Wilderness and Beauty
I’ve been in the Wilderness a lot lately, shooting photos for an upcoming book I’m working on for the Emerging Civil War Series. It seems like I’ve been writing about the Wilderness for so long that, almost by rote, I refer to it as “the dark, close wood.”
“It is a region of gloom and the shadow of death,” one soldier said. Another called it “one of the waste places of nature.” Seventy-square miles of second-growth forest, blah, blah, blah. We get the picture: the place was wild and untamed and foreboding. Got it.
For that reason, I’ve tried to see it with fresh eyes this time out. Fall makes that a lot easier, of course, since everything is in full-force color. As it turns out—surprise, surprise—the place doesn’t look so dark and gloomy.
Here are just a couple shots that, I hope, help you appreciate just how beautiful the Wilderness can be.
The first image comes from the Federal Line Trail, and the second image (as well as the inset at the top of the post) come from the Brock Road/Plank Road intersection.
Beautiful photos. I especially like the one with the vibrant colors. Perhaps it could be titled “Harmless Fire In The Wilderness”?
The Wilderness is as gorgeous as you say. The qualification being that when the leaves are full, you can’t really see the undulating terrain and often only a couple feet in front of you…toward dusk, even closing in on you. Then, suddenly you realize the sun sets sooner in The Wilderness.
When the leaves are mostly gone, everything opens up, and we remember how bright the sun can be. It is not so close, not so dark…