Minor Monarch - East Missoula, Montana

"...the monarch of mountains;
They crown'd him long ago
On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds,
With a diadem of snow."

  -Lord Byron, Manfred, Act I, scene 1, line 62

Not Quite Spring... - Missoula, Montana

Sister #3 has been texting photos from the other side of the world, where all is warm and light-infused.

To balance out the universe, my reply this morning included today's current Western Montana view. 

And it doesn't show signs of stopping...

Reflecting Across - Missoula, Montana

"Sometimes you stumble across a few chords that put you in a reflective place. "

-David Bowie (1947-2016)

Fugitive Image - Missoula, Montana

"...Yet mental images play an important part in my prayers.... 
But they seem to help me most when they are most fugitive 
and fragmentary—rising and bursting like bubbles in champagne or 
wheeling like rooks in a windy sky: contradicting one another (in logic) as the 
crowded metaphors of a swift poet may do. 

Fix on any one, and it goes dead. 

You must do as Blake would do with a joy; kiss it as it flies...."

- from Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, page 86, by C.S. Lewis (1898-1963)

Tangential - Missoula, Montana

"Today’s tangents 
will become tomorrow’s arcs, 
and unforeseen connections 
will tie up your loose ends in a way 
that will make you want to slap your head and 
holler at your accidental 
brilliance."

- Chris Baty 

Weathered Well - Missoula, Montana

"Nothing is more beautiful than the love that has weathered the storms of life. The love of the young for the young, that is the beginning of life. But the love of the old for the old, that is the beginning of things longer."

 -Jerome K. Jerome (1859-1927)

Concentric Circling - Missoula, Montana

"I talk in subjects and verbs, 

and sort of wind around 
in concentric circles 

until I get far enough away from 
the beginning so that I can 
call it the end, 

and it ends."

- Garrison Keillor

Everywhere Story - Missoula, Montana

"The trick to finding ideas is to convince yourself that everyone and everything has a story to tell. 

I say trick but what i really mean is challenge, because it's a very hard thing to do. 

Our instinct as humans, after all, is to assume that most things are not interesting. 
We flip through the channels on the television and reject ten before we settle on one. 
We go to a bookstore and look a twenty novels before we pick the one we want. 
We filter and rank and judge.  
We have to. There's just so much out there.
But if you want to be a writer [or insert  your aspiration], you have to fight that instinct every day. 

Shampoo doesn't seem interesting? 
Well, dammit, it must be, and if it isn't, I have to believe that it will ultimately lead me to something that is." 

- from What The Dog Saw and other adventures, Preface, p xiii, by Malcolm Gladwell