Mindful Day 14, Love in the Desert

I got out for a good long hike up on the trails in the mountains nearby, reversing the hike I took last week. When you reverse things look very different. Something I did not see going one direction jumped right out at me this time. Thirty or forty feet off the trail I got to see love in the desert. As ever, I can picture different scenarios for this photo. Was it done by a couple? Was it done in honor of someone, was it a way to leave a message for someone coming by later, was it to express happiness just about being out in the warm air and beautiful space? You could write a lot of stories!

Mindful - Day 4 Salvation Mountain

Today's response to the Mary Oliver poem, Mindful, came during a road trip we took today to see Salvation Mountain, out east of the Salton Sea in the desert of southern California. Salvation MOuntain was created by one man, Leonard Knight. Salvation Mountain is Leonard's tribute to God and his gift to the world with its simple yet powerful message: "God Is Love." I was taken by many of the sweet details in his artwork - when someone creates, over 30 years, a monumental 50 foot tall, 200 foot wide mountain of painted adobe art you don't expect to see such small details as well. I was taken by his focus, determination and sense of purpose. One of my favorite details are the blue birds of happiness (as I think of them) that cover many of the surfaces of the truck (and tires!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am going to try and respond each day to this moving poem by Mary Oliver as my daily practice for 2017.

Mindful –

Every Day I see and hear something that more or less kills me with delight, that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light. It is what I was born for – to look, to listen, to lose myself inside this soft world – to instruct myself over and over in joy, and acclamation. Nor am I talking about the exceptional, the fearful, the dreadful, the very extravagant- but of the ordinary, the common, the very drab, the daily presentations. Oh good scholar, I day to myself, how can you help but grow wise with such teachings as these- the untrimmable light of the world, the oceans shine, the prayers that are made out of grass?