you get the picture

liz over at abstract the day has undertaken quite the project. she is making 1000 paper cranes to send to 1000 people. each person in turn is to take a photograph of the crane he/she receives, then send a print of it back to liz. many of these photos can already be seen on the paper cranes project pool on flickr.


according to wikipedia, "The Thousand Origami Cranes has become a symbol of peace through the story of Sadako Sasaki, a Japanese girl who contracted leukemia as a result of radiation from the atomic bombing of Hiroshima during World War II. Her story is told in the the book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes."

traditionally, any one thousand origami paper cranes are held together by strings. here too, liz's project is demonstrating a different kind of stringing together. i loved receiving my little blue crane in the envelope from brighton, ma, and following the written directions for pulling on the wings to assemble it. a tangible thing addressed to me from a location i've never seen, from someone i've never met. such a small thing, but how exhilarating!

i didn't take the picture until a few days after receiving my crane. it needed to be just right. then i was listening to the decemberists' "crane wife" album, and i got the idea to put it on my lady figure. it just so happened i was wearing the shirt with the birds, and that isabel came over to lay down in that very spot just a moment before (she gets jealous when i take pictures of other things, i swear).

now i will send the picture, along with a book of stamps and a few pieces of origami paper, as i'm sure they'll come in handy.

if you would like to receive a crane too, just write liz a note...