Shadow and light.
I captured this image while walking in the Pukenui Forest in Te Kamō. I’d been working hard on promoting ‘Julia Eichardt: A Life of Grit and Grace’ and needed a break. Setting out early one morning after dropping the dog off at the sitter, I entered the bush shortly after sunrise. As I wandered down this path, the sun cleared the canopy behind me.
My eye saw a silver tree ahead of me, but my camera caught this – golden light striking the trunk and my shadow, clutching walking poles, superimposed on it.
Shadow and light.
Writing a book is a similar process. I think I know what should come next, but what appears on the page is often quite different to my initial, limited idea. My intuition perceives something different, cleverer, than my tired old brain had mapped out.
The forest is my thinking place, my church, university, and art gallery. It is the place where my imagination is set free.