Serenity

In my composition class, focusing upon "power shapes", we were assigned a "zen word". We each drew a different secret word from a stack. Mine was "Serenity", as you might have guessed from the title.

We were to meditate on and try to become one with this word throughout the remainder of the class and take a picture that we thought would convey its meaning as we had internalized it. My mind generated many ideas, like throwing a stone into a calm pond and photographing the ripples; something I tried today in our outing at Cantigney Park, Batavia, IL. And setting up a shallow reflective pond in my little studio where I could capture ripples of a Buddha sculpture, etc. You get the idea.

Anyway, I started photographing a sort of gazebo building on the grounds at Cantigney Park, next to the pond, of which I may post pictures later. And I decided to go into it and sit down to rest. Once I got inside, I looked up and decided to move a table away so that I could lie down and shoot up (photos, that is) .

While I was lying there, trying to hold my head up against the view finder, I thought to just let my head lie back on the cold concrete slab.

Then I just let the camera rest on my face, and at that point I relaxed, sighed, and a wave of serentity-feeling washed over me; at least I think that's what it was. And I took the picture. While I hadn't thought of anything like this for my zen word, I decided, based upon the experiential context, I would use it for class.

Do you think this connotes "serenity" to you? Any other comments or suggestions? There is still time; the final class isn't until this Thursday.

Pentax K-5, Tamron 10-24mm at 10mm face-held, 1/125, ISO 560, f/4, crop of 4x5.