Personal Fireworks

 

As any of you who have stopped here before are aware, I usually try to build my entries around one of my photos or to take one to match the topic. In this particular instance, however,  I was unable to capture the image.  No combination of shutter speed, aperture and sensor sensitivity could duplicate what the eye so readily sees, so I will simply try to paint the picture in words – in hopes that your mind’s eye will see the beauty and feel the awe, as imagination creates what the camera cannot.

 

 

My last entry touched on the topic of celebrations and included pictures of fireworks from the Fourth.  Those photos were actually taken during a local community celebration the weekend before, so that on the night of the Holiday I was home.  As the sky darkened at the end of the day, the air became alive with the sound of celebratory explosions from surrounding towns and I wandered onto the deck to absorb the joyous cacophony.

 

At first, my attention was drawn above the treeline, as the sky lit randomly from the distant explosions – much as lightning will illuminate the clouds from great distance.  But as my eyes adjusted, my vision shifted to the valley below – and a sight that is my recurring favorite memory of summer since moving here, and which will always conjure awe and joy in my soul no matter how many times I am blessed to witness it.

 

The air was still and warm as the night became alive before me.  For in the trees and all around me – some near enough to touch, some far away – glowed hundreds, seemingly thousands, of fireflies.  Their tiny lanterns beamed for an instant, always replaced by the glow of another in a new location – and my mind linked the tiny lights before me with the explosions reporting in the air to create a July Fourth spectacle for my eyes and ears alone. 

 

Minutes passed and the thunderous echoes slowed and died as grand finales faded, yet the light show before and around me continued in mute silence – to my mind becoming all the more beautiful and poignant.  Sometimes the sheer spectacle of an event is so overwhelming that the combination of sight and sound and feel crowds out the ability to think – and when the sounds slowly dissolved into the silence of a summer night, the light itself and the quiet wonder of nature it represented was permitted its opportunity to permeate and become fixed to the soul.  Mesmerized, I not only saw, but felt each pulse of light – and the celebration moved from the external to deep within.

 

I neither know nor care the duration of my experience, but I know that my heart was at peace when I returned inside – a personal gift beyond price.  Whether it originates in a smile from a stranger, the laughter of a child,  the comforting hand of a friend – or the simple glow of a firefly – I hope that same peace fills your heart, soon and often.