destinylaharris

Tag: nature photography

  • 📸 Learning to Look Closer #16: After the Noise

    At first glance, there isn’t much happening in this photograph.

    An empty set of bleachers. A fence surrounding a ballfield. Trees silhouetted against the fading light.

    Nothing particularly exciting.

    But look a little closer.

    There’s a red ball sitting in the grass, just outside the fence.

    It’s such a small detail that you could easily miss it. I almost wonder how many people would look at this photograph without noticing it at all.

    And yet, once you see it, it’s hard to stop looking at it.

    I don’t know who left it there. Maybe someone forgot it. Maybe they planned to come back for it. Maybe it had been sitting there for hours before I ever took the picture.

    I have no idea.

    But I started thinking about how different places can feel depending on when we see them.

    A ballfield is usually somewhere you’d expect to hear people laughing, shouting, cheering, or arguing over whether somebody was actually out. 😂

    There are games to be played, people to watch, and probably at least one person taking everything a little too seriously.

    But here?

    Nothing.

    Just empty seats, an empty field, and one little red ball.

    It’s funny how a place doesn’t have to change for it to feel completely different.

    The bleachers are still there. The fence hasn’t moved. The field is exactly where it was before.

    The only thing missing is the activity we associate with it.

    And I think that’s what caught my attention about this photograph.

    Not everything interesting has to be happening right in front of us.

    Sometimes, it’s what isn’t happening that makes us stop and look.

    I could have photographed the sky. The colors were beautiful, and the trees looked lovely against the fading light.

    But I like this picture better.

    Because there’s something about an empty place that makes you notice things you probably wouldn’t have seen when it was full.

    Like a little red ball sitting quietly in the grass.

    Something ordinary.

    Something easily overlooked.

    Something that made me stop for just a moment longer.

    And sometimes, that’s enough.

    Until next time,

    — Destiny

    P.S. Have you ever visited a familiar place when nobody else was around and realized how different it felt without all the usual noise?

  • 📸 Learning to Look Closer #15: What Still Grows Here

    At first, it looked dead.

    A mess of old vines.

    Twisted branches.

    Things crossing over each other so tightly I couldn’t tell what was still alive—

    and what had been gone for a long time.

    That was what made me stop.

    In black and white, the whole thing looks stripped down to bone.

    No color to soften it.

    No green to reassure you that something is still growing.

    Just shape.

    Shadow.

    Tangles.

    Old wood wrapped around older wood.

    Somewhere inside all of that, something is still alive.

    I think that’s what I like about it.

    Nature doesn’t wait for everything dead to disappear before it starts again.

    It grows around it.

    Through it.

    Over it.

    The old damage stays.

    The broken pieces stay.

    Sometimes the dead things become part of the structure holding the living ones up.

    There’s something very October about that.

    Not death exactly.

    The space between death and whatever comes next.

    The point where something has already ended, but hasn’t disappeared.

    Where decay and growth are touching.

    Where you can’t quite tell which one you’re looking at anymore.

    And maybe that’s why the picture feels a little unsettling.

    Nothing is clean.

    Nothing is finished.

    Nothing has politely stepped aside to make room for what comes after it.

    Everything remains tangled together.

    Which, if I’m being honest, feels a lot more truthful than the idea that we always leave old things neatly behind.

    Sometimes we don’t.

    Sometimes we grow around them.

    Sometimes they become part of us.

    Sometimes the thing you thought was dead is simply waiting somewhere beneath everything else.

    And sometimes—

    you have to look closer to figure out which is which.

    Until next time,

    — Destiny

    P.S. What’s something you thought was gone, only to realize part of it was still growing somewhere underneath? 🖤

  • 📸 Learning to Look Closer #14: The Thing I Wanted to Look Away From

    I am terrified of spiders.

    And I don’t mean:

    “Ew. Spider.”

    I mean my heart races.

    My palms sweat.

    My breathing changes.

    My entire body goes into panic mode before the logical part of my brain has even had time to remind me that I am significantly larger than the thing currently ruining my day.

    So naturally—

    I took her picture.

    😂

    And somehow, out of all the pictures I could have taken of a spider I desperately wanted nowhere near me…

    she decided to pose.

    One leg stretched upward.

    The others perfectly angled.

    Body turned just enough to show off every stripe, every little patch of color, every horrifying hair on those ridiculously long legs.

    She looks like she knew exactly where the camera was.

    Which feels unnecessarily confident for something that almost made me leave my own backyard.

    But then I looked at the photo.

    Actually looked.

    And—

    damn it.

    She’s beautiful.

    I hate that.

    😂

    Her legs aren’t just black.

    They’re banded with orange and yellow.

    Her abdomen has this complicated pattern running across it that I never would have noticed if I hadn’t gotten close enough to take the picture.

    Even the little hairs on her legs—the part I find particularly offensive—catch the light.

    There is so much detail packed into something my brain normally reduces to one word:

    SPIDER.

    Danger.

    Nope.

    Get it away from me.

    And I think that’s the interesting part.

    Looking closer didn’t make me less afraid of her.

    I didn’t take the picture and suddenly become a spider person.

    Absolutely not.

    I still wanted distance.

    A lot of it.

    Preferably several zip codes.

    But for a minute, fear stopped being the only thing I could see.

    There was fear.

    And there was color.

    Pattern.

    Texture.

    Structure.

    Beauty.

    All occupying the exact same frame.

    I think sometimes we assume appreciating something means we have to stop being afraid of it.

    Maybe we don’t.

    Maybe two things can be true at once.

    She scared the absolute shit out of me.

    And—

    she is gorgeous.

    I can admit that.

    From over here.

    Very, very far away.

    😂🖤

    Maybe looking closer isn’t always about discovering that something wasn’t scary after all.

    Sometimes it’s just about noticing that fear wasn’t the whole story.

    Until next time,

    -Destiny

    P.S. Have you ever found something beautiful even though it scared you?

  • 🕷️ Learning to Look Closer #9 — I Looked. I Regret It.

    Usually, Learning to Look Closer is about noticing the things we might otherwise miss.

    The light coming through the trees.

    The colors hiding in a sunset.

    The tiny details we walk past every day because we’re too busy looking somewhere else.

    It’s supposed to be about slowing down.

    Paying attention.

    Finding something beautiful in the ordinary.

    Well.

    I looked closer.

    I would like to formally withdraw my previous advice. 😂

    I’ve been sick all week.

    And somewhere between laying in bed, watching entirely too much television, and feeling like my head was approximately 97% congestion, I decided it would be a good idea to go through all of my clothes.

    Because apparently being sick wasn’t enough suffering.

    So there I was.

    Surrounded by clothes.

    Completely out of energy.

    Ready to give up on the entire project and crawl back into bed.

    And then I looked up.

    There he was.

    A spider.

    Just chilling above my bedroom door.

    In my bedroom.

    Rent free.

    Like he had somewhere to be and I was interrupting him.

    Now, there is something you should probably know about me.

    I am terrified of spiders.

    Not uncomfortable.

    Not “Ew, a spider.”

    Terrified.

    And naturally, this little asshole had positioned himself somewhere I couldn’t reach him.

    So I did what any brave, capable, independent 33-year-old woman would do.

    I stared at him while trying to figure out how the hell I was going to kill him without getting close enough for him to potentially touch me.

    There was just one problem.

    I looked away.

    For approximately half a second.

    When I looked back—

    he was gone.

    Do you know what’s worse than seeing a spider in your bedroom?

    NOT SEEING THE SPIDER YOU JUST SAW IN YOUR BEDROOM.

    Because now we have options.

    Is he behind the dresser?

    Under the bed?

    On the ceiling?

    Did he leave?

    Is he currently watching me write this?

    WHERE DID YOU GO, SIR?

    And why were you so fucking fast?! 😭

    I read something once about jumping spiders that said they tend to have their own little routines.

    They supposedly wander around the same areas doing their tiny spider business, so if you suddenly notice one somewhere you normally don’t, maybe you’re the one who stepped outside your usual routine.

    I have absolutely no idea how scientifically accurate that is.

    But I’ve been thinking about it.

    Because maybe he’s been here before.

    Maybe while I’ve been living my life, sleeping in my bed and minding my own business, this tiny creature has been living an entire little life alongside mine.

    Taking the same routes.

    Visiting the same places.

    Doing whatever the hell spiders do all day.

    And I simply never noticed him.

    Until our routines crossed.

    Which is actually kind of fascinating.

    I hate it.

    But it’s fascinating. 😂

    Maybe there’s something to that.

    There are entire little worlds existing around us all the time.

    Things happening in corners we never look toward.

    Creatures following routines we know nothing about.

    Tiny lives intersecting with ours for a few seconds before disappearing again.

    Sometimes looking closer means noticing a beautiful sunset.

    Sometimes it means noticing the way two people love each other.

    Sometimes it means finding something extraordinary hiding inside something completely ordinary.

    And sometimes—

    you look up while sorting clothes and discover that you apparently have a roommate.

    A roommate who has now disappeared somewhere inside your bedroom.

    So perhaps Learning to Look Closer needs one small amendment:

    Pay attention to the world around you.

    Notice the little things.

    Look for what you normally overlook.

    But occasionally?

    Mind your fucking business.

    Because now I know there’s a spider somewhere in my bedroom.

    And I can never unknow it.

    Until next time,

    —Destiny

    P.S. If you happen to know where my new roommate went, no you don’t. I would actually prefer to sleep tonight. 🕷️😭

  • Learning to Look Closer #8

    I almost didn’t take this picture.

    There wasn’t anything particularly exciting happening.

    I wasn’t somewhere new.

    There wasn’t a perfect, wide-open view of the sunset.

    There were just trees.

    A lot of them, actually. 😂

    Branches everywhere. Power lines near the bottom. One tree that looks like it gave up on having leaves before everybody else.

    And somewhere behind all of it, the sky was glowing.

    So I stopped.

    And I looked up.

    The sunset wasn’t perfectly framed. The trees blocked most of it. I couldn’t see the horizon, and there was no way to get a “better” view without going somewhere else.

    But I didn’t really want a better view.

    I liked this one.

    Because the light kept finding little places to come through.

    Between the branches.

    Through the leaves.

    Around the trees.

    Little pieces of gold tucked into all that darkness.

    And the longer I stood there looking at it, the more there was to see.

    There was still blue hiding at the top of the sky.

    Soft pink mixed into the clouds.

    Bright yellow and orange burning through the thickest parts of the trees.

    Living branches tangled together with bare ones.

    None of it was neat.

    None of it was unobstructed.

    And somehow, that made it prettier.

    I think sometimes we get so used to looking for the perfect view that we forget to appreciate the one we actually have.

    We want the sunset without the power lines.

    The sky without the branches.

    The picture without anything getting in the way.

    But maybe everything in the way is part of the picture, too.

    Maybe the trees weren’t blocking the sunset.

    Maybe they were showing me where the light was.

    So, I took the picture.

    Not because it was perfect.

    Just because I looked up at the right moment and thought,

    Oh.

    That’s pretty.

    And sometimes, that’s reason enough.

    —Destiny

    P.S. When was the last time you stopped to look at something ordinary long enough to realize it was actually kind of beautiful?

  • Learning to Look Closer #7: Meet Sandy

    I think I accidentally made a squirrel friend.

    Her name is Sandy.

    Did she tell me that?

    No.

    Did I ask?

    Also no.

    She’s Sandy now. 😂

    It started with me feeding her once.

    Then I fed her again.

    And again.

    And again.

    So at this point, I’m not entirely sure whether I’m observing nature or if I’ve accidentally entered into some kind of snack-based agreement with a squirrel.

    Either way, she keeps coming back.

    And I’ve started noticing little things.

    How cautiously she approaches at first.

    How she pauses like she’s deciding whether I can be trusted.

    How quickly that hesitation disappears once food is involved.

    Relatable, honestly. 😂

    The first time I saw her, she was just a squirrel.

    One of those little things you notice outside for a few seconds before going back to whatever you were doing.

    But then I stopped.

    I watched her.

    I fed her.

    And suddenly she wasn’t just a squirrel anymore.

    She was Sandy.

    There’s something kind of funny about that.

    The world is full of things we pass every day without really seeing them.

    Birds in the yard.

    Bugs on the window.

    Squirrels running across fences.

    Sunsets behind trees.

    They’re always there.

    But sometimes all it takes is slowing down for a minute before something ordinary starts feeling a little less ordinary.

    Maybe that’s what I like most about photography—and about this little series.

    It gives me an excuse to stop.

    To notice.

    To pay attention long enough for a random squirrel to become Sandy. 😂

    And apparently Sandy knows where the snacks are now.

    So I have a feeling this won’t be the last time you hear about her.

    Until next time,

    —Destiny

    P.S. Have you ever accidentally made friends with a wild animal?

  • Learning to Look Closer #5

    Sometimes looking closer means seeing something beautiful.

    Sometimes it means looking into your aquarium and wondering what exactly your snail thinks she’s doing.

    Because apparently the glass wasn’t interesting enough.

    The plants weren’t interesting enough.

    No.

    She needed to climb.

    All the way to the top.

    And then hang there like this was a completely normal decision.

    So, naturally, I grabbed my camera.

    I’ve watched snails move around an aquarium plenty of times, but there was something different about seeing her from this angle.

    Usually, we see the shell first.

    The spiral.

    The part that makes us immediately recognize a snail as a snail.

    But from underneath, she looked completely different.

    Her shell became this enormous shield above her body. Her tiny head peeked over the edge. One little antenna stretched outward while the other disappeared somewhere behind her.

    And somehow, an animal we usually think of as slowly crawling along the bottom had managed to get herself all the way up there.

    I think that’s what I like about taking pictures of little things.

    You start noticing how strange everything actually is.

    Snails climb.

    Moths have fuzzy heads.

    Insects have colors and patterns we can’t see until we’re inches away.

    Things that seem ordinary from a distance become almost alien when you get close enough.

    And this particular little alien apparently wanted the penthouse view.

    I have no idea what she was looking for up there.

    Maybe nothing.

    Maybe she simply discovered she could climb it and decided to keep going.

    Either way, I’m glad I stopped long enough to notice.

    Because sometimes looking closer doesn’t reveal some profound lesson about life.

    Sometimes it just reveals a snail doing something weird.

    And honestly?

    I think those moments deserve to be noticed, too.

    — Destiny

    P.S. What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever caught one of your pets doing?

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  • Learning to Look Closer #4

    Most people probably wouldn’t have stopped for her.

    She was just a little brown moth outside near the cat food.

    And with cats around, that probably wasn’t the safest place for her to be.

    So I picked her up.

    I expected her to fight me.

    To flutter her wings, scramble away, or do whatever tiny moths do when a giant human suddenly decides to scoop them up.

    She didn’t.

    She just let me.

    No fighting.

    No struggling.

    She sat completely still on the tip of my finger while I carried her somewhere safer.

    And maybe I’m giving a tiny moth far too much credit, but in that moment, it felt a little like trust.

    So, naturally, I stopped to look closer.

    Up close, she wasn’t just a little brown moth anymore.

    Her head was covered in soft, golden-brown fuzz. Her wings looked almost like velvet, folded neatly against her back. Her antennae were impossibly thin, and those tiny black legs held onto my finger while I moved her away from danger.

    She was beautiful.

    Not in the bright, obvious way butterflies tend to be.

    Moths are quieter about it.

    Butterflies get flowers and gardens and people stopping to take pictures.

    Moths get porch lights and people trying to shoo them out of the house.

    But look closer.

    There’s something beautiful about them, too.

    Maybe that’s one of my favorite things about taking pictures.

    It gives me an excuse to stop long enough to notice things I might otherwise walk right past.

    The fuzzy head.

    The tiny feet.

    The way plain brown wings turn almost golden when the light hits them.

    And sometimes, a tiny creature trusting you enough to let you carry her somewhere safe.

    She was only on my finger for a little while.

    But it was long enough for me to notice her.

    Sometimes that’s all it takes.

    — Destiny

    P.S. What’s something small you almost overlooked lately?

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