Last week, on the lookout for positive images from Paris, I came across something that was both beautiful and sad. Maybe sad is not the right term, maybe melancholic.
I don’t stare at the ground, but keeping a vigilant eye is important as there can be some minor accidents regarding shoes, it has gotten a lot better over the last few years as the fines dog owners have to pay have risen… If you don’t clean up after your dog or carelessly cast away a cigarette bud and get caught the fine is now 68€!
So yes, I do look at the ground, but it is not where I expect to find beautiful things to take pictures of, especially if it is a sidewalk and not inside a park.
What I saw on the ground were chalk like lines that nature had traced around the corpses of dead leaves. Like a proper crime scene, the leaves were gone and the lines still remained.
I smiled and pulled out my phone thinking of the beauty of dead leaves, of comical stories featuring leaf police officers. Leaves have a short life span, after a few months their death is imminent, but it does not seem as if they are mourned much. Or are they? Are those lines proof of nature mourning the dead leaves.
Do you sometimes come across unexpected things on the ground? Do things you see make you wander off into strange stories?
© Solveig Werner 2015. All rights reserved.
Solveig Werner 
My house is filled with strange and beautiful things I have found on the ground. I have to tell myself many times to start looking up a bit or I am going to become hunched over for good one of these days.
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I guess you love looking for seashells and other things. There is a lot of beauty at our feet.
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Yes, one of my best finds was a piece of ambergris on a bed of seaweed. Seashells always…I even get excited about the humble oyster and clam shells.
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Wow. This is beautiful, Solveig, and I love the way you thought about it. It’s different than what most people would think when they see an imprint left behind of a fallen leaf, but it is like a crime scene. (Leaf police. hee hee) I can’t say my mind has ever thought of that, but it’s the contemplation of something outside ourselves that I find most beautiful. Seeing something odd, or out place, throws us off. It makes us think. That’s the beauty of it.
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Thank you Melanie! I think my imagination might have been influenced by current events… I have a bizarre imagination, but I guess that’s why I write.
I do love finding beauty in “strange” places.
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Haha! I think all writers have bizarre imaginations, but there’s nothing wrong with that. It allows us to create strange worlds that fascinate others. ^.^
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I was surprised to see the leaf design still on the sidewalk. It is beautiful. Nature does some wondrous and beautiful things. On my blog, I have a picture of a heart-shaped puddle in the sidewalk where I walk every day. I so love it. Nature is sending us a sign of love. Keep looking for the beauty out there! You will find it in surprising places. Thanks!!
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I did see that post on the heart shaped puddle, and will have to go back to it.
Nature definitely has a lot of beauty and surprises for us. I had never seen leaf imprints like that before, and then realised that they were EVERYWHERE! Well I guess by now they are all gone, it’s been pouring for a few days now…
Thank you for your comment!
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This is so beautiful and melancholic. I’d say that’s the word. Glad you were looking at your feet at the right time!
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Thank you! Sometimes it definitely is positive to look around us and not always look ahead 🙂
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Nice. I would’ve never thought to chalk outline a leaf, but it’s a brilliant idea. Thanks for noticing it and sharing. 🙂
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I have no idea how the lines came to exist, I don’t think they are chalk, more the slow decomposition of the leaf, or the dirt floating in the air (not a reassuring thought…)
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