Flag Flying Free - (& Brewery) - Philipsburg, Montana

“A free will is not the liberty to do whatever one likes, but the power of doing whatever one sees ought to be done, even in the very face of otherwise overwhelming impulse. There lies freedom indeed.” -George MacDonald (1824–1905)

(& if you head to Philipsburg, Montana for the legendary Sweet Palace, they’re open every day but Saturday. 

Built To Last - 1901 Cornerstone, Butte, Montana

Strolling downtown Butte, Montana allowed new perspective on this Masonic architectural icon, in perfect conjunction with Monday’s devotional cornerstone analogy. (Thank you, Jennie Allen.)

Also stirs grateful rememberings of turning life corners out of darker trails. (Although I do have a penchant for alley meandering…perhaps more pondering to be had on this one!) 

Stage Set Up - Mother Lode Theatre, Butte, Montana

Balcony view of the band stage setup for 406 shows off some of the many gorgeous lines and 1923 design details in Butte, Montana’s historic Mother Lode Theatre. (Click here to see ceiling detail at top of photo.)

Narrow Doorway - B'Nai Israel Temple, Butte, Montana

“Every doorway, every intersection has a story.”

-Katherine Dunn (1945-2016)

(This pictured classic doorway is a side entrance to the B'nai Israel Temple in Butte, Montana. Read some of its story here.)

A Different Angle - Missoula, Montana

"I stand in the hallway and listen to her and Etta laughing and realize that maybe my daughter did miss out on a big family life as an only child, but what she got instead was just as valuable.  
How many girls have an honorary aunt like Iva Lou?

Sometimes what we don't get in life makes way for something even better."

-from Milk Glass Moon, A Big Stone Gap Novel, by Adriana Trigiani, p. 162
(Did I mention previously that her series are delightfully addicting?)

Time Past In The Present - Missoula, Montana

”Time is a weird thing. 
 Sometimes you can appreciate a moment that’s gone 
 more in the present than you did 
 when it was actually happening.”
- Steven Pressfield 
From “10 Short Life Leasons From Steven Pressfield" (adapted from Tribe of Mentors)

Staircase And Storytelling - Missoula, Montana

"As we get older, we demand stories that go somewhere. ...Storytelling isn’t an Escher staircase."

 - Dave Morris, from an essay published 4/18/2015 here at  The Bookseller 

Construction Zone - Missoula, Montana

"Every human being is under construction from conception to death."

- Billy Graham

Hip Strip Sunset - Missoula, Montana

"...And dusk crept over the sky from the eastern horizon, and darkness crept over the land from the east."

-John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

Leand(e)r - Downtown Missoula, Montana

"...Vail'd to the ground, veiling her eyelids close; 

And modestly they opened as she rose. 
Thence flew Love's arrow with the golden head; 

And thus Leander was enamoured. 
Stone-still he stood, and evermore he gazed, 

Till with the fire that from his count'nance blazed 

Relenting Hero's gentle heart was strook: 
Such force and virtue hath an amorous look. ..." 

- from Hero And Leander by Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593)

Golden Moment - Missoula, Montana

"...but when men count

Those hours of life that were a bursting fount

Sparkling the dusty heart with living springs,

There seems a world, beyond our earthly things,

Gated by golden moments, each bright time

Opening to show the city white like lime,

High-towered and many-peopled. ..."

- from Biography by John Masefield (1878-1967)

Everyday Connections - Missoula, Montana

"Creativity is the power to connect the seemingly unconnected." 

 - William Plomer (1903-1973)

Dreamscape - Garnet Ghost Town, Montana

"These hushed woods once echoed with the rumble of wagons chock full of gold ore. Teamsters urged horses down muddy streets. Mine hoists clanged. Whistles blew. Children raced to school..."

Monday - delightfully, a holiday - dawned bright and dry, with a precocious wind wafting lazy clouds across the wide Montana sky: a perfect day to meander about Garnet Ghost Town, an hour northeast of Missoula, Montana. 

Garnet's historical landscape proved appropriately thought-provoking for a day set aside to remember hard-won freedom, including the freedom to create and benefit from our own opportunity. Each building whispered its own stories of hopeful small-town families who worked diligently toward making their own big strike.

To continue the earlier quote, from an on-site interpretive kiosk and Garnet's website: "...In January of 1898, some 1,000 people knew Garnet as home...There were four stores, four hotels, three livery stables, two barber shops, a union hall, a school with 41 students, a butcher shop, a candy shop, a doctor's office, an assay office, and thirteen saloons...  By 1905, only 150 [people] remained..." 

Despite all the sweat equity and optimism invested, the wealth to be mined from Garnet's surrounding hills was finite, and the town's residents moved on to the next season of their history. 

Truth be told, the freedom we live under does not promise that our best efforts will yield wealth and success, that giving our hearts will lead to true love and happily-ever-after, that eating right and exercising enough will ensure a long and healthy life; need I go on? 

But the self-evident truth still exists that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights that include those of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. So I choose to be fully present in this now, knowing my future is ultimately held in the faithful hands of One far stronger and wiser than I am. And somewhere in that Pollyanna-ish simplicity resides a lot of peaceful liberty, and an honestly happy life.

You just never know what you'll come away with when you visit a Montana ghost town, especially on the Fourth of July.

Beauty In Brick - Missoula, Montana

"No man ever wetted clay and then left it, as if there would be bricks by chance and fortune." - Plutarch (46-120)

May you pause to see the beauty amidst the sweat equity of your daily becoming.

Brave Leaf Buds - Missoula, Montana

Oh, the serendipitous joys found on a blustery day's walk!

I don't think I would have appreciated the brightness of these green leaf buds quite as much if the day were warm and sunny (as expected); but their vibrant defiance of the swirling, pushy wind stirred me to pause and make my own stand - at least for a few shivering minutes - to snap their graceful colour and forms in contrast against the solid block wall. 

Finding small joys in small beauties makes for plentiful opportunities to give thanks - in our own small ways, of course! 

Happy (small) spring treasure hunting to you!

Reserved Parking - Missoula, Montana

"You know, somebody actually complimented me on my driving today. They left a little note on the windscreen, it said 'Parking Fine.' So that was nice." - Tim Vine

Midnight Train - Missoula, Montana

"I was standin' at the station,

Ten to midnight in the rain

I was mindin' my own bus'ness,

Waiting for that midnight train..."

- from Midnight Train lyrics by Jon Tiven/ Roger Reale 
- My fave recording by Buddy Guy and Jonny Lang.

View Under The Orange Street Bridge - Missoula, Montana

The westward end of Missoula's downtown river walking path winds under the shade of the Orange street bridge, conveniently merging enjoyment of two of my favourite things - architecture and the river. 

Happily, I found a couple appropriate bridge quotes from Bruce Jackson - I couldn't precisely ascertain which Bruce Jackson, but I'm leaning toward the filmmaker  and photographer over the former Military Intelligence Officer.

"Bridges are perhaps the most invisible form of public architecture."

"Bridges become frames for looking at the world around us."

Good Night For Ice Cream - Missoula, Montana

Evening's golden gloaming is the perfect time to walk downtown Missoula's Higgins Avenue toward Sweet Peaks Ice Cream, my fave venue for locally sourced, ever-changing wunderkind flavours. 

Recent samplings included Moscow Mule, Raspberry Beet, Licorice Chocolate Fleck, Orange Cardamom, Rhubarb Swirl, Salty Caramel, Huckleberry, & Orange Juice Sorbet. 

(Full disclosure: While I HAVE been there three times in the past seven days, I did NOT have a scoop of ALL those flavours. Rather, I went with people amenable to  trading a taste, plus added the influential magic words, 'I'm buying!')

X-Y Intersections - Missoula, Montana

“Language is, then… the horizontal surface or plane, the centre of which is always the consciousness of the writer, as in perspective the center of the bounding circle of the horizon is always the eye of the observer. To this Barthes  adds the writer’s style which “has only a vertical dimension, it plunges into the close recollection of the person…” Together, these two, language and style, function for Barthes as coordinates, the horizontal and the vertical axes, which order the writer’s world: “A language is… a horizon, and style a vertical dimension, which together map out for the writer a Nature, since he does not choose either. The language functions negatively, as the initial limit of the possible; style is a necessity which binds the writer’s humour to his form of expression.” Language and style thus become the Cartesian coordinates, the x-y axes, which in Barthes analytical geometry of literature permits the definition of writing, of created literary form, as the equivalent of geometrical form in the Cartesian sense.” - from ‘Painting and Poetry: Form, Metaphor, and the Language of Literature’ By Franklin R. Rogers, Mary Ann Rogers, pages 100-101