Favourite Tree - Bitterroot Valley, Corvallis, Montana

“It was his favorite tree and he

would sit in its shade all day

and smell the flowers.”

-from The Story of Ferdinand

by Munro Leaf, Drawings by Robert Lawson

Open To Imagine - Bitterroot Valley, Corvallis, Montana

“Yet are these things more difficult to accept than that all of existence came out of a single, random moment when cosmic gases exploded? Our eyes perceive so dimly, and our brains are so easily confused. Far better, I believe, to be like children and open ourselves to every beautiful possibility, for there is nothing our hearts can imagine that is not so .”

-from This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger, page 444

(Big thanks to Sissie #3 for this glorious walking scenery shot!)

Going Places - East Missoula, Montana

“Montana, you go fifty-five you never get anywhere. When you do get someplace, it is North Dakota.”

-from The Tumbler, A Gabriel Du Pré Mystery by Peter Bowen (1945-2020), page 4

Nice Montana Evening - Lee Metcalf Refuge, Near Florence, Montana

(Yes, dear Reader, I use this quite a few years back - but it’s apt and  recycle- friendly!)

“And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’” 
― Kurt Vonnegut, from A Man Without a Country

Light Show - Missoula, Montana

 “... O man, learn to dance, or else the angels in heaven will not know what to do with you.”
- from In Praise Of Dancing by St. Augustine (354-430)

Morning Calm - Flathead Lake, Big Arm, Montana

“Now that your worry has proved 

such an unlucrative business
Why not find a better job?”
― Hafiz (1315-1390)

Balanced Camping - Big Arm, Montana

The rightness of grasses not mowed to conformity, shrubs and willows allowed to spread within mostly natural inclination ...there’s something about the ...mmmm...I hate to say ‘balance’ but maybe more at ‘compromise’ of this cheek-to-jowl coexistence between accessible wildness and the minimal human constraints in the best kind of campground.

It feeds something in me. Perhaps it mirrors my own inner seeking - like water seeks its level - to be simultaneously unfettered yet at rest within this life season’s constraints. 

Looking Through - Big Arm, Montana

“As if being me

were a problem, I sometimes 

crave a solution.”

- haiku by Richard Bauckham