I'm incredibly fortunate and grateful to have a husband who understands and supports my enthusiasms, even though he doesn't share them, not even for world-famous anticlines! And good friends further along in life encouraged me to "Do it now while you can!"
My eye also loves the forms...the sculptural shapes of the hills, mountains, valleys, gulches, hoodoos, mesas...and windrows. My camera, even though it's only an iPhone, focuses my roving eye, and then reading and writing give context and depth to what I see. The last time I felt this inspired was at the Chicago Art Institute. I'd ridden a train cross country as a pilgrimage to a place dear to my mother's heart. I stayed in Chicago a week (Edmond was in Texas windsurfing), loving every minute. But when I walked into the modern wing of the museum and encountered a huge Jackson Pollock painting, I was instantly changed. The kaleidoscope had turned.
This journey has brought another turn, and the pieces have fallen into a fresh pattern integrating many of my loves: travel, photography, reading, writing, geology, wide open spaces, meandering, and simply seeing. If I need any justification for leaving home and loved ones for awhile, this is it.
When John Steinbeck left his family and home to travel the USA, his family worried but understood his need, as his son reports, to see his country once again before he died. He traveled over 10,000 miles in his camper Rocinante (named after Don Quixote's horse), with his poodle Charley sitting shotgun. Years ago I said I wanted to take trips focused on geological sites and sights. It was over-due.
And so....as my candle is burning lower with the setting sun, I celebrate each dawn.
Nicely written.
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