Thoughts
The open road. In a way, this is where it all started.
*
On the freeway through the Fraser Valley in British Columbia, I was shocked by the deciduous-ness of the trees. They throw these leaves out, so quickly, all by themselves. Symmetrical, photo-synthesizing, green sheets burst out of old branches and fill mountaintops like many small, welcoming hands. They are so green! So new! And then they only last for a season. They wither and fall, and all of them wait until the next year to burst forth again.
It seems so extravagant. So prodigious. Prodigal trees, shedding themselves and then growing back new again and again. It is organic waste, the best kind of waste, the kind that regenerates, that brings life. Amazing.
It's crazy how something like being away from deciduous trees can make you see something in such a new way.
*
I am on the drug trip of the North American road. I need nothing but the grey ribbon of asphault, spooling out behind me. This is where it all started.
*
In Kelowna, I met with lovely people. Sweet, encouraging, inspiring people. We stayed with friends and ate together. We reminisced. There were clouds racing across the sky. A lake that pulls all the clouds into itself. One cloud looked like a paper airplane that God was throwing.
*
In Victoria, I cocooned with family. My mom and I drank coffee in the morning and I influenced her in bad ways, getting her to pour cream into her coffee when she'd been able to drink it without adding that dollop of fatty goodness. We talked and talked.
*
Now we are in a new stage of travel. We move towards California slowly, like we're in a dream, stopping to chat along the way. We choose connection over convenience, luxuriating in the warmth of the homes we stop in. I look for people to talk with, in coffee shops, in grocery stores, in parking lots under skies filled with swiftly moving clouds.
*
On the freeway through the Fraser Valley in British Columbia, I was shocked by the deciduous-ness of the trees. They throw these leaves out, so quickly, all by themselves. Symmetrical, photo-synthesizing, green sheets burst out of old branches and fill mountaintops like many small, welcoming hands. They are so green! So new! And then they only last for a season. They wither and fall, and all of them wait until the next year to burst forth again.
It seems so extravagant. So prodigious. Prodigal trees, shedding themselves and then growing back new again and again. It is organic waste, the best kind of waste, the kind that regenerates, that brings life. Amazing.
It's crazy how something like being away from deciduous trees can make you see something in such a new way.
*
I am on the drug trip of the North American road. I need nothing but the grey ribbon of asphault, spooling out behind me. This is where it all started.
*
In Kelowna, I met with lovely people. Sweet, encouraging, inspiring people. We stayed with friends and ate together. We reminisced. There were clouds racing across the sky. A lake that pulls all the clouds into itself. One cloud looked like a paper airplane that God was throwing.
*
In Victoria, I cocooned with family. My mom and I drank coffee in the morning and I influenced her in bad ways, getting her to pour cream into her coffee when she'd been able to drink it without adding that dollop of fatty goodness. We talked and talked.
*
Now we are in a new stage of travel. We move towards California slowly, like we're in a dream, stopping to chat along the way. We choose connection over convenience, luxuriating in the warmth of the homes we stop in. I look for people to talk with, in coffee shops, in grocery stores, in parking lots under skies filled with swiftly moving clouds.