Taken: January 12, 2010, approx 2:30 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, CA
I took a walk today.
Sometimes, I forget I live in paradise. Don’t get me wrong; every day I drive around my little town I see something new and wondrous, mostly as designed by Mother Nature. Bashing L.A., where I lived the 15 years prior to moving here, isn’t the point. The City of Angels has its own story to tell, it’s own kind of beauty and I don’t knock it. A person could easily get used to sunny and 70 degrees or as a friend used to say a total lack of weather.
But L.A. changes at the rate a super tanker turns, which is not very fast and the differences are almost indecipherable, especially if you're part of the scene. That’s how you end up waking up one day and realizing half your life is gone and you have no idea what you did with it. The price of chasing your dream in a city of dream chasers, I supposed. I’m not knocking it. Really, it works for some folks and I honestly thought it was working for me. Until I left, that is.
Life and by life I mean the natural life, changes here daily, even minute-to-minute. A heavy winter rainstorm supplanted by a partly sunny day, you know the kind where the sun’s rays poke out through half-dark clouds, reflecting off the pavement like the way they illustrate God in the movies? It’s important to pay attention around here and it’s also educational too. The turn in the seasons is hard evidence that you’re changing with it. It’s not just about getting old although that’s a large part of it. It’s a reminder that everything has it’s moment, that life itself has cycles and you’re part of the whole lot of it, as important as the smallest molecule, and as insignificant too.
I know that sounds depressing but there's other ways to read it. Maybe it's a reminder that you need to get busy doing, living, breathing, exploring .... doing your thing, no matter what it is. Find your passion, follow your bliss, get on your road and walk it, sail your boat or as the ad says 'just do it." The problem with pursing your dream is sometimes the end becomes the means and you forget about the value of the journey itself. You forget the love. I find sometimes just taking a walk around here is all I need to remind me that passion is true and the pursuit is fully part of that.
Pretty heavy for a rainy Tuesday afternoon but like I said, taking a walk around here ain't like taking a walk down Wilshire. We rent a little house at the end of a road that’s surrounded by cattle pasture, bordered in the back by a small stream. My husband is always on me to take a walk up the hill in the back, a path that ends on a ridge that overlooks the valley below. There’s two large redwoods up there locals call Adam and Eve. I haven’t seen it in person yet but today I took the first few steps on the way. It was pouring rain and riding my bike was out so I decided to grab my camera and take a walk.
This shot was taken with my Pentax K100D with the 50-200mm lens. Edited minimally in Photoshop.
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