SEEING RED

"But you don't look like a fish that way; can you swim sideways?"

 

I couldn't believe myself. I talked to the fish? I still remember one of the first times I went to the park and saw a tiny red fish in the creek and wanted to photograph it, I looked through my camera viewfinder and could see only what looked like a vertical red line.  To get a photograph that looked like a fish, it would have to swim horizontally, of course. But even if a human asked a fish to pose that way, there would be no way it would, right?

I couldn't believe it when the fish flipped right after I'd finished speaking, to show me its flank. No. That was coincidence, right? I snapped my picture and went home. They say seeing is believing, but....

On another bright sunny day, I was looking at, not the swimmy things in the water but the flying things in the reeds--the dragonflies. Like the fishy, there was a bright red one nearby. Now that, I thought, would make a nice picture.

But it was in the shade, where it wouldn't photograph well.

"Hey you," I said, feeling foolish that I thot I could speak to insects; "I need you to come out in the sunlight where I can see you." And I said to myself, if I nudged the leaf it was perched on, I would probably scare it away, and I wouldn't get my picture. Well, in the shade, it was too dark to get a clear shot anyway. So I nudged the twig with the toe of my shoe.

The dragonfly seemed to turn its head in my direction; lift and hover; but it didn't fly away. Then I sensed it say, "Look. I'm. in the light now; isn't that what you wanted? Get your picture!"

It was only after loud shutter sounds had gone off the dragonfly turned and flew away.

And I turned and went home, shaking my head at those little red things in the park.