Walking. With Vemödalen.

Posted on by Live & Learn

To bed at 11 pm. Up at 3:30 a.m. The Stanley Cup Finals stealing two hours of sleep that I’ll never get back. 4.5 hours of sleep today. 5 hours yesterday. 4 hours the day before. Not sustainable.

I lay there staring at LED letters flickering on the ceiling. This projection coming from a new clock, this one complimentary from a retailer seeking to redress my stinging complaint on an Amazon review headlined: You get what you pay for.

Wally nuzzles up to me, sighs, and rolls over. I slide out from under the covers, dress quickly, grab the camera gear and drive.

I check my weather app: 71° F — 94% cloud cover — 6% chance of rain — Humidity, Southeast Asia immediately before a monsoon.

1509 consecutive (almost) days on this daybreak morning walk at Cove Island Park. Like in a row.

I pull in, there’s no one in the park. Correction. No one, except me and the Stamford City Park heavy machine operator combing the beaches, every morning. Yes, it’s intrusive, this large, John Deere Tractor scraping the earth, kicking up dust in all directions breaking the silence of the morning. Is this really necessary, beach combing?

I have Vemödalen.

Vemödalen: n. the frustration of photographing something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist—the same sunset, the same waterfall, the same curve of a hip, the same closeup of an eye—which can turn a unique subject into something hollow and pulpy and cheap, like a mass-produced piece of furniture you happen to have assembled yourself.

Vemödalen. Again.

Thinking I need to find Something inspiring to snap at on this walk. Arrogantly thinking that I have Something to do with the output.

It’s dark. It’s overcast. The John Deere insufferably groans on. My underwear sticks to my skin as I walk. Is the humidity that thick or did I wet myself?

I’m on the back end of my first loop. Same old. Same old. Same old. Same old.

And then it turns.

A silver mist rises, and then thickens. Mist transforms to fog. I quicken my pace to get to the waterfront.

And there it is.

No, I didn’t know it was today — Strawberry Moon makes it’s appearance, reaching peak illumination. But she’s been bashful all morning, peaking behind the cloud cover, streaming a single streak of light across the cove.

The mist, ghost-like, paints the break wall.

I stand there. I stand on the shoreline, exactly in that spot in the photo below, my arms down by my sides and doing as Maggie Nelson in “Like Love” suggests:

My advice is to float in this feeling, allow a degree of surrender to it.

Notes: DK Photo @ Cove Island park this morning @ 4:30 & 4:45 a.m. More photos from this morning’s walk here.

36 thoughts on “Walking. With Vemödalen.”

    2. If you patiently walk long enough, you never know what you may encounter. For those of us that love the water, but live inland 😡, it is something we look forward to. At least I do. Often we are our own worst critics. March on, DK. March on.

  3. I had to laugh at your Vemoedalen complex. I just deleted about a thousand squirrel pictures because the computer told me I was getting a bit greedy on the storage settings.

  7. what a wonderful post and a most ethereal & beautiful photo. HH and I were in the mountains for a few nights but did absolutely nothing of any merit. Reason? Rain, fog, wandering banks of mist/fog/sheets of rain, sunshine, wind…… but guess what? It did us a world of good, reading, just being, eating and drinking when we felt like, ‚launching‘ and ‚lunching‘, having little outings in this awesome nature, fighting horrible hay- and pollen-bouts, snivelling and fever, but thanks to the rain on the whole (just about) acceptable…. sometimes Vermödalen is just what we need (and I learn a new word every day). Thanks for that update – still awaiting a full story of your 1500th tour of the land (and water)!

  8. I’m kind of drawn to any photo series where the same thing is photographed over time. you can see the subtle changes, and feel the passage of time. not only nature photos or places, but pics with people as well. so very interesting. I think why I walk a common path so very often, I notice the smallest changes and am intrigued.

  10. Such a beautiful post, words and pictures, and I am stuck on this line: «  Is the humidity that thick or did I wet myself? ». I want to tell you that if anyone notices you wet yourself, tell them it’s the humidity.

  11. Staying present and acknowledging all the stuff that wants to be seen … is so important. Capturing it, is epic.
    Never doubt that you are on the path. Because you are.💖

  13. You love that beach comber…. stop posing like you don’t. Sorry it is so hot there and even more sorry… I am not there to listen to you grumble about it. Proud of you for getting up after no sleep and still hitting your streak! Go DK!

    1. Posing Teacher? Or Pretending? Need some verb tutorials? Is this the quality of teaching our 4th graders being subjected to? No wonder we are in trouble.

      1. Another missed pun by you….. photography… “posing”. Sheesh. So much goes over your head. For such an intelligent man…..

  14. Beautiful. All of it.

    And, I have a super plug adaptor that I can plug in three USB and six plugs. The damn thing glows blue on my ceiling. Drove me nuts until I put a black sock over it. Might wanna put a sock over your clock 😉

Leave a Reply to Under the mask..Cancel reply