Illustrations of Summer
“Back in the day, when butterflies used to be everywhere…”
“Back in the day? That sounds like we’re old!”
“It wasn’t that long ago, was it?
“All the worse…”
A recent conversation with a fellow photographer. He and I, and probably many others, grew up seeing butterflies as flying facts of summer. They danced from flower to flower and, if you were lucky, one might even land gently on your arm.
Butterflies illustrated cheerful summer days. They belonged with warm air mattresses and cool lemonade, with ripe figs and barefoot sprinkler dancing. They colored our childhood summers. And we never questioned it.
Symbol of good
But imagine… …that you’d never seen a butterfly in your life. Never even heard of one.
One bright summer day, something flutters by. Not a bird, not a drone, not a paper kite. Though its wings look as delicate as one. These wings are painted in the most dazzling patterns. The little flapper has eyes and legs. It’s alive! And it hops from flower to flower with effortless grace, like fluttered straight out of a fairy-tale. It breaks nothing. Doesn’t pollute. It simply is. A living symbol of all that is gentle and good in the world.
Now imagine that this seemingly fragile being with “paper wings” is able to fly for thousands of miles, even crossing oceans. Vulnerability and power wrapped in one miraculous package. If someone invented such a creature, you’d call it impossible.
And now imagine it lays this tiny egg. From it hatches a strange little creature that can barely walk normally, let alone fly. It bundles itself up, again and again, growing a little each time. And then one day, it wraps itself tightly for a final time. It hangs motionless, until The Day.
The cocoon that seemed to hang lifelessly for days begins to wobble, and a crumpled ball squeezes out and slowly unfolds into one of the most astonishing beings ever!
What a miracle that would be!
What a miracle that is!
And just imagine… That one day you wake up in a butterfly-free world. Your lemonade tastes the same, but something’s missing. Summers pass. And when your children or grandchildren ask about those magical winged beings, you tell them stories:
How beautiful they were. How fragile, how strong, how magical.
And how they’re no longer here.
But luckily, we still have the photos…
Read about my Hummingbird Hawk-Moth encounter in Nature’s Flying Illusion
