The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every morning, but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life.
The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun, and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.
It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. (paragraph breaks added)
Source: Orthodoxy, GK Chesterton
Perfection, which may express the bird’s self-reflection in this choice moment.
Laurna – Thank you. He/she was just fishing relentlessly. There was no gap between swallowing each catch and watching for the next one. I wonder if they eat as long as there’s light.
My easy solution – take the shot and hope for the best. Maybe that equates to no standard at all, or maybe it is why I prefer taking pictures of landscapes.
John – Gordon Sullivan, US Army Gen (ret’d) titled his book, “Hope is not a method.” I think of that sometimes when I just take the shot, in photography as in other pursuits. But in defence of hobbies (among other more serious thoughts), G.K. Chesterton said, “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.” So we are both excused our poor results (when poor they be) as long as we are doing things we love.