It Hit Me

They hit me unexpectedly: the feels, I mean.

Danica is preparing to move into her own room in a townhouse in Ottawa with three other girls for her second year of university. She commuted during her freshman year, but since her car has been demolished, she has no alternative but to live close to the university. This really had been her plan all along, but there is no alternative now.

You know a milestone event is coming, but sometimes the reality just hits you out of the blue. The fact of the matter is that Danica will be leaving home.

The reality whammed me right between my metaphorical eyes. which I confess leaked, just a little. When the younguns leave, they leave, and nothing will ever be quite the same.

When Shauna left all those decades ago, it hit me more suddenly and even harder than this at the very last minute. We had taken her to get her room set up on the previous day and then brought her back home. Her friend pulled up in the driveway to take her away from home on the next morning. Suddenly, I was sobbing.

My psyche was better prepared for the second child to leave. I knew what to expect, and I dealt with it much better.

But now, Danica, my first grandchild, will be going: not until August and not far, but she will be leaving home, and nothing will ever be quite the same.

It's not the final step of her growing and going, but it is a seminal one. 

Orphan Photos

On rare 😁 occasions, I take snapshots when I am out and about. Sometimes, I don't get around to posting them because they didn't fit my musing at the time. I think these random orphans deserve their day in the sun.

This is the back of an original log house that now serves as a home for the chamber of commence. When we go downtown, we usually park behind it. Every now and then I take another photo even though I have shot the cabin many times before. I like the textures.

Abstract reflections at Riverside Park.

The sun caught a spent Queen Anne's Lace from last year. I thought it was worth a click.

Sue sitting on bench along the trial while I hunted for blossoms to photograph.

After I joined Sue on the bench, I saw that a couple was approaching with their dogs. I held the phone on my lap and waited for them to walk into the frame. I was rewarded with four smiling faces and also received some sloppy wet licks. I like this candid shot very much.

I have more orphan photos, some of which go back a little farther in time. We shall see what we shall see.

Ponds

The pond in the neighbourhood park does not usually teem with life. Why would it with a river just on the other side?

But the heron was there for our first sighting of the year. It was at a distance, but I zoomed the phone and managed to capture something.

I swear that we were being polite and considerate, but it flew off anyway.

A little later we saw a pair of mallards swimming by the reeds. Cute, eh?

Speaking of ponds, we came across another one near the lilacs last week, with a cute, little cottage on the edge. It's a very marshy area, so it would be mosquito and blackfly heaven hell in there. In fact, the blackflies just came out to harass us on the weekend. We live in town, so they are not too bad here, but they will be brutal in the countryside right about now.

Just to see what would happen, I asked Gemini to render it as an impressionistic painting.

Gemini gave me a small, low res image. I expect that the paid version would be of higher res. I think it is more interesting than the actual photo in this instance, but neither version is zackly a stunnah. The light was a little too stark on that bright day, but it will have to do because I don't plan on returning for a good light picture.

Portrait Mode at D&D

On a chilly and rainy Sunday, we drove the very short distance to Dark & Deadly where Sue used her gift card for free drinks. Grampa thanks Danica for Sue's Mother's Day gift. :)

For the first time, on this particular day, the coffee was poured for us and served in real mugs. I think they were poured because our order required an infusion of chocolate. 

Speaking of mugs, I couldn't help but play with the iPhone. Even though the shots were of mugs and not a person, I nevertheless, decided to use portrait mode to see how they would turn out. We can access interesting special light modes that way.

There was a new greeter whom I could see perfectly from my seat next to the door. I took three different photos using different light modes and combined them later.

While I wanted to show the three versions next to one another for comparison purposes, the one on white just didn't fit. So . . . 

Finally, I thought the colour version needed to be featured.

We can do interesting lighting with the iPhone that we cannot do with a camera, or not without a  lot of time and equipment.

Blossom Time

Not only is it lilac time, but trees and bushes are also in flower. I showed you Nick's flowering tree a few days ago but have managed to press the shutter for a few others since then. We found this ↓ one in the country very near the lilac acreage that I posted about two days ago.

There is a row of trees that bloom briefly by St James Park. I photographed them well with my Canon a number of years ago, but their duration is brief, so I have missed them ever since then. This is my first attempt of this row with just the phone.

Another shot from right under the row.

Sue away from the tree row but in the same park and under the blossoms of another tree and beside the tulips. 

A very colourful tree beyond a fence, near the OVR Trail.

The best photo of the bunch, in my most humble opinion, is this ↓ one, taken next day in our neighbourhood park.

The First Coffee Walk

Readers probably don't recall the coffee walk that we might take every week or so last summer and fall. We would park near the Wool Growers Coop, amble from there over to Tims, order a coffee, and then take it around to the Junction where we would sit to drink our coffee.

Yesterday was the day do make that walk for the first time since probably around mid October. We started farther back today, near the market, which is approximately located near that low-rise apartment building in the background near the path, below.

We stopped to take a picture by the sign, something that had always intended to do last year but in the evening once the lights came on. Unfortunately, with autumn gaining ground, they took the display down before we got around to it.

We tottered toward and then past the Wool Growers ↓ where we used to begin our stroll.  Tims is past the Coop around to the left.

We made it and went in to order our coffees to go: 2 large, double cream. Thank you, Mam, here is $4.83.

We approached the Junction . . .

. . . and landed by the kids play structure. Unfortunately, there were no kids yesterday, but there was a selfie to be had, so all was not lost.

It was good to walk that walk again.

🎵 And the seasons, they go round and round. 🎶

Lilacs

Our backyard lilac bush exploded this week ↑ so we thought that we should drive down to Franktown to explore their acres of wild lilacs. This weekend will be their Lilac Festival, but unfortunately, the lilacs are lagging a bit down there and will probably require another few days before they bloom in profusion.

There were some wonderful patches, which Sue enjoyed.

I played with a Live Photo of the above snap and turned it into a gif.

I took far photos, and Sue took close ones, and hers worked a lot better.