The Beauty of Perspective

A couple weeks ago I hurried inside to grab my iPhone so I could get a picture of one of the animals doing something funny or adorable, a normal thing I do quite often I confess. Unfortunately, right after taking the photo, I set said phone on top of a slanted rabbit cage and walked away. I am sure my thought was to complete whatever task I had been doing before I had been distracted by a silly farm animal a moment before and then come right back. I don’t know how long it took before it hit me, the stop dead in your tracks, gut clenching realization that I had done something really stupid. I ran back to where I had left my phone to see it lying screen down on the rocks where it had fallen.

For a just a split second I held on to the hope it could possibly be unscathed and reached down to retrieve it. Oh but there it was, the inevitable consequence of my lapse in good judgment: a spiderweb configuration of cracked glass across my screen. A deep sigh escaped from the pit of my being and then came the stages of grief in quick waves of anger, denial, and acceptance. It is an annoyance to be sure when something we use so often is lost or damaged but when it is the result of  carelessness there is a distinct saltiness added to the wound.

It has been my nature to steam roll through things in the past, to rush and get things done. In setting my mind towards being productive I have missed so much along the way. When I decided to document here the experiment of following my dream, I purposed to slow down and pay attention to the details. I don’t enjoy failure, but I am learning there is a beauty in the perspective you can gain from it. A few days after my phone incident as I was waiting (somewhat patiently) in our truck for the windows to defrost, the warmth of the sun created a familiar cracked pattern to cross my view. I captured this photo of the cracked ice window with my shattered phone to remind myself that the right perspective can reveal to us, the true beauty in our lives.