One picture can be worth a thousand words. Others can leave you quite speechless.

To experience the power of such pictures, go to the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, which is hosting a traveling exhibit called “Capture the Moment: The Pulitzer Prize Photographs.” And go there soon, because this amazing collection is on view only through Dec. 31.

My husband and I saw the exhibit last week on a shared day off (a more than momentary joy). Even as I type this, images from the show resurface in my mind, unforgettable.

Within the gallery walls, photos depict the best of times and the worst of times (thanks, Mr. Dickens). Birth, death; peace, war; celebration, grief: all captured by the magic of the lens —  and the vision of the human behind the camera.

The exhibit brought me to tears more than once. The contrast of joy and sorrow hits again and again. One minute you see the miraculous moment of birth, a wide, elated smile on the mother’s face. A few walls later you see a haunting portrait of another mother and child, this infant just hours from death in famine-ravaged Ethiopia. 

Dramatic moments in history — the attack on the World Trade Center, the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald — are juxtaposed with more personal dramas — the rescue of a young girl caught in roaring flood waters, a Vietnam veteran watching an Armed Forces Day parade from a wheelchair, holding a toddler in his lap.

This world is a terrible, wonderful place. We all bear witness every day.

I give thanks for those who frame and preserve those moments, to remind us all.

—

The National Constitution Center is at 525 Arch St., on Independence Mall. For more information, visit the website: http://constitutioncenter.org.

This representative of yang guards our mailbox.*

I consider myself lucky to be a writer (though as any writer would admit, there are times when a pile of unfolded laundry proves more enticing than wrestling with a balky paragraph).

One of the gifts writing gives me is the chance to indulge my curiosity. Whatever I wonder about I can write about, which means I first get to read and learn about anything under the sun (or over it for that matter).

For example, as I wrote my previous post I realized I didn't know much about yin yang, aside from recognizing the black-and-white symbol you could buy as a patch for your bell-bottom jeans in the 1960s. 

Indulging my curiosity (not to mention my inner editor, who insists on accuracy), I turned to the internet to read up on the ancient Chinese concept, which dates back so much farther than the '60s.

Wading through the web I learned that the dark side of the symbol is the feminine yin, connected with the moon, while the light side is the masculine yang, connected with the sun.

I found more factoids. For example, yin is symbolized by a tiger, and yang by a dragon. (Dang, why do men get to be the dragons?) I didn't end up using any of those details, but the knowledge settled into my brain, like seeds planted. 

Now, let me switch gears, with the promise that all will mesh in the end.

I've been learning Spanish again by listening to Pimsleur language CDs in the car. One concept foreign to my English-speaking brain is the idea of male and female nouns. 

English has just one “the.” Spanish uses at least two: “el,” for masculine nouns, and “la” for feminine. Most masculine nouns end in “o,” and female nouns end in “a.” But not always, which is when I'm likely to misspeak.

I mentioned this to my English major husband, who offered this idea: the older the language, the greater the structure, the more rules. 

Spanish has roots in Latin, which definitely counts as an older language. Hmm. More seeds planted.

A few days later I was working with a teenager who studies French. 

We commiserated about the tricky male/female noun business.

I mentioned “el dia,” day (masculine, even though it ends in “a”) and “la noche,” night (feminine, though it ends in “e.”)

“Why?” I asked. “Who decided that the day is male and the night is female?”

I barely finished that sentence before the linguistic lightbulb blinked on.
    Ahhh. It's yin and yang, moon goddess and sun god. Ancient ideas, ancient languages live on in words we use every day (especially when we speak Spanish).

Those seeds planted had sprouted. And a little piece of the universe made just a little more sense.

   Just one more reason I feel lucky to be a writer.

---

*My dragon sentry is a candle I found on a memorable thrift shop outing with a dear friend (a more than momentary joy). He started out as a Halloween decoration, but I'm letting him enjoy the porch awhile longer.

A view from the tent.

There is joy to be found in the embracing of opposites.

Spring seems all the sweeter following a harsh winter. 

A glass of iced tea tastes more heavenly after mowing the lawn in muggy August.

Kicking off your shoes and putting your feet up feels more sublime after a good day's work.

And a long, leisurely, hot shower equals ecstasy after a weekend of camping, especially in October.

Where there's a yin, there's a yang.
---
   Our annual camping trip last weekend embraced the opposites of wet and dry, as a 30 percent chance of rain became 100 percent reality for a couple hours on Saturday night. We were prepared, tarps up, before the (relatively) brief deluge hit.
   And the fire never died.
   Hallelujah.

My October obsession ...

There's a saying I'm fond of:

A sorrow shared is halved; a joy shared is doubled.

The second part of that certainly came true for me this morning, as I ate my first pumpkin pancakes of the season at the Village Diner.

A dear friend joined me in the breakfast sublime. 

Wonderful food, heart-warming company.
 Much more than a momentary joy.

A sign of the times ... and a summer
memory of Sandpoint, ID.

"To everything there is a season …"

So says the Book of Ecclesiastes, and so sang Pete Seeger, and later the Byrds. ("Turn, turn, turn ...")

I'm hearing that song in my head today, the first full day of fall. Summer took its bow at 4:44 p.m. yesterday, allowing autumn to move center stage.

I love living in a place where the seasons truly change. Winter, spring, summer, fall. In Philadelphia, all have their beauties, and their annoyances. And the transitions always leave me feeling wistful.

 (Another song playing in my head is Don Henley's "Boys of Summer" … "Empty lake, empty streets, the sun goes down alone." Like I said, wistful.)

So. Will I miss summer's 90-degree days with pea-soup humidity? Not so much.

But I will miss the songs of crickets in the night.

And though I just said I won't miss the excessive heat, I will miss the gift that heat gives in my dance class, where we can stretch longer and deeper because of it.

I will miss living in flip-flops, and the pops of color visible on free-ranging toes.

I will miss the ever-changing rainbow of flowers appearing in my neighbors' gardens. 

I already miss the light. The sun may not always go down alone, but it sure goes down earlier.

I think the universe understands we need to ease into all these changes. I suspect that's why we're treated to the firework of fall leaves before the winter unpacks its more subdued palette.

Goodbye, summer, and welcome, fall. 

Winter? Please wait your turn.

Welcome to my world ...

Long time, no write.

There's a story behind that … so here goes.

I think of myself as a liberal, so I suppose it shouldn't have surprised me when I began listing to the left.

Unfortunately, I mean that quite literally.

I've been listing, as in Leaning Tower of Pisa type listing, usually to the left.

Call it, "Adventures in Vertigo."

My tilting began in mid-June, in the middle of a dance class. After stretching out on the floor I started to sit up, but the room took a fierce spin around me. I fell over (yes, to the left), and squeezed my eyes shut. The wonderful women I dance with snapped into action, bringing cold paper towels, ginger candy to calm the nausea, and lots of tender, loving care. 

Not feeling steady enough to drive, I called home, and my dear family came to the rescue, picking me up and driving my car back.

I've experienced vertigo a handful of times in my life, and it usually passed within a week or so.

Not this time.

In the midst of week two of waking up to spinning walls, I saw my doctor. She outlined a plan, and recommended that I see an ear, nose and throat specialist if I felt no improvement in two weeks.

My off-center tilt continued. Walking down the street, I found myself constantly drifting to the left. (At least my liberal self got a laugh out of that.) The persistent dizziness made reading (and writing) difficult; the scrolling and quick eye movements used in computer work proved downright nauseating.

After two more weeks I headed to the ENT office, where, after a series of questions and one brief vertigo-inducing maneuver, the doctor pronounced my diagnosis: BPPV, or benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, a mouthful that means I got dizzy when my head moved into certain positions. He recommended a physical therapy practice in Willow Grove that specializes in balance disorders.

Who knew?

Since starting PT in mid-July, my eyes have been opened to the complex, wondrous workings of the human body's balance system. 

The seemingly "simple" act of standing, not to mention walking, requires constant communication between your brain and your eyes, inner ear, as well as your muscles and joints. If something goes awry with any of those "messages," your sense of balance is … tipped.

That's where BPPV comes in. (If you're not into medical detail, you can skip the next three paragraphs.)

In a nutshell, vertigo can set in when microscopic crystals dislodge themselves from the inner ear and wander into an ear canal, where they start sending wrong signals to the brain. 

  At PT, they induced the vertigo by moving my head into certain positions. By observing the direction of my eye movements (think REM with nausea), the therapists determined which canal was harboring the wayward crystals.

After that, we moved on to the "bump and dump," wherein the therapist carefully and quickly moved my head and body in a way to send the crystals back where they belong. There are different prescribed "maneuvers" for each ear canal, usually named after the person who invented them, such as Epley and Semont.

As I wrote to a friend after the first session: 

"When I wasn't on the verge of throwing up, I found it fascinating."

I still do.

I'm happy to report that the PT maneuvers were successful, and rooms no longer spin around me. Unfortunately, I'm dealing with residual dizziness, visual and balance issues, which often come with this territory.

To help with that, my PT routine includes eye exercises and balance work. My favorite is one I call "the blind flamingo," standing on one leg with eyes closed. (I'm almost up to 30 seconds!)

One side benefit of this dizzying adventure has been the necessity to slow down. My eyes can't handle too much movement -- such as letters moving on a computer screen or cars moving in traffic -- so I have to make time in the day to just sit quietly, with eyes closed.  I highly recommend it, dizzy or not.

On the down side, I wasn't able to watch much of Wimbledon this year.

Momentary Joy has been ... taking a moment.
Stay tuned this week for details.