Photography And Half-Thoughts By Mitchell Hegman

...because some of it is pretty and some of it is not.

Sunday, May 18, 2025

Small Beauties

I don’t always have a Cold Smoke beer when I really need one. It’s a bummer, but I manage to carry on. Yesterday turned out to be one of those days when chance caught me beerless—just when I really needed one for use as my standard scale for size.

On a quick turnaround trip to the cabin, I chanced onto a patch of mixed flowers, including shootingstar and fairy slippers (one of our rare orchids). These two specimens are among the smallest of the mountain wildflowers. At the same time, they are among the most striking to behold. Shootingstar flowers blaze with color, and fairy slippers dazzle with delicate particulars. Both of these natives keep a low profile in growth, and the flowers are something near the size of a dime.

I apologize for not having a can of Cold Smoke to place alongside the flowers so you might get an accurate read on size.

Fairy Slippers

Shootingstar

—Mitchell Hegman

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