Bragi Halldorsson
It rained last night. And in the early morning, the sun was low in the sky, cloudy and raindrops everywhere. They were hanging from the branches of the trees, moving slowly down the windshield of my car, drops on everything. Even a drop on the nose of my cat when he came in from the night’s hunt.
I love raindrops. Especially when it’s not windy or nosy and this morning was both calm and quiet. I could even hear the drops dripping all around me, drip, drop, drip, drop.
So I took a slow morning walk whit my camera, strolling along the beach of my bay looking at every drop, hunting for the right one to take home whit me.
Then one raindrop caught my eyes. This one. Hanging from a railing, so still, didn’t look like it was in the mood for letting go for a while. This moment called for a close-up, no, macro, but not fly eye macro, just close enough to get to know him. I looked at him for quite a while. He harbored all the bay within himself and reflected the houses surrounding it. This was my drop; I was going to take it home with me. So back I went, in the quiet of the morning, listening to the drip, drop, of last night raindrops. So happy whit “my” drop. This drop.
Then it began to rain.
Enjoyed seeing your photo. The backstory on finding this drop was neat to read and your clever, thought-provoking turn of phrase on it is a reminder that every part contains something of the whole.
Thank you, Robert! I try my best to write as good as I can, but English is not my native language, so I’m very pleased if you like it.
You are doing quite well with English, and the fact that you display a teachable spirit means you will only improve. Though we are not fluent in another language we always enjoy hearing other languages and accents. Reading the interpretations of English from others online is always fun, and often insightful. It makes me think about how I use my own language, both spoken and written. It is possible to travel from one region of America to another and not be able to understand the accents used, which is something to be enjoyed but it’s too bad everyone does not. :- )
Amazing photo and awesome background story. 🙂
Thank you so much, Zaklina!
I liked the macro picture of this drop of rain, and the story is very interesting to you
Thank you, Branka! It always makes me happy when people like my work.
What a beautiful story about this little macro rain drop.
This is what I tell so many people, to enjoy the little things!
And it is what I love so much about macro photography.
Most of these types of things go unnoticed.
Thank you, Carol! I love macro photographing because I love the small. And often you can find a whole world in the small.
You found the perfect one I will agree. The story is well worth the read, and I also learned a lot from the comments, and it makes me grin as my boss was always needing help with the English translation to Icelandic Language. Your personality really comes through, great job.
Thank you very much, Kim! And yes, the Icelandic languish is not the easiest one so I understand your boss perfectly : )
lol, I love the sound of your language. It makes me smile, and I can now pick it out in a crowd. Grins. I overheard a couple and their small children the other day at one of our major tourist attractions. They were just behind me. I turned around and said, “Iceland?” lol they smiled and said yes yes, how did you know?
Beautiful image and I learned a lot from the conversation between you and Norman. Good luck with all your endeavors.
Thank you! Yes, I’m so dem unlucky to have never been able to learn to write English because I’m dyslexic. But I can speak it OK, and today I write using all the computer add I can, be it Goole Translate (which is no good reely, well, for some things it’s OK) dictionaries and Grammarly especially. But being a writer/poet and a draftsman in Iceland, I want to be able to get my work out into the world and I cant do that in any other way except being able to write in Englis. I have “bombard” Norman, bout on this site, as well as others, because our way has crossed on few more than this one. And I’m going to get it! Dyslectic ore not. I beat it in Icelandic, and today my main work is making Crosswords : ) Who would ever think that someone dyslectic could do that? Nobody, but I made it, and today after nine years making them I’m considered one of the best in Iceland. So, next it is the Englis, and get my books out ther : )
Great macro, Bragi, and a wonderful little anecdote! In a sense the photo would be enough, but your back-story adds a lot to our experience of it. And I must congratulate you on that masterful phrase, “He harbored all the bay within himself” – magic 🙂
Thank you, Norman! I have been looking for the right English word for “very short story,” called “örsaga” in Icelandic” because that is a story form I have been using a lot and have published few small books where I putt together text and pictures that form a whole story, in the end, if you get too reed the pictures as a part of the text, like text, picture, text then picture again. And I like to be able to do that in English as well, at least so people can understand it, even tho I will hardly ever be able to write them in English like a native. But whit a good proofreading I think it could be good enough because they are so short. I came across the word “anecdote.” Can I use it for stories like this one? The dictionary says that it’s mostly used for jokes but also for little tails, usually from real life that doesn’t necessarily have to be funny.
I’m trying hard to get a grip on English and “He harbored all the bay within himself” took my about half an hour to come up whit. That you are pleased whit it, then I sure I am!
I don;t know whether the gentle word-play was intended, in using the verb ‘to harbour’ which is a homonym for a noun (höfn) related to ‘bay’. Masterful.
From Wikipedia, I learn that örsaga is a British invention and must contain exactly 50 words. That’s just a couple of sentences. Is that what you’ve been writing, or is it more like what one might expect from the word ‘mini-saga’?
Kawabata published a collection of very short stories under the title (in English translation) ‘Palm of the Hand Stories’, but they are longer than örsaga, being about a page long, each one.
The nearest thing, in way, to what you seem to be describing is haibun, which is (usually short) prose in haikai style. The tendency in modern English haibun has been to write very short prose with a haiku attached, but that is not necessary. Take a look at some of the work published here: http://contemporaryhaibunonline.com/
I suspect that ‘anecdote’ has some specific connotations which are not necessarily what you are writing. It has a suggestion of pithy, wry humour.
This sentence was intended to be a wordplay. I use it a lot in my Icelandic writing. Örsaga in Iceland have been used for “very short stories,” usually about half to one page long in an A5 book, but also short as two sentences as you describe it but to my knowledge not striated down to 50 words. My writing is not always like this text here, it is usually more lyrical and “prose” is what I and others have used to call it. Could I use the name “prose,” for writing text like this one and if I were making a book, whit text, and pictures linked together, then in a plural, proses. To describe my books, I have used on the cover something like “Story told in proses and picturs,” or just using text instead of proses.
To show you an example how my works, that I have made in Icelandic and want to be able to either get into Englis, or what I mostly like to do, be able to write in Englis because I want to make something new, not translate the old.
I put in an old story, “THE TOWER — story in three prose poems and pictures,” that I published long ago in Icelandic. I wrote it in what we can call a biblical style and one of the best translator in Iceland, an Englishman, translated it for me. He loved to do it and I had to pay him very little for the translation because, as he said, his “bible” was the King James Bible. Meaning Englis before the King James Bible and after. And he translated it into this same biblical style like it would have been written before King James Bible.
I could newer ewer write a text like this in Englis, and not planning to, because today I write differently. More like this text here, small everyday snapshots from life, but hide in them what I’m really saying. Well, not this text here, there is no significant meaning in it, but my little wordplay is an example of how I’m working now.
The post is still in pending, but hopefully, they will let it thru today. But for some reason unknown to me sometimes my posts don’t get thru until the day after I post them. But, well, we see. I would appreciate if you would read the story and tel my how you think I should presents work like this. That is wath I should call it. “Prose poems and pictures” ? I’m begining to think that would be the right name.