Park walk

At the little park beside the river - Nine things you can't do here:

Drink alcohol, play golf, set a fire;

ride a quad, ski mobile, motorcycle or car on the path;

litter; or let your dog poop on the grass.
Okay to fish, or take your mutt for a romp down the hill, though.

[Click on photos to enlarge]
 

 

Reflections in the water of bushes and sky

Same photo, different perspective -

two sides to every story

 Water spirits

mirrors

______________

Photos taken yesterday with my Olympus SZ-14 digital pocket camera.  I played around with the color options on the last photo via Picasa.    Photo #14 is a cropped, lightened, upside-down version of Photo #4.  All other photos are as originally taken, except for rotating or re-sizing.

People, sculpted

 
 "Blessed be the Lord, my God, who disposes my arm to war,
my hands at combat", " Ps 143.

 

One's hands in prayer, one's hands at the ready, for combat

[on plaque behind the figures, the words "à  la guerre ... mes mains au combat, Psalm. 143"]

". . . aux pauvres", Luc 4-18 , preaching to the poor

These sculptures form part of a monument, erected in 1926, to Bishop Louis-François Richer Laflèche (1818-1898) on rue Bonaventure, beside the cathedral across from Parc Champlain in Trois-Rivières, Québec.   [Photos taken with an Olympus SZ-14 pocket camera, during a trip to the public library downtown, April 7, 2013.]

For an interesting (and more detailed) bio on Monsigneur Laflèche, go here.  Son of a farmer,  this  ultra-conservative Catholic clergyman, who traveled the Prairies evangelizing the natives,  hunted buffalo with the Metis, taught math and philosophy to schoolboys, saved his parish from bankruptcy by succeeding to wipe out its debt, was actively engaged in politics, and lectured on nationalism.   Laflèche served as a bishop for 27 years.  

Cropping segments from a group photo to individualize its participants, observing the expressions in their chiseled eyes, wondering what it must have been like to live here then.  Sometimes when you write, paint,  sculpt or photograph  a thing, and return to look more closely at it later,  the words or images or objects come to life in ways you never imagined.  This happened for me when I spent some time really looking at each of these sculpted faces. What would they say if they could talk, I wonder, as pedestrians stroll by, oblivious, as pigeons shit on their heads; the eloquent, impassioned discourses of their bishop aging in some paper or digital archive.  Who were the models for these statues?  What is their story?

 what's left are things . . .

A people comes . . .  a people goes

maps change, wars stay, 

but all the woes  can't cloud the joys

that love still brings

of Life! despite 
what's left are things

  

Or something like that.  Thank you for visiting this little impromptu photo gallery.   I almost didn't take my camera that day.  Am so glad I did.