VPID 05 (null) - Flight

Today I walked under overcast sky's. The air was warm and a very slight breeze pushed me up the hill that is 12th Street. I noticed something white in my peripheral vision and glanced to my right to see an absolutely white feather floating in the gentle air. What was interesting was that it perfectly paralleled my motion. It moved in perfect time to my steps. A tree planted in the median between the sidewalk and the street inserted itself between that small white bit of bird and myself. The feather reappeared once I had passed the leafy barrier, and continued unabated matching my movement step for step. Very slowly it began to lose altitude, and then incrementally it sped ahead until finally it settled to earth directly at my feet just as I stopped to watch for cars at the intersecting avenue. With a smile I stepped into the newly envisioned world that now appeared before me. Sometimes the smallest things have the most impact on me. Ah life.

VPID 04 (null) - Ocean Going Swans

Brighton Beach, New York - I'm in the water, which is warm/cold - looking out to the flat ocean surface, and I spy what seems at first glance to be a couple of outrageously ornate ships - far in the distance. However, when I focus more directly through the slight swells of the water I see that this apparition is only at most a hundred yards or so from my location, and these are not ships at all. Rather they are two swans swimming, with a purpose, toward the North away from Cony Island. Stunned, I felt it necessary to run up to the shore to share my vision with Georgina, possibly to assure myself that this was not some visitation of a far too active imagination, and possibly just to be able to share this highly unusual sight on the Atlantic shore. Swans simply do not swim on the ocean, or they never did before, yet now after all the evidence is in - they've decided to conquer new waters.

VPID 1027

Let's face it, you're a pretty big guy: well-muscled I mean to say, sitting on the bench amidst the trees of the park. A basketball sits nearby ready for action. Perhaps you've already played today, or perhaps you're waiting for the game to begin. But, your mind right now is not on the court. Instead all of your attention is focused on the small girl-child (maybe 18 months? - tiny really) who's decided that you are the center of her world. She has just handed you something (I cannot tell what), and whatever it is has brought a smile to your face. That smile is a reciprocal gift delivered into her world without reservation. Now your worlds are fully connected. This is a moment of true communication between equals. I cannot know if the two of you are related, nor if you have ever before encountered one another. A woman, whom I take to be the child's mother, looks on appreciatively with a smile on her own face. Her smile is quiet, filled with pride and warmly peaceful. The sun shines brightly in the blue sky filtering through the trees, and joy fills the slightly humid air.

VPID Null 03 - Baby Birds

It's the nature of things that most often catches my attention, perhaps that, more than other thing on earth. Today I watched two baby birds, no longer nest bound, following their mother about on the grass growing between towering sunflowers. What got me caught up in their chirping excitement was that the mother was picking up various bits of food from the ground and feeding it to each of them in turn. Each of the babies fluttered their wings pushing them back in demonstrations of gratitude. Then they'd gobble down the morsel and dutifully hop and/or flit off in whatever direction mom went. Truthfully, I've never before noticed this behavior in the past. I thought that the chicks dropping like stones from the nest were destined to go it alone, to sink or fly as it were. Now I know better: chicks, like children, need nurturing far beyond that moment when they step into the world... free as birds.