• clouds,  landscape,  natural areas,  Pineridge Natural Area,  quotes,  sunrises

    Just Beyond Our Understanding

    December 28, 2023

    The God of our understanding is just that: the God of our understanding. What we need is the God just beyond our understanding.

    Rami Shapiro

    As I set up my tripod this morning, the full moon was setting behind me and the sun had not yet risen. Predawn or twilight are the names we call this time of day. It is a favorite time for me. An orange glow sat along the horizon, a color I have come to know as the gift offering of the day’s mysteries. And today I think I will call those mysteries: adventures. As I returned home and walked to my front door the sky above me became filled with the sight and sounds of hundreds of Canada Geese. I just stood there with a bag of groceries in one hand and 12 roll package of toilet paper under the other arm. I watched them zig and zag in their attempt to keep perfect formation. And, as always there are those one or two or three that wander off course, then hustle to get back in formation or join another formation. I watched the rising sun begin lighting them with its glow against the clear blue sky. I accepted another of the day’s offerings!

    When younger I did not use the name God in any form or shape of reverence or awe, but usually out of anger or frustration with life. I’ll just say it was profanity. I could not understand a God that would cause or allow the pain and suffering I saw in life. However, I reached a point in life where, as Rami Shapiro suggests, I began to seek a God just beyond my understanding. As I experience moments of reverence or awe like this morning, I have a sense this is what God is all about. Yes, it is just beyond my understanding. Hoping you have a wonderful day!

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  • fall season,  leaves,  Plants,  quotes,  seasons,  Thomas Berry

    Awe and Reverence

    November 12, 2022
    Light, shadows, shapes, patterns, colors of leaves

    There is an awe and reverence due to the stars in the heavens, the sun, and all heavenly bodies; to the seas and the continents; to all living forms of trees and flowers; to the myriad expressions of life in the sea; to the animals of the forests and the birds of the air.

    To wantonly destroy a living species is to silence forever a divine voice. 

    Thomas Berry

    The man made worlds of our homes, work cubicles, television, and phones, cannot fulfill that awe and reverence. Our separation has caused us to see nature apart from us. We no longer hear the divine voice in nature and therefore can and do commit violence against it. All of creation is the divine voice! How many of us stop and just listen to the voice of falling leaves. It was another cold morning in Colorado, 9 degrees at 6:45 am. Sun has set and it will be in the single digits again tonight. Hope you enjoy your day tomorrow!

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  • insects,  quotes

    Discovered the fly

    July 11, 2021

    “The Utah deserts and plateaus and canyons are not a country of big returns, but a country of spiritual healing, incomparable for contemplation, meditation, solitude, quiet, awe, peace of mind and body. We were born of wilderness, and we respond to it more than we sometimes realize. We depend upon it increasingly for relief from the termite life we have created. Factories, power plants, resorts, we can make anywhere. Wilderness, once we have given it up, is beyond our reconstruction.”

    Wallace Stegner

    I believe Stegner’s quote is valid for any place. Wilderness is always close by even in our cities but becoming smaller all the time. And we mistakenly call the elimination of these places development. Sigh!

    I noticed some Campanula rapunculoides, also known by the common name of creeping bellflower, in a greenbelt and canal area on a walk along Shields Avenue. I felt a closer look was necessary. After a few photos I spotted these mushrooms. Since I was already on my knees I decided they also needed to have their photo taken. I took three photos of the mushrooms and later discovered the fly is only in one image. Guess the fly wanted their photo taken also. 😁

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  • Black and White,  clouds,  journal,  landscape,  musings,  prairie,  rants,  writing/reading

    Looking for Awe and Wonder

    March 22, 2018

    Afternoon Clouds on the Farm
    Afternoon Clouds on the Farm

    I have always carried stress in my shoulders. It’s there now. There is a feeling of restlessness. I find my mind wandering to unknown places in the universe. Feel I’m not listening to the inner voice within me but the chatter of my ego and the noise of the world around me. Maybe if I share myself more on this blog, hear what you have experienced, take more action, the stress will lessen. 

    Now in my retirement there is a life to live full of excitement and adventures, images to receive, words to write in my journals, blog posts to write, places to visit, people to meet and a chance to discover more creativity within me. I find this exciting. However, this requires me to take action and not just dream of them. In the past I have only dreamed. There are no excuses. As I’ve heard, “Dreams without action are only fantasy.” I hope and pray I live the rest of my life with excitement, without fear of failure or success, looking for awe and wonder all around me.

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