Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Road Trip Thoughts

I have many deep thoughts.
I have many shallow and kinda weird thoughts.
Usually the two don't intertwine.
But occasionally......... they do a little dance together. Not a waltz. Hmmm A Samba. Yes, a Samba.
The other day I made a trip to Santa Clarita. For those of you who don't know what that means... It entails leaving my desert home, traveling over the mountain passes and into another valley which is about halfway between my house and Los Angeles. The In & Out Burger place there is the official visitation drop off point for my ex hub and I.
I am driving along, having deep thoughts and I realize that
I really need some visual interest so I am driving along, watching for the CHP and shooting pictures with my digital camera out the windows-- without having any true idea if I was capturing what I wanted to show you. Here are some of my more successful shots. I took about 50 pictures to get these. Clearly a very low success ratio. You have to wonder what the people in passing cars thought.
This is a partial shot of Vasquez Rocks. The fascinating thing about th
is area is that many TV shows and Movies are shot here. Whenever you see something that looks otherworldly in a hostile living environment, it is probably this area. Another interesting thing is that lots of Industry People live here (celebrities and people who work in movies and TV).

Here is where it gets deep.
Prepare yourselves....

What struck me is how incredibly green the desert has gotten just from a few weeks of rainfall. A few weeks ago I went by and it was sienna, taupe, and just plain ugly brown.
Then the rains came and the grasses and what not just come to life. Soon there will be beautiful wild flowers.

And this, my dears, is a metaphor for life, is it not?
Are we not occasionally shades of sienna, taupe and just plain old ugly brown? Dry and windblown and fragile. Bent to the breaking point. Dehydrated to the point that the smallest thing can pulverize you?
But have you ever experienced how a truly deep laugh, or some kindness from a really true friend can make all the difference? How hearing your child laugh or just show affection or appreciation can go such a long way toward bringing life back into the dryness of your soul? Seeing something really beautiful? Having someone pray with you or drop you a quick 'I love you' text. These things pay a dividend much higher than you might expect. An employer telling you that you did a good job on something can make up for a lot of missed opportunity.
I want to find more opportunities to bring little bits of life into someone's da
y. Maybe it is a silly blog. Maybe it is a little compliment. There are lots of opportunities if we look for them.
See how green it is getting out there?




2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm listening to this book (yes, I said listening) called "Welcome to your brain" and they say that one of the best things people can do to make themselves happier is to make a daily routine of writing down 3 nice things a day and what made them nice. So simple, but so effective. So you've got one today; I'm waiting for the other two.

critterlover said...

Wow, deep. I like it.

I LOVE audiobooks, I'll have to look for that one.

It's very Zen to ask yourself at the end of the day.. What did I give today? What did I receive today? and... what harm did I do today? Hmmmm, interesting.