a couple of years ago, during one of our stays in southern France, our family worked through the book drawing on the right side of the brain by betty edwards. the book states that drawing is not about drawing, in the end, but about seeing. today, my 16 year old got an easter basket photography book, called the practice of contemplative photography by karr and wood. in the prologue, the authors say that photography is easy, but seeing is hard. i started STILL blog in order to have a daily creative practice, but i have ended up with a daily seeing practice. case in point: these buds were tiny flecks of green in an otherwise unremarkable thicket of understory brush. prior to STILL, my eyes would have passed over the mesh of haphazard brown twigs without even registering the points of green hidden among them. today, with my newly art-honed bionic eye, i saw not a vaguely late winter landscape, but the bud-burst explosion trumpeting the arrival of spring.

budding (unidentified) shrub

arden hills, minnesota