Bucket List: Project 2

SO I’m finally getting around to posting my bucket list project #2. It’s long overdue. I actually took these photos a few weeks ago, but due to the magnitude of the project, I just wasn’t sure if I was pleased with my decision.

The project topic seemed so simple. “Heaven on Earth”.  There was no particular guidelines. Just “Heaven on Earth”, that’s it. Simple, right? Hardly.

So what is one of the first things that comes to mind when you hear that phrase? I think it’s safe to say most people think of the sky, the clouds, a sunset, and if you’re an early riser, maybe even a sunrise. All of these things came to me (well, except the sunrise, I don’t see those often).  My plan was to just watch the sky for a few days and when the time is right, I will find a spot where I can see it all for all it’s worth and start shooting. That is what leads me to what you see below.

Once I started to post my project, I began to struggle with it. I looked over that picture a hundred times, it didn’t ever shout “Heaven on Earth” to me, not once. At first, it just looked to me like a typical sunset shot, maybe not even a great one.

So I started thinking. What exactly is “Heaven on Earth” to me? That part became easy.

Do you remember when you were little, could have been 5, 10, even 15, and you stayed at Grandpa and Grandma’s house for the weekend? Staying at my Grandpa and Grandma’s house was about overly greasy popcorn, green and blue sleeping bags, and cheerios for breakfast. It was the old orange swivel chairs and the sound of the furnace flooding the entire house.  Those nights, those feelings, those were heaven on earth.

Those 3-4 days spent tending to my livestock at the York County Fair, washing my hogs with my dad, chasing around the boys from out of town, and getting ready for a night out at the Midway, those days were heaven on earth.

Throughout life, we experience an endless number of these moments. Some of them are huge- graduation, a wedding day, the birth of a child.

And as you get older, those Heaven on Earth moments seem to come so easily. It could mean waking up early for work and realizing it’s Saturday. It could be that sweet old man at the grocery store that is overly chatty, the one that makes you slow down, just for a moment, to hear some wonderful wisdom from days past. It’s a crazy theory of a 2 year old, or just the voice of a beloved family member on the other end of the phone.

When I was back “home” at my parents house around the holidays, I had been inside a somewhat noisy house for a few hours when I had to run outside to get something out of the car. The moment I stepped outside and the door closed behind me, it seemed as though I had walked into a soundproof world. I was standing in complete silence. For that moment,  I felt a little heaven on earth.

So this picture, this sunset, and every other sunset brings me to this. Heaven on Earth is every day that I get to see go by. It’s every single one of these moments that I was blessed with. It’s all the good, the bad, and the ugly of each moment of my life. And at night when I lay in bed, there is a moment that my mind FINALLY stops stressing about what didn’t get done, the things I have in days ahead, and the overall craziness of life just goes away. It’s that moment where your heart slows down and I can breathe a little easier. It’s that final moment when the sun starts to set in my own head, and there I lay in complete relaxation and I am able to thank God for letting me experience a little Heaven on Earth each and every day. It’s knowing that someday, I will actually be there to witness every sunset and maybe even a sunrise, and all those moments of heaven on earth will be found in EVERY moment for all of eternity.

Looking forward to crossing another project off my list. Hoping to work on #3 this weekend (we'll see what we can get done in a snowstorm!)