Timing is everything.
I headed to the Presby Memorial Iris Gardens ( http://presbyiris.tripod.com/ ) in Montclair, New Jersey, in hopes of capturing a field of thousands of irises, which are my favorite.
I remember the day several years back when I was riding mountain bikes with my buddy Eric in Colorado. We had climbed about 1500 feet of steep hiking trail on our bikes. Just as the steepness leveled out, I found myself in a sea of wild irises. It started to rain but that didn't matter. I was standing there alone (Eric was much stronger and therefore about a billion miles ahead of me by then). The experience was burned into my soul.
Unfortunately, it has been a little cool this season and the flowers have decided to take their time. There were very few in bloom. So, I crept down low to capture some of the isolated flowers against the blue sky. I will try to return in a week or two when the flowers have had time to awaken...in hopes of reliving that moment from a few years back when nature offered a generous gift to me in that Colorado field...a gift that still carries me along in my life as I hold the memory in my soul.