The Prophet Canoniah.

Steps walked: 8256.

Furthest point travelled: 1 mile. Chapel at the North Middlesex Hospital.

Face to face non-household interactions: 3.

Track of the day: ‘Melancholy Hill’ - Gorrilaz.

            Today would have been day two of my pilgrimage, taking me twenty-something miles from Fenwick to Town Yetholm, and indeed from England to Scotland. I keep wondering what the weather’s like, the views I might have enjoyed; at various moments during the day I’ve paused and wondered, “Where would I have got to by now? How would I see?”

            So praise God for the Prophet Canoniah.

Last year I really began to get into photography. It is changing me. It is changing how I look at the world around me.

It can be all too easy to see the ugliness in life. The litter and the fly-tipping; the people pushing their way past (admittedly, not so much pushing going on at the moment) or shouting at each other in the street; smashed windows and graffiti-ed shop shutters; careless wealth and helpless poverty. It’s all there, it’s all out there; and in a big city like London, it can occasionally feel overwhelming.

Just having a camera with me, changes how I see my environment. Now I’m looking at the colours, contrasts, patterns and textures of my context. Even the broken glass and graffiti can sometimes take on forms of beauty.

In January a second wave of grief at Mum’s death hit me. We’d all been focussed on ‘getting through’ Christmas and New Year and making sure the boys had a good time. And we did get through it, and she hadn’t been there, and those thoughts brought a new sadness. I wasn’t thinking things through in that way, but I suspect that something like that was going on in my heart.

The canary in the mine that made me sit up and pay attention to myself, was the realisation that I’d stopped taking pictures; or rather, I’d stopped seeing anything I wanted to photograph, stopped seeing the colours, contrasts, patterns and textures of life, that make up its beauty.

And photography is about light. Photography is a lot about light – where it comes from, how it falls, the colour it takes, the shadows it leaves, the reflections it causes. When I have my camera with me, I think about light a lot. I look for the light and pay attention to it; I think about the difference it makes and where best to put myself in relation to the light.

Hence, my lowly Canon camera is elevated to the status of Prophet – the Prophet Canon-iah.

For the role of the prophet is to help God’s people see the world anew. The prophet points to the wonder of being a part of a Creation, and the wounds that are caused when we forget or deny that truth. The prophet has a keen sense of the presence of light, and strives to point us to the places where the light may be found.