some days i work work really hard for my (non)pay. i may try as many as a dozen compositions of a subject before i get something i like. and on other days, i don’t even have to lift a finger. this image was one of the latter. these two bedfellows snuggled up together on my desk all by themselves, and then the dried flower rolled onto its side and threw an arm over its companion. i simply had to rotate my tripod and click the shutter on this odd couple in love.

raccoon (?) jaw bone and dried (unidentified) wildflower stem

great salt lake, utah (bone) and northern minnesota (wildflower)

at some point in the life of a daily blog, you run out of ideas. you’ve plucked all the low hanging fruit, you’ve stood on tiptoes and grabbed some of the fruit above your head. you’ve stood on a ladder. and you’ve climbed the tree. and one day, there’s no fruit left. in my case, you’ve taken photos of single flowers. of arranged flowers. of wilted flowers. of dried flowers. of flower buds. of the roots of flowers. of the scattered petals of flowers. and one day, you’ve run out of ideas. that’s when you look at a tulip past its prime, and recognize the curve of its stem, and you remember the bone collection in the basement, and suddenly things get interesting again.

tulip and bone

our family of four came upon this well-dressed gentleman pulling himself along the street. we were beside an organic vegetable and herb garden just inland from the monterey peninsula, and i immediately thought how elegant he would look as a STILL blog subject, maybe climbing a stalk of nearby fennel, with a sheet of white tagboard held behind him. my son wanted to adopt him and carry him on an outstretched index finger for the rest of our trip down the california coast. my daughter wanted to save him and all of his kind from the tires of oncoming cars. and my husband began musing about butter and garlic. we were all looking at the same thing, and seeing four very different snails.

land snail

carmel, california

this is the kind of end-of-winter bouquet i can only assemble after a mild winter. normally, these slender stems would have been bent and broken under a several feet of snow.  but this year, we were spared that, and so these delicate structures are still standing tall facing the sun. i gathered this bouquet on one walk with my friend kristin. we walked, and talked for about and hour, and i occasionally stepped off the path to grab another stem. eventually she asked how i decide which stems to grab. “i go for the unruly ones,” I said. “the ones that look like they’re misbehaving.”

a winter bouquet of assorted wildflower and weed stems

grass lake regional trail, saint paul, minnesota

first, let me say that I am sorry (kind of) for my april fools joke yesterday, but let me also say how touched i was by those of you who had minor panic attacks at the thought of STILL blog going away. i love thinking about all of us sitting at our desks in the morning with a cup of coffee or tea, looking at STILL blog together. i’ve talked a lot about community on this blog, and you are about the best community, digital or IRL, that i could imagine. as for today’s image, it was an apple blossom in a perfect organic garden, below a perfectly pruned carmel valley vineyard, in perfect california light, on a perfect warm spring morning, before a perfect drive down the pacific coast highway. my daughter has narrowed her college choices down to only california schools as of this afternoon, and i think that’s just about a perfect decision.

apple blossoms

carmel, california