Magnificent Lowering Sky - Missoula, Montana

Before exiting Natural Grocers’ parking lot yesterday evening, I texted The Best Husband Ever to go look at the magnificent cloud forms  (right now!). This big Montana sky never ceases to amaze.

Blue Heaven, Missoula, Montana

“Sometimes, lying out on Aunt Ivy and Uncle Holt‘s back lawn, it‘d felt as if I could stretch out my arms and my fingertips and rake them across the underside of the heavens and end up with a fistful of stars.
Not even the biggest giant I could imagine could brush this Montana sky with his fingertips.”
- From Hattie Big Sky by Kirby Larson

Heaven’s Landscaping, Missoula, Montana

This day, dear ones bid a formal farewell to a loving man, who stepped up as an extra dad when I desperately needed a good one. All these years, it’s been great comfort knowing his solid, practical self puttered about the home place, and a visit ensured his “Hello, daughter!“ greeting. Now memory must deliver his wisdom and (often corny) humour - but what a treasure trove he left in the minds and hearts of family and friends.

On days like this, I look to the sky. I like to think of fabulous clouds as heaven’s front yard landscaping, setting the stage to welcome travelers home. I know, I know, maybe the literal location isn’t just a hop, skip, or jump beyond the firmament we see. But since I haven’t been there yet, I just don’t know; and it could be, so dive with me into that fanciful thought.

You are dearly missed, Dad, and we can’t even realize yet how much.
Happy trails, until we meet again. In salute to your genuine cowboy self, here’s a horsey landscape quote that I think you’d like, from one of my favourite western genre authors.

“There were clouds at the mountains, and the snow pack reflected the sour-lemon sun into one of the most beautiful and perverse sunsets I had ever seen. The clouds were dappled like the hindquarters of an Appaloosa colt, and the beauty kicked just as hard. The head wind rattled the bare limbs of the cottonwoods as the longer branches swayed, and the remnants of grass and sage shuddered close to the ground.”
-From “The Cold Dish” by Craig Johnson

NorthBound, Shelby, Montana

vernal by joanna dibble
i hear the cranes again
riding the thermals upward
this warming morning
calling and circling, they
fall into the long v shape
an arrow swiftly northbound

Read more from joanna dibble at her Hello Poetry site.

Winter Wetlands, Missouri Headwaters State Park, Three Forks, Montana

This winter wetland area along the meadow path at Missouri Headwaters State Park brought to mind childhood winter rambles. In our quest for a sledding hill on Grandpa’s farm, we trekked across acres of pastureland, skirting sloughs much like the one pictured, always careful to step on thick hillocks of grass and avoid the iffy ice. There was plenty of snow, and the cold had us bundled to leave only our eyes showing. Talk about a golden era of childhood freedoms - it still amazes me when I consider the leeway given be gone all day, on our own, with no cell phone tether and no neighbors for miles. Perhaps therein lies a clue to my craving for the balance of "alone time" and also views of unfettered terrain.