A while back Sandy Knauer started a new group called Icons in which people would explain the origins of their Gather icons. Well, now I'm finally getting to doing mine.
My icon is very simple...and yet complex. A dead tree, and yet a tree alive with expression.
Photographed on 35 mm film with a Nikon SLR from Mount Hood, near Portland, Oregon, on an overcast and chilly day in November, the photo epitomizes the starkness of the foreground and the promise of the distant future.
My tree lies bare its emotions, its heart on its sleeve, its blunt truth visible for all to see. It bares its soul. The deep and foreboding clouds prescient the omens of difficult times. And yet the tree reaches out...stretching to take on the challenge even as that challenge seeks to consume it.
And yet, focusing further, one notices the light on the horizon. The snow-lit peak of Mount Adams growing into the sky. The strength that can move mountains and bring clarity to the day.
From the naked truth of the tree to the promise of the mountain we find solace. Truth and promise.
Best wishes!
Posted in Gather it All and Share it with Your Friends and International Travel (Here and Abroad)
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Comments: 56
Mine says: I am everything, yet I am nothing. Balance is the key to life.
I think it says you are both sides of a coin, both the head and the tail. Capable of experiencing both the pain and the passion of life. And yet, reach that balance you mention.
Smiles always.
I'll take that smile and raise you a hug. I've been on a spiritual journey lately and learning that it's okay to be one at times, the other at other times, and sometimes both at the same time. (or something like that)
Kind of like that tree of yours...both dead and yet alive if someone has the clarity and wisdom to see both sides of that coin. ;)
Complex and simple at the same time.
I'm still thinking about why I chose mine ...
Also thanks for letting me know of such a group, I will write about mine as well...
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
It looks as if the building in the background might be a school, which would add another level of meaning.
Actually, I like my fruit eaten separately, David. It's a traditional martini - Beefeaters, double, a hint of vermouth, preferably on the rocks. [when I say a hint, I mean that the creator should simply open the vermouth bottle, and blow across the top of it in the general direction of the gin.] ;-)
Thanks for sharing your icon story David.
The "more" that you perceive may be the part of the image that speaks to the viewer's subconscious mind.
Thanks for the tree-t. :)
(I was worried that maybe you were a stick-n-the-mud)
Cheers! (-;[>
Best wishes.