Snail

This is my first entry after setting up my account last evening. A friend pointed me in the direction of the site ~ it immediately appealed since it combines my two greatest passions in life (next to my children): photography and writing. I admit to having puzzled this morning over what my first photo assignment would be though, and what I would write as my first entry to go with it.

It was raining when my daughter and I left the house this morning, a refreshing change from the heat and burning bright sunlight we have experienced recently, not that I feel to complain about either. I was aware of being on the look out for a photographic opportunity... something that spoke to me, drew me over, caught my eye. Funny how, when you push for something, it rarely happens. A few photos found their way into the camera, one a beautiful alley between two old warehouses, a buddleia sprouting out from the time worn walls, some grasses and plantain, a ready made water feature spurting forth from a piece of broken guttering, trickling steadily down the wall, forming a little puddle at the bottom, constantly being added to. But I knew none of them was the one I was after.

We did our bit of shopping and began the wet walk home. I scoured shop windows for anything vaguely interesting, lined up shots of street scenes with my eye wondering whether I should introduce myself in my first entry with a picture of where I live... after all, it does look very pretty with all the decorative silk flags adorning the town after the jollity of last weeks midsummer Golowan festival. But somehow, a street full of people scurrying into doorways to shelter from rain did not appeal to me, even if the flags are pretty.

Maybe, I reasoned, I would have to make do with one of the images I had just taken, or try for that first photo entry again tomorrow. I told myself it really mattered not whether I started my photo journal on the 1st of the month or the 2nd, since what is time but a construct anyway.

We were very nearly home, four houses away in fact, when my daughter pointed out a snail creeping its way along our neighbours wall... I knew as soon as I saw it that this was to be my entry for today. That small, wet, spiral shell a work of art in itself. I work very much with an environment that speaks to me, calls me to photograph it. The snail spoke and my daughter heard. We watched it for a while... me wondering what life for a snail is like. And then we carried on home to our own shell, me equipped with the ingredients for my first entry. So here it is.....


(NB. Golowan ~ also known as Gol-Jowan ~ is the old Cornish word for the Midsummer celebrations that take place in the West Penwith area of Cornwall every year.)