Precocious Memories of Small Scale Miracles

Hmmm, is memory simply fickle by nature or do certain moments connect with something primal in us?

Although I hate to admit it, my memory is becoming rather cranky with age. It decides what it does and does not want to record with a will entirely its own. I can be in the car five minutes from home, telling myself not to forget to stop and pick up milk, and still forget to do it. Notes on the table and in my shirt pocket are exercises in futility.

And yet, I can recall certain moments from months of years past with crystal clarity. Etched in mymemory like it was only yesterday…

A Silvery Blue Butterfly. A beautiful specimen perched so cooperatively on the pine needles at Kortright Centre for Conservation. Not the most striking of butterflies. But etched in memory for… the contrasts of soft blue in its wings and vibrant green in the pine needles it rested upon… the subtle blend of background shadow and foreground sunlight… the subtle markings of its feathery antennae…

A Unicorn Clubtail Dragonfly. Found at the back end of Ken Whellan Resource Management Area on a trail not much used. Not an uncommon sighting. But etched in memory for… Perched so elegantly on a bent stem of grass at the edge of the stream… Intersecting curves of grass stems arching over it as if in worship… Bulging green eyes, clubbed tail and clear wings with fine filaments of black…

A Hickory Hairstreak Butterfly. Awaiting me at Pinery Provincial Park on the shores of Lake Huron. Etched in memory for… the mere fact it is so seldom seen… the thin but graceful spot band arching across the wings… faint blue spot enclosed by orange chevrons… cluster of broad green leaves like hands bent in prayer…

A Giant Swallowtail Butterfly. One of hundreds on Pelee Island in August. Etched in memory for… the flash of sun-yellow against silky black… graceful perfection of its curving, white fringed wings… the peacefulness of its nonchalant pose at the edge of a woodlot…

These precocious memories will never leave me. They will always be within reach when I need to calm my troubled mind. My memory, it seems, is partial to metaphors. For each of these creatures is an indisputable metaphor for the wonder and beauty that exists in nature's boundless inventory of small scale miracles. So easily overlooked, but so unforgettable when once we behold them.

~ Michael Robert Dyet is the author of "Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel" – double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael's website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog .

~ Subscribe to "Michael's Metaphors of Life Journal aka Things That Make Me Go Hmmm" at its' internet home www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog2 . Instructions for subscribing are provided in the "Subscribe to this Blog: How To" instructions page in the right sidebar. If you're reading this post on another social networking site, come back regularly to my page for

postings once a week.

~ Send comments or questions to michael@mdyetmetaphor.com .