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“This life is yours. Take the power to choose what you want to do and do it well. Take the power to love what you want in life and love it honestly. Take the power to walk in the forest and be a part of nature. Take the power to control your own life. No one else can do it for you. Take the power to make your life happy.” ― Susan… Read More
“Where’d the days go, when all we did was play? And the stress that we were under wasn’t stress at all just a run and a jump into a harmless fall” ― Paolo Nutini While travelling the Peterson Road outside of Maynooth, Ontario this past weekend, I stopped along the road to make some photos of a roadside lake, a swamp, and some local wildflowers. As I stood on the roadside, a… Read More
“Light can be both friend and foe, too much or too little and the full story is not told, overexposed or unseen, parts are missing. Balance, deliberate balance of light, is the way to see the true scene. Our eyes are designed to create that balance, humans are created for balance, and I try to imitate that through my images. – Ed Lehming Still on the topic of ‘The Gut” Conservation area, near Apsley, Ontario. I had… Read More
“The whole point of getting engrossed in something that interests you, is that you dissolve into it, the more the intensity…the more you become vapour – you dissolve. In fact, there is no you to judge, to see… only emptiness within, that is the whole purpose of life… at least my life!” ― Ramana Pemmaraju Above, is another photo of “The Gut”, a location mentioned in an earlier post. This time, looking… Read More
“We don’t realize that, somewhere within us all, there does exist a supreme self who is eternally at peace.” ― Elizabeth Gilbert My wife and I discovered this magical place a few years ago on a “fall colours” tour of the area where we spend our summers. I was following the local waterways, looking for a few named waterfalls when I came across this place, who’s location I will not divulge. The… Read More
“All in all, it was a never-to-be-forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life, but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers which, in a fortunate combination of delightful weather, delightful friends and delightful doing, come as near to perfection as anything can come in this world.” ― L.M. Montgomery My final memory of an extended weekend away is… Read More
“There is a hidden message in every waterfall. It says, if you are flexible, falling will not hurt you!” ― Mehmet Murat ildan As many of you who follow my blog might know, I love moving water and waterfalls. A few years ago, I set out to discover and document the many waterfalls and cascades in the area where I camp. My journeys have taken me down some long, little travelled trails,… Read More
“Dawn was breaking over the horizon, shell pink and faintly gold…” ― J.K. Rowling Today, I move away from flowers and a brief view of my morning. I woke up to a slight orange glow through the camper window and the cry of a loon on the lake. The quintessential Northern Ontario experience. I grabbing my gear, I headed down to the dock. Mist danced over the water’s surface, barely a ripple… Read More
“If you will stay close to nature, to its simplicity, to the small things hardly noticeable, those things can unexpectedly become great and immeasurable.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke Just east of Bancroft, Ontario is a north-south connector road known as Boulter Road, which, naturally takes you to, and through, the small town of Boulter. The road travels north from McArthur Mills and offers spectacular views of the high rolling hills so typical… Read More
“When we tug at a single thing in nature, we find it attached to the rest of the world.” ― John Muir I’ve spent a lot of time of the trails this year, watching the earth grow greener with every passing day. The brown forest floor literally exploded with life, which kept expanding,growing, thriving and eventually blossoming with flowers, providing beauty for me and nectar for bees and butterflies. The forest has… Read More
“She is free in her wildness, she is a wanderess, a drop of free water. She knows nothing of borders and cares nothing for rules or customs. ‘Time’ for her isn’t something to fight against. Her life flows clean, with passion, like fresh water.” ― Roman Payne This week’s submission to Norm 2.0‘s Thursday Doors. Thursday Doors is a weekly feature allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favourite… Read More
“The river moved so swiftly and yet it had no purpose other than to flow, just flow.” ― Gioconda Belli During a recent backcountry drive, I tried to retrace my route to a little gem of a park I found a few years back. There is no road sign identifying the park, just an unmarked road that leads to a beautiful groomed park on the shores of Papineau Creek, near Maynooth, Ontario…. Read More
“Writing is something you do alone. Its a profession for introverts who want to tell you a story but don’t want to make eye contact while doing it.” ― John Green This must be the most photographed tree in Markham, a community just south of my home. This oak stands at the top of a convenient mound, nicely isolating the tree from any distracting background. It’s not a true ‘solitaire’ by my… Read More
“While there is perhaps a province in which the photograph can tell us nothing more than what we see with our own eyes, there is another in which it proves to us how little our eyes permit us to see.” ― Dorothea Lange I find myself working with photos that did not quite communicate my vision as intended. I see so much more in my composition, but struggle to articulate just what… Read More
“Some beautiful paths can’t be discovered without getting lost.” ― Erol Ozan Back to Slabtown, who’s only claim to fame, at present, seems to be the bridge that crosses the York River. In days gone by, it must have been a thriving mill town. Today, not so much. At this point in the river’s journey, it has just passed through the Great Bend. A long, fairly slow flowing section of the river…. Read More
“When someone you love says goodbye you can stare long and hard at the door they closed and forget to see all the doors God has open in front of you.” ― Shannon L. Alder This week’s submission to Norm 2.0‘s Thursday Doors. Thursday Doors is a weekly feature allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favorite door photos from around the world The image above is of yet… Read More
“Until a seed falls to the ground and dies, it does not become a tree that later yields many fruits and multitude of seeds. We must embrace the thought of death for us to have greater lives.” ― Sunday Adelaja We used to call these ‘giant dandelions’ as kids. Why not, they certainly look like dandelions, even the blossoms look like overgrown dandelions. The Goat’s Beard seed head, looks like a gigantic… Read More
“God draws near to the brokenhearted. He leans toward those who are suffering. He knows what it feels like to be wounded and abandoned.” ― John D. Richardson A scene from along the roadside in rural Ontario. When I see stuff like this , I wonder what the story is. How did this old car get to its final resting spot under the canopy of the ancient maple. Did it just die… Read More
“I thought how lovely and how strange a river is. A river is a river, always there, and yet the water flowing through it is never the same water and is never still. It’s always changing and is always on the move. And over time the river itself changes too. It widens and deepens as it rubs and scours, gnaws and kneads, eats and bores its way through the land.” ― Aidan… Read More
“Then the singing enveloped me. It was furry and resonant, coming from everyone’s very heart. There was no sense of performance or judgment, only that the music was breath and food.” ― Anne Lamott This week’s submission to Norm 2.0‘s Thursday Doors. Thursday Doors is a weekly feature allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favorite door photos from around the world The image above is of the old… Read More
“A lie has many colours, while white is the only faithful colour of truth.” ― Munia Khan This year has been an interesting shift for me, photographically. I tend to lean towards natural places, such as forest trails, rivers, and lakes. This year I’m finding myself also taking in more man-made gardens and cultivated flowers. Perhaps this is because I’ve been spending more time in my own backyard and going to botanical… Read More
“Spring turns to summer and delicate pinks and whites, give way to bright reds, oranges, and yellows, as nature shifts her palette to match the temperature” – Ed Lehming Today’s photo is another attempt to understand and enjoy the world of macro photography. The bright Orange Hawkweed (Pilosella aurantiaca) is a smallish meadow flower that is common in this area through June and July. It blooms a few weeks later than it’s yellow relative,… Read More
“Do not let your difficulties fill you with anxiety, after all it is only in the darkest nights that stars shine more brightly.” ― Hazrat Ali Ibn Abu-Talib A.S Hmm, this sounds like the title for a love story involving some damsel and some adversary. This single daisy shone like a beacon in the distance, against the dark forest, as I turned a bend in the trail a few days ago. It… Read More
“Many collectors died in the process of searching for new species, and despite persistent reports that the men died from drowning, gunshot and knife wounds, snakebite, trampling by cattle, or blows in the head with blunt instruments, it is generally accepted that in each case the primary cause of death was orchid fever.” ― Eric Hansen Perhaps I got a touch of the aforementioned ‘orchid fever’. I have to admit, I’ve been… Read More
“A garden should make you feel you’ve entered privileged space — a place not just set apart but reverberant — and it seems to me that, to achieve this, the gardener must put some kind of twist on the existing landscape, turn its prose into something nearer poetry.” ― Michael Pollan A change of pace from all my recent flower and butterfly photos, though if you look closely, there are still flowers… Read More
“I must have flowers, always, and always.” ― Claude Monet This strange, flowering bush has fascinated me for some time. The blossoms form from the outside of the flower disc. I had a hard time finding good specimen this year but the photo above should suffice. The central bud clusters are rimmed with beautiful white blossoms. At first glance it would appear to be a form of dogwood, that is till you get… Read More
This week’s submission to Norm 2.0‘s Thursday Doors. These doors can be found in Toronto’s Distillery District. All the doors in this area are painted the same green colour to match the period when the buildings were part of the Gooderham and Worts Distillery. I posted another door from this wonderful historic district last week. This door belongs to a great local restaurant and once led to the distillery’s shipping room. If you are ever… Read More
“Butterflies are self propelled flowers.” ― Robert A. Heinlein Butterflies are summer to me and I just love the Robert Heinlein quote above. As the air warms, I see more and more of them darting around on the air. They seem to come in all sizes and colours and tend to be a bit elusive when it comes time to photograph them. They sit wonderfully still, till it’s time to release the… Read More
“Despite its dark veins, the transparency of dragonfly’s wings assures me of a pure, innocent world” ― Munia Khan Ah, warm weather walks. As plants grow taller and spread across the forest floors, their insect companions abound and show in ever increasing displays of colour and variety. Some are tougher to photograph than others. This female emerald jewelwing, with her distinctive black body and white wing spots, is fairly common around here, but they… Read More
“The world is a beautiful place, you just don’t see it all the time.” ― Phil Mitchell I generally go to Lynde Shores to photograph birds or make lakeshore images. When I approached the viewing platform, I saw a bunch of ducks taking off and surveyed several trees filled with noisy, smelly, cormorants. As I stood there, movement from the corner of my eye attracted my attention. Here’s what I saw: a yearling fawn,… Read More
Ed Lehming Photography 
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