For Sunday Stills our monthly color challenge – Glacier Blue
Feelings shift like oceans beneath the frozen ice glaciers of emotions pain too long denied struggle against the cold mind closed against the truth pressures build, exploding in a single tear of glacier blue
Blue Sunrise — Kauai
Blue ocean – Princetown, Hawaii
and MORE blue oceans — Kaikoura, NZ are you sensing a theme here?
Snowy night in Richfield, UT I love the way the street lights at dusk create the blue glow
Here where the artesian spring gurgles up through the ground, I pause. My intuition stirs, something. I glance behind and see him there, browsing amongst the fading autumn grass. I sense no fear from him, no tensing of muscle and sinew. Why should he flee? My soft pink form is no threat to him. I wonder if he knows, something inside, outside the bounds of human knowing. I would not harm him, nor his home.
Others are treacherous and wasteful, caring not for the needs of growing things. Contemptuous of all they deem lesser, and all is less. But for now, we are content to share this bit of world, the deer and I. I smile and he turns away from the warmth of sun on waning grass; away from me.
We drink from the stream, with a warm delight – the same the deer and I
2020 may well be know at our house as the “year of the doctor” with more than it’s fair share of medical problems, diagnoses, and treatments.
January dawned bright and clear, with the cancellation of our trip to Kauai, and the scheduling of two surgeries. That was OK though, a return to normal life was at our fingertips while we continued to recover nicely from the YOH that was 2019.
a lone pinecone in the snow outside my door
February brought us snow and the glistening beauty of winter life. I recovered quickly from surgeries and watched the world outside go by, snug in our little home.
bush after a March snow storm
March brought more snow and a corona virus that began to sweep through the world at a frightening speed, crushing travel plans in it’s path. But it also brought a medical release back to “light duty” so I could work the summer as planned.
Kwan yin golden statue at panyu lotus hill resort guangzhou
April brought us cancelled flights and all hope for travel outside (and sometimes inside) the United States were dashed. It also brought another set of minor seizures for Superhubs, and poof, back behind the wheel I went.
Amazon grocery order – yep it’s empty
May brought the resumption of my part time seasonal job and new adventures in on-line grocery shopping. This is a shot of one of my orders from Amazon, yep, completely empty, perfectly sealed, not a thing in it. But the best was yet to come.
Creepy Clouds
June and the whole summer brought seriously weird weather. Lots of thunderstorms, biblical in scale.
half melted hailstone
July brought hail storms, several, the likes of which have not been seen here in decades that left our part of the state designated a disaster area. This is a hailstone from one of the storms. It was about a hour after the storm so a lot of it had melted, the stones were the size of baseballs when they struck.
changing colors
August and September brought stress, panic disorder, and the most beautiful fall colors I’ve seen in years. It also brought a Cardiac Sarcoidosis diagnosis and finally admitting that my working days are done. My last day of work was October 1.
Once in a blue moon, on Halloween
October brought much needed down time, and a rare Halloween Blue Moon.
Tiny display of fall leaves with a bitty gnome
November brought us an LADA (autoimmune diabetes in adults) diagnosis, changes, more changes, to daily life. New definitions of “holidays” too as we learn how to celebrate on our own, without travel. Adventures in “backyarding” on our little nature walks through the RV park observing what there is to see, a hawk circling, leaves falling, skies changing was a saving grace.
December Sunset here at Hart Ranch
December brought us dyshidrotic eczema *ouch*, socially distanced Christmas greetings and a ton of grandkid videos. As the sun set on December, I realized, in retrospect, what a gift 2020 was and how I look forward to the unseen gifts 2021 will hold.
For Sunday Stills our theme this week: Winter Wonderland brought to us by catsandtrailsandgardentales while Terri is off this week. Well, here in the Black Hills of South Dakota, we finally got some snow. It feels so much more wintery and holidayeee with snow. I love it! We’ve spent 12 of the last 14 years snowbirding. Staying in areas with warmer weather and while we had great fun, nothing quite beats a Christmas snow! A few Winter Wonderlands from our travels
The hills outside Virgin, UT covered in the all too rare winter snowIt always amazes me how snow brings out the child artist in people. We found this funny little fellow at Zion National Park during another of the rare snowfallsThis is more of the type of ice sculptures we get here. This is an icicle that ran down the side of our RV and finally frozen itself solid to the concrete slab.Winter wonderland of snow and frozen fog here in South DakotaOnce again, here in South Dakota a pretty little snowfall
It’s been a crazy year, that’s for sure. If you feel yourself a bit uninspired in the thanks department this year (and who isn’t), please do pop over to Terri’s site and get yourself a dose of thankful reminders.
Early in the 2000’s Superhubs and I left our home and family behind us. We abandoned the 5 year plan and the 10 year projections and became pilgrims, seekers, voyagers. We became Wide Eyed Wanderers. For the next 13 years our home was a 30 foot class C motorhome christened the SS Minnie.
I am so thankful for that little home on wheels. Ah the adventures, the views, the fun we had with her. Oh the places she took us.
The historic beauty we found in Sioux Falls, South Dakota
the magic spires of Bryce Canyon, Utah
and the places where the Minnie couldn’t take us, Opaekaa Falls, Kauai, Hawaii
Lake Wakatipu, Queenstown, NZ
We let her go last year to a new home for more adventures, but I am thankful for the memories. Mostly, I think I’m thankful for all the goodness of life. Let’s raise a song of harvest home, the glass of good cheer, the heart overflowing with joy. I have so much for which to be thankful, so much about which to smile. Chief among those is:
Status board at the hospital after Superhubs first brain surgery
I have so much to be thankful for, al I have is truly all I need. Life has bestowed upon me an extravagance of riches, but still I hope for one thing more. The gift of a thankful heart, a heart that does not forget the blessings I have received.
