Taking in Nature’s Beauty. #writephoto

Photo credit, Sue Vincent.

“Taking in Nature’s Beauty,”  a short story.

(c) 2018 by Pamela Schloesser Canepa

“You have the words to describe it; I struggle with this.  It’s beautiful, though.”  Matt sounded unsure of himself and felt like a heel, remembering she couldn’t describe what she couldn’t see.  Or could she?

They sat on a log, and Pauline felt the breeze change.  Yes, they were in the presence of great beauty.  Only, Pauline could not see it.  Matt didn’t know how to describe it.  She fought against frustration at him, confident she could coax the words out of him.  Asking questions usually got her some clear answers.

“There are mountains,”  Matt began.

“How many Matt?  Two?”

“No, More.”  A man of few words, he was more at home in the world of numbers.

“Are they connected?”

“Yes.  Some of them could be as one, but with more behind them.  The two in fronted are separate, almost as if to let you see the ones beyond them.”

Pauline was forming a picture in her head.  “Is the sun shining at all?”

“Yes, there are a few rays of light, but clouds, too.”

“The sun only shines through in one spot?”

“Oh, no, there are several patches in the clouds letting in light, though they are thick and gray to one side.  It’s lovely.”

“Yes, I felt the clouds, the coolness, coming on.”

“There is a stream, and some trees,” Matt went on.

“What sort of stream?”  she asked.

“Um, just, a stream, no, a lake.”  Matt stopped there.

“Yes, it’s sounds quite lovely.  It feels so lovely,” Pauline mused.  In her head was the most wonderful picture of the scene that she sensed with her being.  It was void of color, for she had never seen color and only imagined it as variations of shading, as on a person’s skin, for she’d had such things described.  Color, to her, was an emotion, such as being on a rollercoaster, tasting a spicy food, or getting a cut on her foot as she had that one time.  It was all so frustrating to her as a child, but she developed an imagination that would fill in the gaps.  When people described beauty, she imagined how it would look, and it pleased her.

“Anything else, Matt?”

“Oh, I don’t know.  It just feels good being here.”  He grabbed her hand.

“Yes, it does.”  She held his hand tighter, needing no more explanation.  They’d gone way ahead of the other members in their group and had a few minutes to sit still and enjoy the scenery, each in their own way.  A hawk flew over, and his call resounded through the valley, carrying another breeze toward them.

~The end~

The #writephoto challenge is a weekly writing challenge based on a new photograph presented at https://scvincent.com and you may visit this week’s challenge at Write Photo Thursday Prompt

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