I found these picture of a small lake in the Crowsnest Pass when I was looking at the pictures I posted at A Time to Listen. Nature is a spectacular and paradoxical part of creation and I hope this is revealed in the following.
Green, aqua, granite
Nature draws from her palette
Drawing me to her.
Water cascading
Suddenly appears out of rock
Disappears again.
Calmness and chaos
Nature speaks in paradox
Harmony emerges.
Kathy and I travel. We spend time during the summer touring Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and adjoining American states. This summer we are revisiting Waterton Lakes National Park as part of my rehab. We travel through this area regularly and it brings back great memories.
On one trip, we stopped at a provincial park just above Lundbreck Falls. Recently, I went through pictures of the Crowsnest River downstream and it reminded of what I notice and don’t notice in life. Wendell Berry wrote a beautiful piece: The Impeded Stream is the One that Sings. I realized I heard the river before I saw it. I recalled the life around the river: cottonwood fluff flying, flowering wild rose, insects pollinating, and a musky smell perhaps of a bear recently by. The river is a living instrument sharing a song to others forming a web of life.
I read Wendell Berry’s words while reliving the picture and was inspired to write a Haiku.
Observe life’s current
Pausing, listening, caring
Present with my self.
There was an image here and some of you responded. I appreciated your comments and left them in place. Apparently, I infringed on a copyright of a group that sells the postcard I posted. I leave you with this.
What advice can I give?
Stand firmly rooted to the Earth.
Reach and touch the sky.
Take risks.
Trust those closest to you.
Love those closest to you.
Find your voice.
Speak right.
Act right.
Apologize sincerely when it is right do so.
And wonder in awe when it is time do so.
About the rights of nature and humans.
Take care.
I humbly apologize for using an image posted in various other places. I meant no harm … Here is what I am legally obliged to present for making a human error:
The Advice from a Tree image and words previously posted were an infringement of the copyrights of Ilan Shamir and Your True Nature and has been shared around the Internet. I am reposting the correct version of this and encourage you to visit the Advice from Nature website at http://www.yourtruenature.com for Advice from a Tree and over 100 other advice bookmarks, posters, journals, tshirts and other eco products. copyright 1993-2012 YTN
Again, enjoy.
Each year, we learn about Haiku in our classroom. I was fortunate this year. We began the process during the fall when the Harvest Moon was in full glory. Driving to work in the morning, the Moon would be sitting above the horizon or in the evening it appeared as a rich, orange orb almost asking me to reach and touch it. I also drove through the Rockies just before the school year began and Mount Robson was in full majesty with a tiny wisp of cloud.
It had been several years since I heard a student say, “Poetry is stupid. My dad says it is a waste of time” or words to that effect. This year I heard it. I even had one parent tell me it was a waste of time. I calmly pointed out writing out poetry, in general, is the practice of choosing the right word and Haiku takes this one step further, at least I think it does. What I left unsaid, but is worthy of saying, poetry is always present, is part of being mindful, and being in the world.
Those mornings and evenings I observed the moon I found words pressing forward and asked to be shared. I wrote these on the whiteboard as an exercise of being mindful and present.
Majestically,
Touching endless sky above
Roots firmly grounded.
Greetings and adieu
Sun and Moon sharing the sky
Guides my morning drive.
Enjoy Saturday.
Here is a nice thought for the evening and beyond. I am sure we can relate to this many days. What do we remember about someone or something long past? Personally, I give it a lot of thought. It is so interesting what quiet time conjures up and who it conjures up.
Nothing worth its salt comes easy. I enjoy Wendell Berry and his reminders that the world is a better place if we live in it fully in the moment and mindful of this very moment and place.
If we will have the wisdom to survive,
to stand like slow-growing trees
on a ruined place, renewing, enriching it,
if we make our seasons welcome here,
asking not too much of earth or heaven,
then a long time after we are dead
the lives our lives prepare will live
here, their houses strongly placed
upon the valley sides, fields and gardens
rich in the windows. The river will run
clear, as we will never know it,
and over it, birdsong like a canopy.
On the levels of the hills will be
green meadows, stock bells in noon shade.
On the steeps where greed and ignorance
cut down
the old forest, an old forest will stand,
its rich leaf-fall drifting its roots.
The veins of forgotten springs will have
opened..
Families will be singing in their fields.
In the voices they will hear a music
risen out of the ground. They will take
nothing from the ground they will not
return,
whatever the grief at parting. Memory,
native to this valley, will spread over it
like a grove, and memory will grow
into a legend, legend into song, song
into sacrament. The abundance of this
place,
the songs of its people and its birds,
will be health and wisdom and indwelling
light. This is no paradisal dream.
Its hardship is its possibilities.
─Wendell Berry
When we discussed this poem, students understood that success is not always an easy journey. Some important aspects are the hard work and disappointments along the way. The word and phrase that caught their attention was “This is no paradisal dream. Its hardship is its possibilities.
insignificant
countless gathering form one
majestic power
This is a winter picture of La Chute (waterfall in English) Montmorency just outside Quebec City. At the base of the falls, around the open water, fly fishermen will be out during the summer. What you see a the top is a walkway across the falls and there is a tram just to the right of this picture. The St. Lawrence River is only a few hundred metres from the base of the falls.
Here is a second picture of the falls. When Kathy and I were determined to see these falls. The pictures do not do them justice, but, as you can tell even in winter, they are spectacular. While driving across Le Pont Pierre-Laporte my fear of heights kicked in when I realized how far above the St. Lawrence we were. I needed to be in the right lane, but there was no way I was getting that close to the edge and it took creative driving on the far side of the bridge to get to the falls.
This is Athabasca Falls in Jasper National Park. You can see the Athabasca River in the background. Even in the park, it is a wide river at this point and it narrows quickly to shoot through the gorge. Kathy took this picture from the small wooden bridge that goes over the falls. You can just see the railing in the foreground. When you cross the bridge, you can walk up-stream along the river for several kilometres.
This is a slightly different view of the falls. The force of the water passing through the gorge has created a new stream bed. The water cut through solid granite. Below, you see one of the many mountains along Highway 93 between Jasper and Banff.
This is a view of one of the many mountains along Highway 93 between Banff and Jasper and is not far from Athabasca Falls.
This is the Columbia Icefield looking back towards the source of the glacier and mountains. This is at the headwaters of the Athabasca River.
This is the Columbia River in Oregon. Although it is a spectacular view, I wonder what price we pay for progress:? Under that water, lies a spectacular river with rapids and waterfalls. Also hidden from view is a way of life of people who settled along this magnificent river. What a loss!
This was a small waterfall along the Continental Divide in Yellowstone.
Let me admit, “I am not a cat person.” Cats view me as a scratching post and someone to annoy, but we once owned a cat or maybe she owned us. She was beyond unique as feline characters go. This is the story of how she captured us.
We lived across the Fraser River from McBride in the Robson Valley of British Columbia. Our dog was agitated that evening as an early winter storm descended upon us with all its wrath. She insisted on going in and out of the house. Kathy suggested I check and see if a coyote had come down from hillside into the backyard. Armed with a .22 caliber rifle, I went outside accompanied by the dog. The snowfall was heavy and the wind was blowing it around to the point I could not see the trees at the back of the yard. I decided there was nothing of real interest and turned back to the house.
I stopped momentarily to tap snow from the roof of the dog house. When I did, a kitten shot out and ran across the backyard to the willow stand and some derelict buildings to the side of the house. I followed and saw it enter one of the old buildings, but was not dressed to continue my search. I returned to the house and Kathy asked what I had seen. When I replied that is was kitten she wanted to know where it was. I pointed out I was not suitably dressed. She put on a parka and boots and went out to look for the kitten. Kathy returned with a tiny black and white bundle that was none too happy. We closed the door, released the kitten, and she immediately escaped under the couch to avoid the dog who thought this was a potential playmate. Kathy put a bowl of warm milk with broken up bread just under the edge of the couch so it was out of reach of the dog, but accessible to the cat. We left the cat there for the night, put the dog in the bedroom with us, and went to bed listening to the howling wind.
The next morning dawned beautiful. We had a layer of fresh snow, a brilliant blue sky, and a sharp cold feel in the air. Kathy went to put the dog out and there was a flash of black as the kitten shot out the door, across the backyard, and found refuge under the hay shed. To keep hay from getting wet from the marshy piece of land we sat on, the floor of the shed was elevated above the grond. We could see the kitten and it could see us, but it was not coming out.
Kathy, an innovative farm girl, got a bowl of milk and bread and put it 3-4 feet or about a meter in front of the shed and stood on the front lip of its floor. She did not wait long. The kitten tentatively edged out and began to lap up the milk. Engrossed and oblivious to its surroundings, the cat was vulnerable and Kathy pounced and recaptured our future cat.
We owned the cat for about 4 years. I was never her scratching post. She would come and sit with me in my easy chair in the living room to watch TV. She was always tiny never getting beyond the size of large kitten. We think she was abandoned, likely part of a litter, to die. A newborn would be easy prey for coyotes, quickly starve, and dehydrate. In the cold weather of early winter, she would not have lasted much longer. Besides being tiny and my only feline friend, she was odd in other ways. Her best friend, besides me, was the dog. They played, ate, and slept together. When not sleeping with the dog, the cat tucked her forehead on the floor, put her butt in the air, and in that odd position slept. When company visited, she disappeared. One visitor knew we had a cat, because her allergies flared up instantly upon arrival. The cat reappeared when the door closed behind any visitor.
To this day, I remain skeptical of cats and their intentions towards me, because they still mistreat me. Having said this, I am not certain I was not once owned by a cat and enjoyed it.
These pictures were from a trip through parts of Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon.
This is a small church along Highway 89. It seats about 10 or 12 people and it must get very warm inside on a hot summer day. My mother always reminds us the heat we feel here is a small sample of what we might get in the after life.
Here I am at the University of Portland at the convocation ceremony when I received my Master of Education degree. The cohort group I was part of and the unique delivery of this program by the University of Portland made this one of those events that I look back and treasure.
The white speck up the mountain side is the statue of Our Lady of the Rockies as you drive into Butte. It sits on the Continental Divide at more than 8000 ft. above sea level and it is about 90 feet tall. It looks the mountains and valleys traveled by First Nations’ people and explorers such as Lewis and Clark.
Kathy and I are avid golfers. This is a view from a Jack Nicklaus designed course in Anaconda MT called Old Works. The course was built on the site of an old copper mine and the black pile in the foreground is a slag heap from the mine. In the design of the course, the slag was used to fill bunkers instead of sand and several tee boxes were built on top of some of the piles. In the background, you can see the stack from the mine. The greens are unforgiving and difficult to read. I hit most of my fairways and reached the greens in regulation or one more shot yet struggled to break 95 in the rounds I played. Most of the greens I putted 3 or 4.
Here I am at one of the Lewis and Clark interpretive centres in Great Falls MT. We spend a fair amount of time in museums during our travels. I was auditioning for role, but apparently, the people were a bit smaller than I am.
This is a view of the dam at Great Falls MT from the Lewis and Clark interpretive centre.
This was a small creek we stopped beside as we made our first crossing of the Continental Divide.
Please enjoy.
My mother tells a story about her mother, my Mémère, which is French for Grandmother. The family lived in a cabin and had a homestead on the Lesser Slave Lake when my mother was growing up. The cabin had a dirt floor which needed sweeping regularly. People tell me a dirt floor is swept so things spilled on it are not packed down into the dirt and to reduce vermin.
Mémère was sweeping when, quick as a flash, a weasel ran across the floor. She, Mémère that is, moved her bottom hand adeptly up the broom handle much like a baseball player would to hold a bat and, without missing a beat, took a mighty swing that would have made even Casey proud. My mother recalls how the weasel was accommodating and hopped just a bit so he was above the floor. The broom head connected, the weasel flew across the room, and struck the wall solidly. It fell unmoving to the floor and Mémère returned to her sweeping as if nothing had happened. She quietly instructed my mother to remove the weasel and throw him into the yard for the dogs or cats.
My mother says it was an everyday event and was treated as such. It was just another day on the little homestead on the Lesser Slave Lake.
ivonprefontaine
Teacher as Transformer 