No matter how many mornings I climb out of bed, I always find new things that delight and amaze me. The world is constantly reinventing itself, and it’s filled with more surprises than any movie or tv show we could ever hope to watch.
“Those who are awake live in a constant state of amazement,” the Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield said.
I found myself in a state of amazement as I sat inside Rosie's, my favorite café. Sitting at a table near the door, I noticed that the door’s window was coated with a clear adhesive film adorned with different textures. As I looked out through the film-covered window, the world appeared as a kaleidoscope of fractured colors and shapes.
It was as if I'd stepped into a surrealistic artwork with wet paint dripping down the canvas.
Grateful that I had my camera with me, I took a series of pictures through the looking-glass window. I knelt and squatted and shuffled my position with each successive shot, watching the distortions change dramatically with my slightest movements.
I’m guessing the patrons coming in through the door thought I was one deranged photographer. What in the world was this guy shooting? Why was he taking all these pictures just inches from the window?
I was just busy being amazed, that’s all – amazed that this world can look so beautiful and so surprisingly different from one moment to the next.
Photographer’s Footnote: When I went back to the café this week, the adhesive film on the window was gone – another lesson about the constantly changing, impermanent nature of all things.