Sundries

Just like these photos, the past few weeks have gone by in a blur. Blur, good word... yes, blur could describe my life as well. It's all we can do to keep up with the necessities most of the time, it seems. Perceived necessities, are they doing me good? I guess that's a good starting point to reviewing the year. Especially now, with the year changing and time off work, there's space for thinking things over. Ordinary moments mined for meaning or a good laugh.  And road trips provide a nice opportunity for sitting and thinking, one main reason I love them. On this trip, visiting some places I've lived created a flash flood of memories, but also had me noticing small moments of happiness, contenment, or charm, wrapped up in the days speeding by. The days begin and end, sleep and wake up, and the in between and all it contains gets rolled up and stored away, stamped with a date. During the course of our road trip there were many external sightings of beauty and poignancy, but I was not ready with my camera. I wish I had been. Gazing out the passenger window I spied a rusted out lime green AMC Gremlin in someone’s hilly backyard in TN, surrounded by little tan oaks still clinging to their leaves (like they seem to do down there - very prettily) amidst the taupes and grays of the taller bare trees and evergreens. In Georgia, a single white egret slowly glided over a pond and up into the cloudy trees, just enough light left in the day to see the dark green of the fir trees looking perfect against the marbled gray sky. At night on Christmas Eve two young deer stood watching us get out of the car and followed us across my son’s lawn. Their hoof prints were all over the snow. They’ve found mums and pumpkins on this porch before, so they were checking for potential snacks, never mind us. These are Columbus ravine dwelling deer, well used to the human presence. On stops along the way seeing small children being fed by grandparents at roadside restaurants, noticing people being patient, Christmas decorations standing by, on duty. Even if it's all been a blur I'm grateful for the simple noticing of scenes of beauty and goodness. Hoping the hectic pace doesn't smack me upside the head when the busy days start again, you know how it does. I'm going to try to keep this attitude going as long as I can.

May the simple things make you happy and bring you comfort in the coming year.