One tree against an endless sky

Touch the sky, sort of
London, ON
April 2026
This photo originally shared on Instagram

Every photographer keeps a mental list of themes they’d like to shoot, scenes that they’ll return to again and again for reasons that aren’t always explainable.

I’m no exception. And one of my go-to themes is somewhat simple: single trees in the middle of nowhere.

It doesn’t matter where I am or what I’m up to, but I’ll happily stop what I’m doing if I come across a particularly fetching example.

Which explains how the dog and I found ourselves in the middle of a park last night staring at this one.

Strangers gave us weird looks as I crouched down at the bottom of a gentle hill and composed against the twilight sky.

The end result was far from perfect, as a pesky stand of trees on the distant horizon insinuated itself into the frame. But I decided to share this one as a reminder to myself to keep looking for scenes just like this.

I’d like to imagine that we return to the things that bring us quiet comfort, that offer familiarity amid lives that often seem devoid of it. I’d like to imagine there’s a certain kind of grace to be had by immersing ourselves, even temporarily, in scenes and places that ask nothing more from us than a little attention.

So we meander through the wet grass in search of them, not because we especially needed another picture of another tree, but because we couldn’t miss an opportunity to feel something.

It’s why the stories of the everyday, simple as they may seem at first glance, matter as much as they do.

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