"I want her to use a macro lens . Zoom in. Linger on coral pinks, golden oranges. On dew drops that can't be staged."
You are listening to Notes with Kathy Patalsky.
Today's episode takes a sweet little trip into my backyard.
Dew drops.
This morning I was out in my backyard taking photos of the flowers after it rained. And there's one thing you should know about dew drops. You can't fake them. I know this because I've tried. I've sprayed flowers with a hose, thinking I could add a few perfect beads of water, the kind that catch the light just right and sit in random patterns across pink petals and glossy green leaves.
But hose water isn't dew. Dew drops come after real rain. Or in the early morning mist. They sit there like silent glass marbles, silky, round, delicate, fragile. They wait until the sun burns them away, or a tiny slug slithers along and drinks them up.
But they're temporary and that's what makes them so beautiful.
If you know anything about photography, you know the only way to really capture dew drops is with a macro lens. A macro lens zooms in, pulls you closer than your human eye ever could. it magnifies color and texture. The veins in a petal. The tiny hairs on a stem the way one perfect droplet holds an upside down version of the whole world.
Inside of it,
And this morning the colors.
colors always stand out more after a rain. Coral pinks, golden oranges that look like a sunset pressed into a flower bed. Soft ballet pink of a snapdragon, rich orange, yellow of a grapefruit.
rusty blue clay pots. Subtle whites, lined with hot pink edges.
Buzzing bees, garden lizards. Rolly pollies crawling across a stone. Jasmine in the air. Grass still wet under bare feet or rain boots.
This morning it was quiet. The rain had finished, leaving behind that clean, misty air that smells like earth. I tiptoed out and started snapping photos.
Wouldn't it be lovely to be a ladybug for an afternoon to sit inside folds of those petals to feel the cool glass water on your feet. To watch butterflies, flutter overhead. To know the sun is on its way and you have nothing to do except find a cozy leaf or blade of grass to perch on.
I've always been drawn to backyard nature. The simplicity of it, the safety of it, the quiet ease of dirt and bugs and flowers you planted with your own two hands. Trees that grow a little taller every year. Cobblestone paths cracking at the edges from so many joyful footsteps pounding on them.
If you're lucky enough to have even one fruit tree, you get to pluck something warm from the sun and eat it seconds after it leaves the branch. Plums, grapefruits, cherries, apples.
One of my absolute favorite trees we had in our backyard as a kid was a fig tree. It had these soft, silky branches that I could climb, and they were elastic where they'd bounce when I climbed up to this little perch. And then I'd be surrounded by these soft green, giant leaves, and I could see all the purple figs around me.
It was just so peaceful up in that soft tree.
And this morning, we were both up early, my daughter and I, and it was a school day. And we had an extra 20 minutes to spare. So she came in the backyard with me.
She shares my love of backyard things.
I once told her we were going to "check on the flowers." She loves that phrase. "Let's go check on the flowers." She pulls on her rain boots, walks out with her hands on her hips, squints at the petals, and says, "these are looking pretty good. Look, we got a new bud."
She checks on the strawberries. She has pride in the colors she picked from the flowers, the petals opening that were once tiny buds. She watches roses grow and wilt, and fall away to make space for new buds. She rescues rolly pollies. We have an entire rolly Polly sanctuary in this little bug cage. We give them walnut shells and carrots and fresh flowers.
Then she asks me to lift stone blocks on our grass to see what's living underneath worms, pinchy bugs, spiders, slugs. She wants to see it all.
We tiptoe back inside and we get ready for school. The sun rolls higher. Slowly lifting those dew drops back into the sky as the warmth builds. School mornings are rarely this quiet.
I watch the colors glow against the green grass. I watch the squirrels, watching us. The birds flying overhead, black ravens and backyard sparrows. And suddenly the world feels so small, even in loud, chaotic, busy Los Angeles.
And that's all I want for her childhood.
I want her to use a macro lens in her own life. To grow quiet and still. To zoom in, to notice those tiny beautiful things. To linger on coral pinks and golden oranges on dew drops that can't be staged. On quiet mornings that disappear by 7:30 AM this morning, that's what we did.
We zoomed in. It sent us into our day, warm and bright, filled up by the smallest, most beautiful things.
My favorite poem when I was a little girl was called "The Little Land" by Robert Lewis Stevenson, and it went like this "when at home alone I sit and I'm very tired of it. I have just to shut my eyes to go sailing through the skies.." And then my absolute favorite line from it was always, where is it? " Little thoughtful creatures sit on the grassy coasts of it.
Little things with lovely eyes. See me sailing with surprise." I love that line. Little things with lovely eyes. I picture these little bugs under these clover tree tops and they're just standing there on little dirt paths as you sit in this leaf boat and sail along. And that's always what I pictured when I went to sleep at night as a kid.
And so these mornings when I get to go in my backyard and show my child that little world, that's what I think of.
If we keep doing that, drowning out the noise and chaos of the world. And zoom in close to tiny, lovely things. I keep her childhood magical, and steady, wherever we go.
This was Notes by Kathy Patalsky
For more, follow Kathy on Instagram or visit healthyhappylife.com
