It’s autumn now, my favourite season. I love going to the woods especially at this time of the year. For me forests are a perfect place to just wander around and think. I love being surrounded by the silence and I admire the colourful scenery.
During one of my many walks I’ve been thinking; If trees could speak what stories would they tell? If they could remember, how far would they remember? Trees outlive human lives. Trees can last for centuries. Human existence is insignificant (I‘m not talking about the actions of human kind) on the scale of existence of life itself. The planet is 5 billions years old and humans have been around for only (around) 300 thousands years. According to Google an average human’s life is 79 years, which is long enough from our perspective. But from the perspective of a tree or rock it is nothing. What stories would we tell if we could live for centuries? How would we use our time? How much would time be important to us? It is quite beautiful to stop for a while and appreciate being part of this majestic nature, being surrounded by things that are older than us, yet surely they will outlive us. But here and now we share this place together. Nature is greater than us, we are a small fragment of it. Being aware of it makes me feel very respectful towards it and at the same time I feel myself very insignificant. Not in a bad way though, but rather in a modest and accepting way. Humans often strive to be the greatest but sometimes it’s just nice to be grateful instead. Grateful for being here.
I took these photographs in the last couple of months during my wanders through the woods.
Lucie Nechanicka, 2020