Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Realizing Winter, scene 2






I saw a young woman beside the stove, really a girl. She was dressed in a faded cotton skirt and waist. As I came close I saw that she carried a baby in a crooked arm and the baby was nursing, its head under her waist out of the cold. The mother moved about, poking the fire, shifting the rusty lids of the stove to make a greater draft, opening the oven door; and all the time the baby was nursing, but that didn't interfere with the mother's work, nor with the light quick gracefulness of her movements. There was something very precise and practiced in her movements. The orange fire flicked out of the cracks in the stove and threw dancing reflections on the tent.

I was close now and I could smell frying bacon and baking bread, the warmest, pleasantest odors I know. From the east the light grew swiftly. I came near to the stove and stretched my hands out to it and shivered all over when the warmth struck me...

-John Steinbeck, The Long Valley

2 comments:

  1. These are great as well. Curious: what lens did you use for these?

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  2. Hey Laura, I used a Canon 50mm lens, with the aperture wide open at 1.4. That shallow depth of field can be really fun!

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