Shuffled – “Here’s Looking at You Kid”

A couple of days ago, I noticed that a reader had liked one of my posts from February.  Now that’s a great thing because it wasn’t one of the stories that was “pinned” to my home page then.  Generally speaking, our older posts drift backward in time and out of the spotlight as we write new ones.  So the reader had to take a little time to hunt this one down.  Or maybe they just stumbled upon it.  Either way, I was happy they found it.

And then I noticed that this particular piece, Coffee, had one of the highest number of likes of all of my posts.

Anemopsis Californica

Yerba Mansa or the Bear Root

The past few years have held many traumas.  Many disintegrations.  Many challenges.

A number of failures.

Dragonflies and Catalpas

My shadow was short this morning.

I had hit the trail late and the sun was close to being directly overhead.

I should have started earlier, much earlier, because it was already 90 degrees and with 70 percent + humidity, it’s stifling out here.  The air is heavy, thick, hard to breathe.  Kind of like you’re underwater, but it’s hot water.

More like thick steam.

Query

So, I’m walking backwards today.  I’ve often said I do things backwards in life, in terms of my career growth, progression of tackling various challenges, both mental and physical, etc.  But today, I’m applying this to writing a post for the blog.

I usually get some type of thought bubble, stumble upon related materials and then try to link them all together.  A draft comes together.  I polish and post it.  And I enjoy, and learn from, the comments that follow.

Today, I’m going to ask for comments before I write.  Yes, the backwards approach.

Serpents and Milkweeds

I was out of breath as I reached the top of the bluff.  But it was worth the hike.  I now had a falcon’s-eye view out over the South Fork of the Snake River.  Absolutely beautiful.

The sprawling flood plain to the East was fully plowed and planted.  Potatoes, wheat, and alfalfa.  And maybe a few specialty crops lay low in the distance.  Broccoli, cauliflower, rhubarb, and cabbage.  Casting different hues of green.  Forest green to fern, to mantis, to dark pastel, to castelton.

The Star Beneath Our Feet

The wind picked up as I hit the fourth mile mark.  The warm breeze wrapped around my face and lifted upward and to the East.

It had been a cool fifty degrees when I started my trek an hour and a half earlier, but once the sun crested thirty degrees above the horizon the temperature had been in a steady climb and was fueling the wind gusts that reminded you that the invisible vapor we breath is a powerful force.  One not to misjudge.  It is tornado season after all.

Chicory

Well, I’ve slowed down a little on my writing.  Time is a proportionate thing.  Right now I’m in training.  Training for my next adventure.

So as training time increases, time for everything decreases.

But since I’m out and about as part of my training, and since it’s Spring, it’s time for wildflowers and flowering trees.  I guess I’ll stick with the Photo Journal until the right combination of forces conspires to persuade me to tell another story.

Enjoy 🙂

Photo: Chicory – an amazing plant. You can use its roots as a coffee substitute.  And now for the close-up of the close-up . . . Hope you like the color Blue.

Beauty – Adaptive or Arbitrary

A number of days past, I made a post titled Wildflowers where I pondered the evolutionary adaptations of plants.  How their beauty, shape, and the perfume of their flowers attract certain pollinators to ensure the propagation of their species.

Naturally, I simply enjoy their beauty, regardless of how it came to be. 😊

Then yesterday, I stumbled upon an article discussing the theories of “adaptive adornment” versus “arbitrary beauty.”*  And I must admit, those terms are much more scientific and deliberately descriptive than my own ponderings.

It seems that Darwin had a second theory apart from natural selection – sexual selection.

Hawthorn

It’s that time of year.  The flowering trees have started to bloom.  It usually begins with Wild Cherry and Plumb.   Then come the Redbuds and Magnolias.  Then Dogwoods, Catalpas, Buckeyes, and Mimosas.

There are a lot of trees in my area with small, white flowers.  Probably too many to know all of them.  But the other day, when I was out on the trail,  I spied this little beauty laying in the grass.  It only took a second to realize that it wasn’t a ground flower.  There was an entire blanket of these blooms lying under a tree.  The Hawthorn Tree.

This was the first time I took a close look at this particular blossom.  And it was quite a gift for the day 🙂

The center sort of looks like a creature with unfolding tentacles.  Perhaps a Sea Anemone.  Take in its beauty and use your imagination.  What do you see?

For Vera

Look closely.  What do you see?

About three years back, I was walking along the roadside and I saw Red Clover blooming in the ditch.  I bent over and snapped a picture, a close up, without even giving it much thought.

Later, back home.  I opened the pic up on the computer screen and my jaw dropped.  It was, is, absolutely stunning!  At least I think so.

What we often regard as single blooms are really composite flowers.  A cluster of miniature florets forming that glorious efflorescence.  And this is what I saw.

A common plant.  So common that people don’t seem to notice it.  Just walk on by.

The Bumble Bees notice it , though.  It seems to be one of their favorites.

But just look at those tiny composite flowers.  The angle of the ones at the top produce the effect of looking at flames dancing in a fire.

But straight on, you can see the tiny detail of each independent bloom.  The red veins of each. Those vascular bundles of Xylem and Phloem that extend the entire length of the plant. The Pistil, holding the reproductive organs.  Each of these tiny flowers will become a seed . . . once the bees do their work.   It will transform and appear much like the head of a Dandelion, before the tiny umbrellas balloon its many children to their distant destinations.  To start the cycle anew.

And to the side and lower views, you see each of the microblooms’ petals.  What an intricate design.

Like a cluster of diminutive orchids.

So many focal points.  The camera can’t decide.  It zooms in on the tiny hairlike projections in between the hues of crimson.

Three years ago, with the snapping of a picture, I snapped back into life.  Back into the life that matters most.  Appreciating the real world and all its glory.  And this re-awaking was fueled by what some would call the commonplace.  Would scarcely give a glance to such a plant.  A wildflower.  An uncultivated beast.

After all, it’s not a Rose . . .

My friend Vera and I were talking about this in relation to my post Wildflowers yesterday.  The uniqueness, the beauty, the ability to recognize and appreciate it before it’s gone.  And I think she said it perfectly when she said:

“It’s funny how we are inclined to categorize things as common or rare, forgetting/ignoring the fact that each one is unique within their own kind. It takes wise reminders to be conscious of that. To have the capacity to appreciate beauty while it lasts, or indeed, transience, in general, demands high wisdom and appropriate temperament.”

And so I dedicate this post to her.  And if you really want to read some fine poetry, and by “fine” I mean amazing, you should check out her blog.  To Dad With Love Poetry.

Until the next wildflower . . .

 

Busy Living

“I guess it comes down to a simple choice really, get busy living or get busy dying.”

– Andy talking with Red in The Shawshank Redemption.

I’ve always loved this quote.  It seems simple enough, but there’s a lot to it.  Some people say we are in the process of dying from the moment we are born.  That’s an organic process.  Can’t change it.  Can’t stop it.  But we can change what we’re doing when we’re alive.  While we’re still breathing.

Silence is Golden, but Mantras . . .

You can fill in the blank in the title.  I might say . . . “are miraculous.”

***

I can remember back in college, I had friends who used to wear their headphones constantly.  They told me they couldn’t study without listening to music.  And I always found that hard to believe because if I’m listening to music, the only other thing I can do at the same time is dance.  And I’m not so great at that either, although I have fun flailing about 🙂

I mean I can’t even go to sleep listening to music.  Music just seems to engage some part of my brain that carries me somewhere else completely.

And totally.

The Destination Was Her

It’s hard to describe,

truly meeting someone.

When eyes open,

Hearts synch.

 

A special soul,

To embrace,

Enfold, entwine.

 

But there were many separations.

Space-time matrices to traverse,

Miles,

Life Stages.

 

Two nurturing souls.

Playful,

Understanding.

 

Horizons expanded.

A mystical wonderland.

Alive and pulsating.

An endless flood of sensation.

 

Time shared.

Bonds forged.

 

Then a withering flame.

A magical land,

Turned landscape of loneliness.

The dichotomy of dissonance.

 

Beauty everywhere.

With heart-tie gone,

There could be no gravity.

 

The mark on the map

was never the journey’s end.

The geography was never Earthbound.

The destination was her . . .

Her heart.

 

 

Photo: From light years ago.  A special flame.