COLLECTION

feathers - Greeley, CO | wooden spools - amish colony in Iowa |  mini pine cones - Garibaldi, BC | weather worn stones - Cape Elizabeth, ME

I have collected all kinds of things since I was a little girl. I would search for sticks, feathers, buttons, leaves, stamps or anything else that had a cool texture or pattern to it. My favorite though, were feathers. I always found it so fascinating how each little thread had a different color, and how together they made stripes, dots, or zigzag patterns. My mom would was never very thrilled about me finding feathers (she thought I may catch a disease or something,) but I felt that I was lucky every time I found a feather. It was like a bird had left me a trace of its presence to make me wonder where it had flown to next. I loved holding my treasures up to the sky to see how the sun could make them glow as glimmers of light slipped between the tiny stands. 

Now and then when I find a feather, I am reminded of when I was little. 

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
 -Emily Dickinson