I take my phone and head out for a walk around the lake with the pup.

The air is cool. The wind is high. The sun is radiant.

The pup runs back and forth on the trail. He follows his nose into the woods here, up a hill there. Every so often, he comes to check on me. Every so often, he makes his way to the water for a long cool drink.

I see red, orange, yellow, green, brown. I hear a plop-plop-plop as turtles flop from their perch – tree roots that extend out into the water – into the lake. I smell autumn (I never know how to describe the smell of autumn, but the woods in autumn have their own particular smell). I taste the bitter-sweet flavor of vinegar-honey-water (my occasional breakfast drink) on my tongue. I feel the wild liveliness inspired by the chill and the trees as well as the playful curiosity that my camera inspires.

While I mean to walk around the lake, I find myself mesmerized by the leaves.

I sit or stand in front of first one tree, then another, then another. Watching, with camera and eye, the brisk lively dance of the leaves, the pause between each movement an adagio. Watching, with camera and eye, the play of the light as it sparkles and shimmers through the trees.

It is almost like nature is having one last glorious hurrah before the onset of winter.

As I sit, watching the leaves blow to and fro, I find myself wondering if the purpose of photography, of art, of any practice, is this: to slow us down enough to to see something, to really see something, like we are seeing it for the very first time; and to remind us that life is a collection of moments, and what seems like one small moment can be a glorious and exquisite gift.