Sunrise, Sunset

Do you remember the lyrics from the song in Fiddler on the Roof, especially the refrain?

Sunrise, sunset

Sunrise, sunset

Swiftly fly the years

One season following another

Laden with happiness and tears

This morning and yesterday we started our day watching spectacular, sky-searing sunrises while walking one of our dogs. Today, while we were sipping our first post-walk cup of coffee, a ghostlike hummingbird visited the window-mounted nectar feeder in our office. The barely visible gray-tone flutters startled us because, for no particularly good reason, we didn't think hummingbirds fed before full daylight. At least that's the only time we've seen them at feeders prior to today.

late July sunrise, DSLR

Photo by J. Harrington

Unfortunately, once again we were frustrated by the apparent inability of our smartphone camera to capture deep fire colors from dawns like today's, about the shade of candy on this color thesaurus, or the bright band near the middle of the picture above, without washing them out. According to at least some folks, "The problem is that the auto white balance of digital cameras will typically try to cancel out any shift in color temperature, with the aim of producing results that are more neutral. As a result, the AWB setting can leech all the orange light out of sunset and sunrise shots, giving rise to insipid, neutral images as a result." (Problem #8) We'll see what happens after we spend some time reviewing iPhone camera tips and tricks, and maybe try a third-party camera app. Or, we could remember to take our DSLR for early morning walks in late Spring and early Summer, although we've had similar issues with that camera. Time to learn more about how to use a DSLR? Isn't technology wonderful, the way it "just works?" Conversely, we'd like it if our DSLR included GPS info the way our smartphone does.

mid-May sunrise, iPhone 6

Photo by J. Harrington

As happens all too often with us, and, we suspect, many others, we spend time fiddling around with alternative technologies rather than settling down and mastering any one. We noticed that our artisan sourdough improved markedly the more we studied and practiced baking bread. Our fly casting improves the more we practice. But, with a camera or a computer, we expect to be able to pick it up and have it read our mind. When will we act on the recognition that spending $$ on a hobby is not a valuable substitute for spending time engaged in that same hobby? What else might this apply to?

An American Sunrise

By Joy Harjo

We were running out of breath, as we ran out to meet ourselves. We

were surfacing the edge of our ancestors’ fights, and ready to strike.

It was difficult to lose days in the Indian bar if you were straight.

Easy if you played pool and drank to remember to forget. We

made plans to be professional — and did. And some of us could sing

so we drummed a fire-lit pathway up to those starry stars. Sin

was invented by the Christians, as was the Devil, we sang. We

were the heathens, but needed to be saved from them — thin

chance. We knew we were all related in this story, a little gin

will clarify the dark and make us all feel like dancing. We

had something to do with the origins of blues and jazz

I argued with a Pueblo as I filled the jukebox with dimes in June,

forty years later and we still want justice. We are still America. We

know the rumors of our demise. We spit them out. They die

soon.

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