Excerpt…

Like others, I admire the physical beauty of hummingbirds, but I must make a confession — I am addicted to these little critters and never tire of watching them. Each time I pick up a camera to photograph them the challenge becomes intensely personal and demands total focus. Never have I experienced such a level of fulfillment as during my humble attempts to capture these small, ephemeral spirits passing through the window of God’s world.

 

 

Childhood experiences influence understanding of adults. Long ago, the author found these fossilized therapod dinosaur tracks near a canyon in Arizona. They bear striking similarity to those of modern day turkeys and hummingbirds.

The author…

Joe Lively is a former military officer, former chemist and chemistry teacher. Today he is a retired Paw-paw, engaged in more adventures than he has time to schedule. He frequently hikes the canyons of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah looking for evidence of ancient people and wildlife. He is fascinated by the unique geology of the southwestern states and Native American pictographs, which record the culture and spirit world from another time. Joe is passionate about bird photography. He is also sensitive to his responsibility to share his specialized knowledge with others.

After many trips to natural history museums as a young child, young Joe Lively began to think of birds as an extension of dinosaurs. And what child hasn’t been thrilled by the thought of a T-Rex or Velociraptor emerging from over the next hill? His imagination still flares up when he occasionally discovers bird-like, dinosaur footprints imbedded in an Arizona rock matrix. The physical similarity is indisputable and should be enough to convince any child that modern birds, even hummingbirds, developed from the dinosaurs of yesterday.

Joe was raised in a rural environment where the ultimate experience was seeing his dad call in and then hand feed wild birds. It doesn’t take much imagination to understand that once the flame of enchantment envelopes a child, the spell continues into adulthood. In reality, as one ages, the spell only intensifies. From hiking mysterious canyons once inhabited by ancient people, discovering their fading pictographs and dinosaur footprints, to photographing hummingbirds feeding on their favorite flowers, Joe Lively continues to learn from a living adventure. As his relationship with birds matures, his observations of interdependence between species crystallize into an ultimate reality. Putting together these simple stories and up-close photographs of HUMMINGBIRDS AND FLOWERS THEY LOVE was also an adventure into personal spiritual awareness.

 

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