Tawny Delights

Rain continues across the Piedmont Plateau of North Carolina. Weather prognosticators talk of several inches more headed our way. Near evening brief breaks in downpours provide opportunities to seek out aesthetic aftermath amid the chaos and destruction wreaked by flooding. Camera in hand I head towards the village of Bynum. In many places the Haw River already tops its banks. Our red clay soil turns water into creamy ripples of cocoa. I pause at river’s edge spellbound how the warm afterglow of sunset intensifies the liquid hues. At nightfall I meander towards the village. The Old Bynum General Store sits just up the hill from the river. Regaled in Christmas decor it shrugs off the elements as it has for decades.

© Ilija Lukić 2015

Tawny Delight

Blue-Eyed Beauty

Old Bynum General Store

Balmy Christmas Repose

Christmas morning awakens to warm sunrise hues. Careful attention to whispers of breezes reveals muffled squeals of delight and laughter throughout homes in city neighborhoods as children discover treasures left under festive Christmas trees by Santa Claus. A day of merriment and family gatherings follows.

Sundown finds Pittsboro main street stores buttoned up and all thoroughfares quiet. Nary a soul is afoot. The old courthouse positioned on our city's central roundabout dominates views on approaches from each cardinal direction. Chatham County dates to the 1770s and Pittsboro named for William Pitt the Younger, son of the 1st Earl of Chatham, to 1785. In front of the courthouse Old Glory waves majestically in balmy southerly breezes.

An El Niño-inspired weather pattern continues to funnel atypical December humidity, rain and 70-degree temperatures across the Piedmont Plateau of the Carolinas. I take a moment and reflect on the birth of Christ, our history and slower-paced days of yore. A feeling of peace on earth and good will fills heart and mind. Tomorrow the hustle and bustle of modern America returns.

© Ilija Lukić 2015

Christmas Morning On Cobble Ridge
(Pittsboro, North Carolina)

Christmas Sunset
(Historical Chatham County Courthouse in Pittsboro, North Carolina USA

Balmy Winter Repose
(Main Street in Pittsboro, North Carolina)

The Ides Of December

While on an outing to capture early winter sunset panoramas from the Old Bynum Bridge, I stop and take a trip down memory lane. Echoes of purposeful footfalls by workers headed to the Odell cotton mill and farmers rumbling grain wagons to the riverside grist mill linger. The captivating rush of the Haw River below soothes the din of the hustle and bustle. A timeworn cotton mill race endures as a slowly moving reflecting pool. Defiant albeit worse for wear the gray lady stands lost in dreams of glory days.

Built in 1922 to replace a covered wooden bridge inadequate for automobile traffic, her 800-foot span stands a lane and a half wide by modern standards. In her day the bridge is a major north-south connector in the Piedmont Plateau area of North Carolina. Since 1999 the bridge serves foot traffic across the rock-strewn waters of the Haw.

Weather and the Haw River take their physical toll over 93 years. But of late the unthinking onslaught of graffiti defiles her personality. An old-timer walking the bridge stops to chat. His heart aches over the willful disregard of respect for the aged gray lady.

© Ilija Lukić 2015

The Ides Of December 

The Yin And The Yang 

Last Gasp Of Autumn

Ghosts Of Bynum

(Abandoned post office and general store) 

First Day Of Winter

Through A Glass Darkly

Grains of stardust quicken rain drops,

Give life to mirrors in puddles of regret,

Abet visions through such glass darkly

Until face to face with remedies within.

© Ilija Lukić 2015

Through A Glass Darkly
(Mary Barber Park north of Pittsboro, North Carolina)

Day's End Reverie

Autumn mists caress her wildness,

Her woodland skeletons in reverie

And usher in most unexpectedly

A contemplative, gentle sojourn 

Into the perfect dying of her light.

© Ilija Lukić 2015

Day's End Reverie
(Woodlands just north of Pittsboro, North Carolina USA)

Foggy Daydreams
(Mary Barber Park north of Pittsboro, North Carolina)