keep an eye out
Feb. 3rd, 2011 02:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliThe hills are all frosted with white -- you can see the brown beneath, because the white stems from the freezing rain still clinging to the branches. And it's amazing how colorlessly clear icicles can form, though others are cloudy with air bubbles, sometimes large enough to be seen, and both can have marvelous stalactite forms. . . .
It pays to keep an eye out for that sort of thing. To watch the succession of plants that sprout in the spring, to keep track of the blossoming times of flowers, to go for hikes and get a good look at what a forest looks like, to watch sunsets and moonrises, to see things by moonlight alone. . . .
The last of those I pulled off once but it was real trick. Light pollution is just about ubiquitous, so I kept looking for a long time. And one day, I was actually in a suburban home, but the trees were sheltering it from the streetlights, so I actually saw that everything does look gray by moonlight. (It's an odd sensation when you know what color something is, and it teases you with the belief that you are seeing it.) And getting an eyeball on the Milky Way is even harder.
Moonrises help you keep straight where the moon is when it is full, crescent, etc. And a look at the enormous brazen moon that rises over the horizon. . . . .
OTOH, there is the temptation to include readers to the passage of time by succession of seasons, or by the phases of the moon. This can lead to problems if your readers can't pick up on them. Writing is full of tradeoffs.
It pays to keep an eye out for that sort of thing. To watch the succession of plants that sprout in the spring, to keep track of the blossoming times of flowers, to go for hikes and get a good look at what a forest looks like, to watch sunsets and moonrises, to see things by moonlight alone. . . .
The last of those I pulled off once but it was real trick. Light pollution is just about ubiquitous, so I kept looking for a long time. And one day, I was actually in a suburban home, but the trees were sheltering it from the streetlights, so I actually saw that everything does look gray by moonlight. (It's an odd sensation when you know what color something is, and it teases you with the belief that you are seeing it.) And getting an eyeball on the Milky Way is even harder.
Moonrises help you keep straight where the moon is when it is full, crescent, etc. And a look at the enormous brazen moon that rises over the horizon. . . . .
OTOH, there is the temptation to include readers to the passage of time by succession of seasons, or by the phases of the moon. This can lead to problems if your readers can't pick up on them. Writing is full of tradeoffs.
Re: nature is present
Date: 2011-02-04 03:53 pm (UTC)