Tuesday Tidbits

It is a rainy afternoon here on Little Beaver Creek - we have had much rain this month, and the creeks and river are fierce in their fullness. These pictures were taken by Apple on Monday afternoon, while I was at work. The weather yesterday was indeed glorious, beautiful skies and mild temperatures. I knew the weather forecast was for rain today and cooler tomorrow, so I am pleased he got these shots.

It is a read a book, sip a cup of hot coffee, snuggle under a blanket kind of a day.

A young girl who would have turned 11 in December lost her life in an accident on Sunday in our area. A tree, root system made unstable by the recent rains, toppled and crushed her as she was out squirrel hunting with her father. Life is a fragile thing, not promised for any length of time for anyone.  We have to live and appreciate what we have now - it may not be here tomorrow, life may be better it may be worse, it may be altered in our experiences forever with just one act. 

I wrote in a message to someone last night "Don't borrow tomorrow, it will be here soon enough".

We do that, you know, we worry today about the myriad what-if''s of tomorrow. We stress, we panic, we theorize, and our now, our today gets wasted, frittered away. I am not advocating a life of not planning ahead. Dreams are planning ahead, retirement funds are as well, along with home purchases, budgets, all manner of things. Setting goals and working towards their completion, learning new skills, expanding our experiences and communities. These are wonderful, marvelous, fulfilling endeavors. I am speaking (or writing) of being so consumed with the worry of all the negative possibilities that we see littered about in the nebulous future that we are not seeing the "now". Prepare for the worst and hope for the best? Yes. Become obsessed with the worst and getting stuck there? No. 

The time shall soon be here when the trees along the mountaintops have shed all their leaves. When the air is cold and clear, the clouds are heavy and gray, the trees in their bare beauty look like fringe on a rug rippling along the contours of the mountains. I am going to try to remember to take a picture of this gift from the season this coming winter - it is especially striking when there is snow or heavy frost scattered along the hightops.