The Day I Invented

After finishing “January First? yesterday, I decided it was time to get out of the house and invent the day I wanted it to be.

As I left the house with my camera, I was greeted by this hummingbird and couldn’t pass up a few shots:

I drove four blocks to Pt Defiance beach and took a new look at some sea gulls I hadn’t really looked at for awhile. Strangely, I’d never noticed their colorful beak:

Gazing out into the Sound, I wondered why I was the only one watching this small Horned Grebe repeatedly diving, catching small fish:

On my way back to the car, a spied a seagull carrying a leaf and wondered if it was decorating for Halloween:

Only after it moved closer did I realize the gull was holding a crab in its mouth, and the crab was holding the leaf. Silly me, I should have known that crabs, not seagulls, celebrate Halloween.

I spent a little while wandering around the boathouse, trying to figure out which way the wind was blowing

before leaving the beach and driving another two or three blocks up the hill to the zoo to get some pictures of the Wood Ducks. When I arrived I was told they were hiding in the grass after being terrorized by some wild Mallard drakes.

While waiting for them to return to the pond, I went to see if the Arctic Kit Fox was out. He wasn’t, but there were several dragonflies flying around. Since I’ve been trying to get a picture of one for months, I didn’t really mind when visitors looked at me rather oddly since I seemed fixated on an empty exhibit. My patience paid off as I managed to get this shot:

After taking several photographs of the dragonflies, I went back and got the picture I had really come for:

By then the compact flash card was full, so I had to skip the mushroom and Pileated Woodpecker pictures I had also hoped to get.

How’d you choose to invent your day?

8 thoughts on “The Day I Invented”

  1. I couldn’t invent my day; I spent it arranging flowers for a wedding tomorrow. I love these photos, and I think seagulls celebrate July 4th and New Years instead of Halloween.

  2. I don’t think that counts, Shelley.

    Though it’s pretty clear that if we don’t invent our own reality, somebody or something will do it for us.

    How often does one see a gull carrying a leaf, not nearly as often as one sees an eagle sitting in a tree as I did today.

  3. Looks like you had one of those days in the flow. Yessssss.

    “It may be that we are puppets-puppets controlled by the strings of society. But at least we are puppets with perception, with awareness. And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation. “–Stanley Milgram

    jon

  4. It was too late to invent my day when I read your post last night. Today, though, soon after I woke up I saw the possibilities for inventing my day. Thank you and Elizabeth Bishop for reminding me of this. Enjoyed this series of photographs, especially the seagull with the crab with the leaf. Nature is a poet.

  5. You invented a remarkable day and filled it with delightful pictures. I loved the gull especially. The dragonfly, too!

  6. ok, i am late… but that pic of leaf crab and gull is really good. you know it? well i just confirmed it as well.

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