Ode to Joy

How photographs can uplift and make you smile

This week’s post is about joy - and let’s face it, we all need some of that now. If you feel guilty experiencing joy amidst the world’s chaos, don’t. Joy creates hope and hope is what we all need to sustain us through the challenges we face.

Let me share some joy I had several years ago. I was leading a photo tour, and we were traveling down British Columbia’s Inside Passage - from Johnstone Strait all the way down, eventually ending in Friday Harbor area of Washington. One day, the waters were glassy calm, and we were gliding along as if on a mirror. I was thrilled about that, because it was sublimely beautiful for photographs; but suddenly, the water erupted in splashes and glimpses of marine life here and there - about a dozen Pacific White-sided dolphins all around us!

Dolphins are very playful, and they love to ride the bow wake. Mind you we were not a fast boat, maybe 12 knots (I really can’t recall, but it wasn’t fast!) but apparently we were the only boat around, so they decided we would do. In the gallery below, you can see various situations in which we saw and photographed them. The surface being so calm allowed us to see below the surface, which was amazing; they rolled on their sides to look up at us through the watery filter. I wondered what we must look like to them?

They criss-crossed over each other, playfully fighting for the one closest to the boat where the wake was the strongest. They would have to breathe of course, so they would speed to the surface like a bullet and gulp air before diving again, barely breaking the surface to get that air. It would happen so fast that to try and capture that moment when they broke the surface was near impossible, but we tried! Sometimes, as in the lead photo above, they would simply leap for fun, way out of the water.

We giggled like little kids, the energy of the dolphins being infectious. We tried fast shutter speeds to freeze the motion - and while it would have been fun to use slow shutter speeds too, as an experiment, we were all honestly too caught up in trying to capture sharp images.

Photographs of Pacific white-sided dolphins swimming in clear waters.

Needless to say, we had a blast, an unexpected 45 minutes of sheer joy and laughter. And every time I see these images in my photo library, they bring a big smile to my face, and my spirits are lifted.

One final image - so surreal to see this. I was still standing on the boat, yet as I mentioned the water was so clear and smooth that I was looking down into it, and this dolphin was about to break the surface of the water to breathe. The pressure wake created a white arc above it, and I was lucky enough to be present to click the shutter before it was gone. It was like a halo over this wonderful sentient being, and it took my breath away.

Maya Angelou (or a Canadian greeting card writer, it’s undecided) once said “Life is not measured by the breaths we take but by the moments that take our breath away.” Whoever is the original writer of this line sure created a winner!

I hope that each of you can find some bit of joy this week - it can come in many different ways. When you do, hold on to it, let it lift you, and carry on!

Thanks for being here! I truly appreciate every one of you.