Seeing

Last weekend Hubby and I went on a long walk. A walk made longer by the heat (we went at lunchtime) and the fact that Hubby is sloooooow. He looks at everything. It's like going into the world with ET or a toddler. It always bugs me at first. Come on, come on, come on, I think. But this time eventually I accepted and slowed down too. And instead of seeingeverythingflashbymelikethis, I saw crabapples and oak leaves and bubble gum hyssop and red roses and old cars.

Then I came home and read this:

To really see something is to let yourself move beyond the narrow place of words and into a 360-degree kind of noticing, an act which, if done correctly, temporarily takes up all of a person, and utilizes much more than the eyes--utilizes, for example, the heart and the soul.

It's from Elizabeth Berg's Escaping into the Open: the Art of Writing True. A reminder that I have a lot to learn as a person and as a writer.