Photographic pictures are images, snapshots frozen in space and time.
Well, hey there reader. Thanks for checking in. Hope you’re well and happy.
I was just thinking of people sending pictures to each other, which is so popular these days. But if you were to paint your own personal picture of how you see life in the world around you, then how might it appear?
It could entail blue skies, sunshine, crystal blue lakes and mountains in the background. Hey, you know, this could be fun.
You have a gentle breeze blowing, little birds singing, flowers all about. Hey now you’re doing great.
Our colors are bright, vivid and beautiful. Can you maybe add in some soft soothing music and an occasional afternoon shower? Oh, I see a marvelous double rainbow arching across the mountain. Hey, you should put your signature on this painting. It’s a masterpiece!
Oh, oh. Look, there’s some distant smoke. And is that a forest fire? It’s spreading and causing much damage. That’s not really part of your picture, is it? How did that get there?
Oh, now I see. Other people are also artists and painters with their own abilities to color and paint in their desired scenes and actions.
They too often let their creations run into other people’s canvas.
Now look. There are stores, factories, warehouses and freeways. Looks like someone is grabbing your beautiful space and building a city in it. This shouldn’t be!
Do you see that long lonesome train chugging across the desert and winding on down through the canyon? Well, that’s part of my picture.
So are those little houses with the white picket fences that the train is passing by now. So please don’t block my train or build anything in its path. Please don’t erase any part of my little town. This is my picture; my space and I like it just the way it is.
No, I’m not telling you what you can and cannot create. I just ask you to please not paint on my canvas. You have ample space and canvas of your own.
How much space are you allotted for your picture, you ask? Well, what is the height of the sky, the depth of the ocean and how vast is the desert? You are free to put a frame around space, time, beauty and the living colors of life.
You know how they say “Every picture tells a story”, and “A picture is worth a thousand words”? Well, I think that, under the US Constitution, we each have the right to paint our own picture.
It is our personal private property and we bear total responsibility for it. However, we should not infringe, alter or destroy the picture of another without his or her permission.
Of course, when two people marry, they quite often merge both of their canvases into one. And when kids come along, well then there is the family canvas that they all willingly, (hopefully), co-create.
Companies, communities, city councils and such each paint one large picture in common with their individual members. But this so often is where much conflict and competition come in. There are squabbles and disagreements among members. They continually paint over each other’s creations. The colors run together and their pictures darken.
States, nations, geopolitical regions and religions likewise paint their own pictures. But there are so many opposing and counter creations within these scenes that they can get very dark indeed.
The more artists sharing a canvas, then the more likely are the conflicts, or so it would appear.
All one has to do is look at the big picture of the world as it is today. Does it look like a bright, clear, beautiful picture to you?
Being that we are in the age of the iPhone these days, taking pictures and sharing them with our friends has become ever so popular.
So dear reader, this is a picture I have created with less than a thousand words. I am sending it on to you and would like to know how you view it?
Dan O’Connor can be reached at danhughoconnor@gmail.