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One Word Sunday 10.8.22

Lens-Artists Challenge #218 – Over The Hill

Donna at Wind Kisses, creator of beauty through photos and words, is guest hosting the Lens-Artists Challenge this week in honor of her joining the over-the-hill gang in the same week. 🙂 (That includes me, so I feel free to say that.)

When somebody says to me-which they do like every 5 years- “How does it feel to be over the hill?” my response is, “I’m just heading up the mountain.” — John C. Baez

Sometimes the path leads literally over the hill as it did here in Cape May, New Jersey quite some years ago. There’s something intriguing about a path that leads through a portal, don’t you think?

Sunset in Wyoming. I was down near the cabin when I decided there might be a wonderful sunset in the offing, so I ran up a very, very long, steep hill (at 7,000’+ altitude) that the horses take some time getting up. I wasn’t over the hill but the sun certainly was. I was simply exhausted but managed to keep the camera steady.

I don’t know how I got over the hill without getting to the top. — Will Rogers

Plants that are seemingly over the hill still may manage to keep their beauty. Of course diamonds always add to that!

Sometimes “over the hill” is a bit more permanent than just being old. This is being ancient!

These rock stairs invite you to go over the hill in Descanso Gardens in California.

One early morning on the way home, the Bighorns once again stunned as I drove over the hill (think mountain and very unimproved road) and get ready to put it in first gear and head down the mountain. You never know what view might await over the hill.

Over the hill means the hardest climb is over and the view is terrific.
~found on a coffee mug

Finally, we’re now in autumn and in many places leaves are now over the hill, aging gracefully and beautifully.

Got a leg up on you

Six-Word Saturday 8.27.22

Just FYI, we’ll be at the LA men’s rugby 🏉 7s tournament, the last tournament of the year and the one that will decide who wins the championship, both today and tomorrow pretty much all day meaning I’ll be offline most of the weekend. So you know I’m not ignoring you but just having a blast! I was hoping to have a sign made but that’s going to happen. 🙁. Look for a woman wearing a stylish woven brown sun hat and a light purple/lavender long-sleeved sun shirt, sitting next to a husband looking a little like Santa (just the beard) and rooting for South Africa. P. S. He finally trimmed the beard! Hurrah! No further clues right now but he’ll be wearing red Ohio State cap. .

Friday flowers…daisies

According to my Pl@ntNet app, these are alpine daisies or if not, another sort of daisy even though we usually expect daisies to be white. But as a friend says, “You never know, you know.”

Hi, neighbor!

Once the unpacking is done, it’s time to see what neighbors are in residence. Fair warning: not every photo in this post is perfect. For instance this first one was taken in somewhat of a hurry with my phone because this neighbor is always leery of spending time in close proximity to the rest of us. But this isn’t so much about the photos but about the story told by those photos, about shy but always welcome neighbors and inhabitants of the mountains.

Although it was hot and getting close to the end of July, I was pleased to see plenty wildflowers, many of which were hosting their own guests. These guests never overstay their welcome.

The first two neighbors, although always enjoyed, aren’t as rare as these next drop-ins. Since we moved to Arizona at the end of March in 2020, the so-called monsoon season hadn’t produced much rain at all. I felt we were getting a good rain if there was enough water so that individual drops melded into the wet pavement look. (This year we’re thankfully getting lots of rain; lots for a place averaging 9″ a year.) So I was thrilled to see more drops in this photo than our back patio sometimes got in rains past at home.

Once the walk or walks are over, there’s always the porch. I like porches a lot. Spanish-style houses don’t have porches; they have patios. Patios are fine but they aren’t porches.

There are lots of good sayings about porches. Here are a few I really like.

Nowadays, people are so jeezled up. If they took some chamomile tea and spent more time rocking on the porch in the evening listening to the liquid song of the hermit thrush, they might enjoy life more. ~Tasha Tudor

True luxury is being able to own your time – to be able to take a walk, sit on your porch, read the paper, not take the call, not be compelled by obligation. ~Ashton Kutcher

My ideal summer day was reading on the porch. ~Harold E. Varmus

I dream of land, cut only where streams glistened with birdsong wander through quiet hills burnt hard by the scrape of wind, and of a porch from which a single road leads only homeward. ~Nancy E. Turner

LAPC #213: Here Comes the Sun

“Here Comes the Sun” conjures up dawn and sunrise, my favorite time to be out walking and taking photos, so thanks to Amy for the theme, although it did make it hard to choose. 🙂 So I have to interrupt the retrospective of my Wyoming vacation to go for the sunshine.

This shot was taken on my way down the mountain in Wyoming as I headed home in 2017, the day of the eclipse. As you can see, it began in a stunning way, really more beautiful than the eclipse itself.

At the Preserve here in Arizona…

Sunshine inside the house…

In the morning in Illinois…

As backlighting…

Listening to the sound of bells

Six-Word Saturday 8.20.22

Day two…all about the mountains

There were mountains as I went over Raton Pass, but as it was completely dark, I didn’t see them. I only know they’re not only there but beautiful from return trips when I get to the pass in the afternoon. 🙂 The first year I drove this way, I had no idea what was out there but my eyes were wide open catching for deer or elk bounding onto the highway and even for the curves of the highway itself in the dark.

But day two was all about the mountains. The Rockies from a moving viewpoint (or van-point) north of Denver,

rain over the mountains near Douglas, Wyoming,

a first glimpse of the Bighorns, and finally

the view from near the cabin. By the time I arrived, I felt I’d earned this view after a day of driving, grocery shopping, et al, and the drive up the mountain on a road that requires first or second gear on a rocky road not always quite wide enough for two vehicles, and a top speed of 10-15 mph if you’re in a van rather than a pickup truck or four-wheel drive vehicle. Arrive, unpack, and get away from the heat! Now we can settle in for the visit itself.

Egg

A blessed Easter to all of you. He is risen!

One Word Sunday: egg

Lens-Artists Challenge #191 – Curves

I’m thrilled and thankful to report that we are now grandparents. Wow, does that sound old! 😁 Our first grandchild/grandson was both last night. ❤️❤️❤️. Much rejoicing here. God is good.

Ann-Christine has set us a most enjoyable challenge this week, looking for curves…except that there are so many choices!! I just started scrolling through my photos and picked some of the first examples I found that I liked. Then I stopped and went back to watching Six Nations Rugby Super Saturday games (writing this on Saturday.) Let me take you through some of natures curves, as I don’t have all the many of my own to share. 🙂

In our bones we need the natural curves of hills, the scent of chaparral, the whisper of pines, the possibility of wildness. Richard Louv

I could smell the curves of the river beyond the dusk and I saw the last light supine and tranquil upon tide flats like pieces of broken mirror, then beyond them lights began in the pale clear air, trembling a little like butterflies hovering a long way off. – William Faulkner

In life, as in art, the beautiful moves in curves. ~Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton

As all curves have reference to their centres or foci, so all beauty of character has reference to the soul, and is a graceful gesture of recognition or waving of the body toward it. Henry David Thoreau