Found Objects

When I walk with my girls at Dog Park, I tend to look down a lot. What do I see? Mostly the things you expect: turds, dirt, rocks, trash, mysterious holes, sticks, and dead creatures—birds, frogs, mice, or snakes. (Tho' yesterday, I stepped on the tail of a very live snake. I shrieked like a girl and hopped in the air. So did the snake.) In spring, of course, there are the wildflowers. Sometimes, though, I find more durable treasures—unusual objects or ordinary objects that strike me as beautiful. Last week, I found several broken strands of barbed wire and a button torn from a thick canvas jacket or trousers. Years ago, while wandering in the creek bed along the trail, I found (and lugged home) a chunk of limestone with a perfect imprint of a shell. Here they are: 

These objects remind me of just how the natural and human worlds intersect at Dog Park. People try to cordon things off with wire and hold things in place with buttons, and yet wire breaks and buttons tear off. And where do they land? On the ground, next to the rocks and all the rest. 

--z