrictive environment, forced to be fast—and far to crassly
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