What I Might Have Missed (A Guest Post by Patricia Hunter)

The photo that ignited my passion for photography six years ago wasn’t a breath-taking sunrise or a majestic mountain view. It was a macro photo of a weed – a tiny red tassel flower. The quality of that photo (taken with my first digital camera - an inexpensive point and shoot) doesn’t begin to measure up to today’s standards, but I was mesmerized by the detailed and delicate beauty God had created in a flowery weed – beauty I’d never know or appreciate without a camera.

For weeks I tried to duplicate that image. On photo walks around Pollywog Creek, I searched for nothing else but tiny red tassel flowers. Though I took a gazillion tassel flower photos, none were as inspiring or beautiful to me as the first.

Trying to duplicate a photographic experience became a pattern. I’d capture the detailed features of an insect and for days afterwards, I’d ignore almost everything else to focus on taking more photos of insects. More often than not, just like the tassel flower, nothing would compare with the first one.

Early one morning a year ago, I rounded a bend in the isolated road to my friend’s house to see four large deer grazing at the edge of the woods. It was rare for me to leave home without my camera, but that particular morning I’d left in a hurry and failed to grab the camera bag.

When I returned to my friend’s house a week later, I was determined I’d not make the same mistake again. With my camera resting on the dashboard, I continuously scanned the woods for deer as I slowly drove down the road, but I pulled into her driveway without seeing a single deer. I turned off the car, put my camera away, and thought, "I wonder what I missed while I was looking for deer."

What wonders did I miss while I was looking for tassel flowers or insects or in any of my attempts to duplicate (and manipulate) God’s gifts and experiences?

As we move from the Thanksgiving season of gratitude into the season of celebrating the birth of the One for Whom we are most grateful, it would be all too easy for me to become narrowly focused on my plans and agenda. But taking a lesson from photography, I want to keep my eyes wide open to the joys and wonders of each new day.

I don’t want to have to wonder what I might have missed.

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Patricia Hunter calls herself a "Psalmist With A Camera." She blogs at Pollywog Creek, and every single time I stop by, her posts take my breath away. I am thrilled beyond measure to be hosting Patricia here today at Jumping Tandem.