Photo Of The Week, Part One

By Tom Poland

 

See Them For Free

My good friend and co-author, Robert Clark, and I have long been planning to give readers a look and a read about the Southland and its abundant beauty and fascinating stories. We developed a “Closed Wednesdays” concept but never got it off the ground. Too much traveling, too many book-related events, and life’s way of throwing detours in our path got in the way. We stepped back and thought things over and decided to offer readers something different. Robert’s idea, “The Photo of the Week,” resulted and so far it is getting a good reception.

Here’s the web address for the Photo of the Week. http://www.photooftheweek.net/ Bookmark it and pay it a visit each week from Tuesday on. We try to post a new one each Tuesday but sometimes it’s Thursday before life lets us get the new one up.

You’ll see that we cover nature, man and his creations, and more. Meanwhile, here are several that have already run so you can see what you’ve missed and get an idea of what’s coming.

 

 

Sand Fence Pathway

Who can see the wind? Neither I nor you, but when the winds pass through, beach sand does too. Winds encountering plants, however, slow and drop sand. As grains accumulate, plants grow and spread, further limiting the wind’s ability to carry sand away. When plants are scarce, sand fences like these at Folly Beach slow the wind letting sand accumulate around their base. It’s a win-wind scenario.

Walking through grassy dunes harms the growth of plants letting winds blow flakes of mica and grains of quartz and feldspar away. These Folly Beach sand fences, however, provide more than a pathway to the sea. They build dunes—barriers against storm surges. Photographed ten minutes after sunrise, Folly Beach will warm creating winds. Sands passing through the fences will drop and plants will grow.

 

 

Heirloom Brooms

In the hamlet of Boykin a sign, “Hand-Made Brooms,” adorns an old slave home. Inside, beneath axe-hewn heart pine beams impaled by ancient nails, Susan Simpson uses vintage 1800’s equipment to make heirloom brooms.

The wheat-colored straw—tough as hog bristles—comes from Laredo, Texas. Susan dyes the sweet-smelling straw the colors of the rainbow, cuts it, and binds it to handsome dark handles. Decorative-but-sturdy, her hearth and large house brooms grace homes and businesses in all 50 states and 29 countries.

An ancient broom more than 100 years hangs high on a wall. “If you touch it, it will disintegrate,” warns Susan. Not her brooms. They’re solid as a rock.

One more thing.If a new broom sweeps clean, what do Susan’s vibrant brooms do? They sweep boredom from the eye.

 

 

The Bluebird Of Happiness

Quite simply the bluebird is iconic. American Indians saw it as a symbol of the rising sun, a new day. Harbinger of happiness, hope, and love, the bluebird is dear to many, businesses included. Yellow-schoolbus-manufacturer Blue Bird Corporation uses the bluebird as its emblem. American Express uses it to symbolize a mobile app. Myriad companies use “Bluebird” as their name. Because quite simply, the bluebird is iconic.

Songs and films aplenty pay homage to this member of the thrush family. “Don’t fly, mister bluebird, I’m just walking down the road.” So sang the Allman Brothers. In The Wizard of Oz, Judy Garland sang, “Somewhere over the rainbow bluebirds fly.”

The bluebird has its own song, a lilting, liquid, mellifluous anthem. Hear it and see a feathery flash of blue and you know you’re in for a good day.

 

 

Autumnal Majesty

Though softened by rain, maples and elms brighten the land nonetheless—testament to hardwoods’ autumnal majesty. Autumn—that’s when we realize just how much grandeur we miss owing to the million of pines that have displaced maples, oaks, and hickories. Pines, green year-round, are a non-event come fall.

Not hardwoods. As summer retreats, chlorophyll’s decline unveils their magnificent hues. Temperatures drop and fall’s palette of red, orange, and gold banishes summer green.

You’ll be hard pressed to find anyone who doesn’t love fall and its cavalcade of colors. Predicted with accuracy or not, fall’s arrival kicks off leaf-lover season. Colors pull hard at foliage worshipers and all highways lead to the northwest corner. Without doubt, fall colors are one of Earth’s better performances. There’s music in the mountains and no resisting the trees’ siren song.

 

 

Saluda River Dawn

Outside of sportsmen, photographers, and naturalists, few witness the dawning of a river morning. For photographers, it’s a sublime-yet-fleeting moment to capture the start of another day, and what a day. As fog gathers over a swirling Saluda River, dawn’s early light spreads a golden patina over waters that have made their way from the cold depths of Dreher Shoals Dam.

Few will behold this daybreak pageantry.

As people get ready for work, as others take in the news, as others sleep, the Saluda gleams beneath spokes of light. The founding editor of South Carolina Wildlife, John Culler, wrote a simple truth long ago. “The most delicious time in all creation is just before sunup.” Indeed it is. How many Saluda River dawns have you missed?

 

 

A Golden Treasure … The Sea’s Nursery

The colors of the Earth live in this Hunting Island estuary. The hues hint of abundant life, for when marsh grass turns golden, it begins to break down and nourish the sea’s food chain.

The beauty’s obvious. The utility isn’t. Yet few places are as biologically rich as a salt marsh where sunlight, nutrients, and water produce five to seven times more protein per acre than an acre of Midwest wheat.

Tides flow in and tides flow out, planetary breathing. And how lovely when winds ghost across marsh grass giving form to zephyrs. And when the tides stand still, the sea holds its breath until the moon’s push-pull nourishing of creeks resumes.

Gazing upon this spartina-fringed estuary near Hunting Island should resurrect the fertile smell of marshes, a fragrance that speaks of life rising from death.

 

 

 

Visit Tom Poland’s website at www.tompoland.net 
Email Tom about most anything. [email protected]

Tom Poland is the author of eight books and more than 700 magazine features. A Southern writer, his work has appeared in magazines throughout the South. The University of South Carolina Press has released his and Robert Clark’s book, Reflections Of South Carolina, Vol. II. The History Press of Charleston just released his book, Classic Carolina Road Trips From Columbia. He writes a weekly column for newspapers in Georgia and South Carolina about the South, its people, traditions, lifestyle, and changing culture.

 

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