DAY 017 -- "In The Wild From Nowhere"

 A fifty-fifty day: sitting one half of it atop a Harley rolling thunder road, and one half inside a kayak on the Ompompanoosuc River. In the background now comes a paraphrase of my favorite Yogi Berra quote: “Cancer is 90 per cent physical; the other half is mental.”

Up popped another rule for good living, and because I'm taking the time these days to not let life's little big things get by me, I followed it. It's simple enough:

Look up in the sky occasionally.

We don’t think to do it routinely, and even then, not without cues (a bird, a plane, a passing superman, the usual) but we should.

This picture is why. Spectacular … and I made it my own:

The afternoon’s sky was Parrish blue, painted with an airscape of cirrus cloud tails like this one, wisping every whichaway. This is how it presented vertically, and if it isn’t a ringer for a pair of lungs with an exiting trail of cancer cells draining away, then I don’t know my imagination.

Cool, eh?

And, don’t forget to purposefully look down once in a while, too. Not just to be sure you sidestep the dog poop, spot that oil leak, avoid the pothole or notice your mismatched socks, but because you otherwise just might miss the lily pad flotilla floating in the right light and shadow.

 No Photoshop required. Ma Nature will always entertain us for free, and with no help from us, if we’re wise enough to let Her.

Lastly, don’t forget to look straight ahead on ground (or water) or you might not capture that pocket of rock-rooted black-eyed Susans, or the birdhouse jutting up in the wild from nowhere, or a girl and her dog on a paddle-by barking.  

** Blogger’s privilege: I deliberately wear mis-mated socks these days. After a near lifetime of conforming to a dumb standard, I’m done with ever considering it again. Who says socks must match? Not me. Not anymore. **

Let’s close this vision-fitting day with Yogi. No paraphrase necessary:

“I want to thank everyone for making this day necessary.”

More as we go, El