MORNING GLORIES

I am a naturalist. My passion is the study, and appreciation of Nature.

    In my garden I have a trellis on which I’ve trained Morning Glories to grow. Every morning in late summer the trellis is covered with new blooms. It’s quite beautiful. The blooms are visited by Ruby-throated Hummingbirds searching, no doubt, for small insects. It’s all very idyllic, calm and peaceful until that is, the dominant male appears and violently chases the females and immature hummingbirds away. 
It strikes me that the natural world is not the peaceful idyllic place that we think that it is. Instead, it is a place of constant struggle for survival, a place where there can be no peace, where selflessness is completely unknown, and I think to myself that it’s much like the world that we humans occupy, a world visited by war, and never ending conflict fuelled by a belief in the supernatural in the guise of religion. Are we humans really that pitiful that we can’t see the beauty in this place that we call earth? Are we are really so pitiful that we're unable to appreciate the miracle that we call life? There is so much that we could do were we to work together to make this planet a paradise. But, I suppose that this is not to be our destiny. Many of us have have been taught to believe that there is a better place, and in the rush to ascend to this better world we’re hell bent upon destroying this world for a chance to live in what might be described as a mythical world. I'm sorry, but this strikes me as being somewhat insane. Just how could there be a better world? Were we to give this world, our home, the appreciation and attention that it deserves it could easily become the paradise that we so eagerly seek.

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There exists countless natural places in our world where peace and solitude can be enjoyed. One of these places is Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario, Canada. Over the years I've escaped the hustle and bustle of my day to day reality with visits to this park, and when I visit I always try to do a bit of sketching to remind me of my visit. We recently managed to get away to Algonquin for a few days, and despite not exactly perfect weather I managed a few sketches: -