November 08th, 2018

Two nature lovers.

Took us a few weeks but Joy and I finally got back into our old routine and had our first photo safari of the season this week!  We enjoy spending time together, we enjoy hiking and we enjoy photography.  What could be better? Both of us really are nature lovers.

Of course because we are totally different people, we sometimes love it differently.

Oh there is some cross-over of course.  I think we both took photos of the pretty yellow flowers we saw in the field.  And I know we both admired the reflections on the water. And I'm pretty sure we each commented on how many pretty dragon flies were buzzing around, although I'm equally certain that she is the only one who managed to get good photos of those.

But while I greatly admire all of nature, the entire circle of it, top to bottom , inside and out, beginning to end, I don't want to witness the icky bits.  So for me I suppose it's a rather carefully edited version of nature whereas Joy embraces it all. I honestly admire her for that.  But still, sometimes, ewww, just ewww.

Perhaps it comes from all her years of being a Ranger at Yellowstone where she is, of necessity, far more up close and personal with some of the ickier bits of nature.  Or maybe she is just a more pragmatic person than I and sees things from a more scientific point of view. I don't know for sure the why of it. I just know that it's true.

For example, during this recent outing, Joy spied a particularly interesting spider web and she was delighted to see that there were a few insects snared in the web that were literally, still kicking.  Seriously ick.  She took quite a number of photos of the trapped victims while I walked to the other side of the trail and snapped some interesting grasses.  I am well aware that nature isn't always pretty.  I just don't want to take photos of it.

I'm not saying that one of us it right and the other wrong but that's not the case at all.  It's just one of the ways that we are different from each other.  I have seen some truly amazing photographs that she has taken of things like an eagle flying with a fish in it's talons or a large bird in the process of swallowing a frog.  Remarkable and beautiful photos!!!  But while I understand that this is just nature, just creatures doing what they do,  and I certainly have no intention of trying to change it.  I don't want to be witness to that part. 

I was never one of those kids who enjoyed those really graphic nature shows. You remember the ones where the lion attacking, killing and devouring a zebra. Nope.  I was the kid leaving the room in tears.  I totally get it.  Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly and lions gotta eat.  I completely totally entirely understand it.  I just don't want to watch it.  What a big baby I am.

Funny childhood story.  When Joy and I were little,  maybe 7 and 4 years old, a big treat was for each of us to have one of those little boxes of animal crackers that looked like circus wagons.  And even though that stupid white string would break almost immediately we would still carry those boxes around all day, ever so slowly eating our way through the circus.  One time, toward the end of the day, we were sitting on the front porch finishing off our treats.  Y'know, the way kids do, playing with it a little, eating a little.  And I noticed that Joy ate her cookies differently than I did. Hmmm.  So I said to her, "I always bite the heads off first so that they don't feel any more pain".  Joy nibbled at the feet of her animal and said, "Not me.  I eat 'em from the feet up so that they suffer".  I guess we haven't changed all that much.

And thus paved the path for our futures.  Joy embraces all of life, both the beautiful and the not so pretty.  I seem to turn a blind eye to anything less than appealing.  Quite frankly, her outlook is smarter, healthier and absolutely braver than mine.  And yet, much like Popeye, I yam who I yam.  I guess what they used to say back in the day is true, 'Different strokes for different folks'.  What a boring world it would be if we were all the same ;)