I’m looking out my kitchen window. The ground is covered in heavy snow which has been melting gradually as the temperature edges above zero. The forecast for this evening and into tomorrow is for heavy rains and winds gusting up to 90 km/h. I need a reminder of spring.

So, once again I return to my extensive file of Keukenhof Garden images to see what inspires me and select this colourful gem filled with cheerful tulips and graced by an elegant swan.

Swans remind me of my mother who, while working in Europe as a young opera singer in the late 1960s, fell in love with them. Because of this affection she has for swans I feel drawn to photograph them wherever I travel  — I guess partly so she can enjoy seeing them through my eyes and partly, I suppose, so she’ll know that for at least as long as it took me to take the photograph I was thinking of her.

Copyright Aimwell Enterprises 2012