Browsed by
Category: beauty

everyone loves a parade

everyone loves a parade

Comments 0 Comment

Last Friday evening, I rode in a parade through the streets of downtown Waterloo. I saw some of you along the route: Lee Jensen and all the Prescotts, Kurt Kaliban, and Grant and Klara Hornung. It was a beautiful early summer evening, a great night for a parade.

It was, of course, the My Waterloo Days parade. I rode in a black Toyota convertible with Frieda and Anna Mae Weems, invited to join them as a board member of the Cedar Valley Civil Rights Peace Walk Memorial Committee. This committee exists to promote the development of a Peace Walk memorial to Martin Luther King, Jr. in Washington Park, to commemorate Dr. King’s visit to Waterloo in 1959 and to serve as a symbol of our community’s commitment to peace in the midst of an often fragmented and divisive society.

Thousands of Waterloo’s residents lined the streets of the parade route, watching and waving and cheering, and it was a thrill for us in the car, having the advantage of moving among all of them, to appreciate the scope and diversity of the crowd. We have a beautiful city! We are an emblem, a case in point, of the melting pot that is our nation. The parade brought together, side-by-side, rich and poor, mayors and street people, young children and old men, African-Americans and Bosnians and Africans and Hispanics and European-Americans. For a few moments, we existed, not in our isolated and separated neighborhoods and working places, but together, all of us sharing a parade, all of us sharing this beautiful summer evening.

It was a glimpse of what we are, as a community, as a people, a glimpse that convinces me all the more of the appropriate purpose of a memorial, a peace memorial to Martin Luther King, and of the honor it would be to have it here, in our neighborhood. Don Damon said he saw me that night in a TV report about the parade. He scolded me because I wasn’t smiling. Sorry, Don! But I am smiling now as I think about that parade and about all the people, all God’s beautiful children, I saw along the way …

a spring delight

a spring delight

Comments 1 comment

I have been experimenting with our new digital camera, the camera I plan to use extensively this summer during my sabbatical. This is a photo of the phlox and daylily shoots growing at the foot of our mailbox.

Lavender creeping phlox

what makes the soul great

what makes the soul great

Comments 0 Comment

Notice the Wonder was posted today on the inward/outward website. It quotes Abraham Heschel, a theologian and a lover of God whom I have always found most insightful and eloquent.

To pray is to take notice of the wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the divine margin in all attainments. Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living. It is all we can offer in return for the mystery by which we live. Who is worthy to be present at the constant unfolding of time? Amidst the meditation of mountains, the humility of flowers wiser than all alphabets—clouds that die constantly for the sake of god’s glory, we are hating, hunting, hurting. Suddenly we feel ashamed of our clashes and complaints in the face of the tacit glory in nature. It is so embarrassing to live! How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned rights to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.

reminders of an (almost) perfect day

reminders of an (almost) perfect day

Comments 0 Comment

The Bubbles reflected in Jordan Pond

This is one of my favorite photographs from a five-mile hike over Penobscot and Sargent mountains in Acadia National Park. It frames the reflection of the Bubbles overlooking the north end of Jordan Pond. I like the way the photo turned out, granite mounds reflected in the still waters, framed by green branches and a half-submerged rock in the foreground.

Stoney, our two-and-a-half year old Australian Shepherd, accompanied me on the hike and we both had a great time that day. At least I know I did!

Stoney on Sargent Mountain

I had been anticipating and planning this day for a year. Each year for three years, Stoney and I have done a hike in the Jordan Pond area. Last year I heard about Sargent Mountain Pond and decided we needed to see it! The pond lies between the two summits and offers both unusually beautiful views and a refreshing rest stop mid-hike. Here’s a view of the pond …

Sargent Mountain Pond

 
As Stoney and I headed up the trail from Jordan Pond House, the Pond and the flanks of Penobscot Mountain to the west and Pemetic Mountain to the east of the Pond were engulfed in low-lying clouds. But the clouds gave way to strong sunlight as we made our way onto the summit ridge. The day was everything I had anticipated … and more. The climbing was challenging and exhilarating; Sargent Mountain Pond was a delight; and the views from the top of Sargent were an unexpected treat. It was an (almost) perfect day! And a day I will remember for a long time … at least until next year and our next hike!

(Click on any photo to see a larger image!)

here!

here!

Comments 1 comment

This poem by David Wagoner, entitled “Lost” was posted on April 18th at the inward/outward website …

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

Every place is a Here … and every place may be a home.