Steps to the Future

Steps to the Future
Originally uploaded by sofieamanda.

It takes just one step at a time to make the future you desire come true.

THE HAWK AND THE MOTORCYCLIST

Lunar Orbit
Originally uploaded by Tommy Simms.

The Hawk glides through a dusky eve, peering below for wayward morsels of dining delight. The Moon bathes the fields with glowing amber. The Hawk has the advantage.

Like a Hawk the motorcyclist expertly and curiously manuevers along a moonlit country road. Fast and smooth she zooms through fields aglow with nightlighted wheat, irridescent onions, and tip-topped legumes.

The Hawk and The Motorcyclist. One and the same.

GEYSERS AND LIFE

The geysir is just blowing
Originally uploaded by Gunnlaugur.

Nothing is as full of natural essence as a geyser. Mother Earth allows her heated soul to explode in rythmic cycle, deep and pure. How primitive; how balanced. Simple.

Becalmed

Walk Into the Light
Originally uploaded by Slightly Cynical.

On certain eves a wind evaporates; clouds disappear and moonlight fills a previously blackened sky with soft light and tone.

The air fills with pungencies of flowers, trees, even a nearby bay. You are within a world beyond -- a world unharmed by storm or care. The nowness of place and time is poignant.

Like an ancient mariner you are becalmed. You are in a perfect state of being.

Yonder lies your future. Here lies the present. Enjoy the present.

STREET OF DREAMS

Old road in Lohr am Main
Originally uploaded by PauPePro.

Years ago I was privileged to meet privately with Sarah Vaughan. What a wonderful vocalist and performer.

She asked me which songs of hers were my favorites. I told her that I most loved her renditions of "Black Coffee" and "Street of Dreams." She laughed and explained that she had recorded those songs 30 years earlier. "Yes," I replied, "but I really adore those songs."

Later that night I attended her show in Georgetown. She was so vivacious, so masterful of the entire audience.

She didn't sing my old favorites, but she did bring down the house with her rendition of "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes."

I still listen to her music. I even hum my favorite tune when my adventures take me to special little ways, like that shown from Germany in this fab photo taken by PauPePro. Great street.

I want to walk along it humming a Sarah Vaughan tune.

PATAGONIA

El Camino se Va
Originally uploaded by Nandos.

Patagonia.

Now there's a place for a long ride, a slow ride with music and wine, motor humming along, a bite of cheese, an embrace, laughter, and then more riding.

Patagonia.

I'm ready to try it.

ON TOP OF THE WORLD

照片 119
Originally uploaded by hs_yin.

The best adventures are those that leave us feeling, as the saying goes, "On Top of the World." Concerns are overcome with new knowledge and new perspective.

Artists show us new perspectives in their masterpieces. Nature shows us new perspectives in ever changing environs.

Those who embrace new perspectives are blessed. They see more than what is momentarily at hand: they see a better tomorrow.

NO COINCIDENCES

A Surrealistic Dream
Originally uploaded by _marmota.

Looking at this lovely photograph of a tiny stream one thinks of peace, tranquility, and even fate.

Are we just floating along in a course we cannot steer? Such a normal question.

I think not. I believe that we have greatly more steering control than not. True, life's curents and pools pull us. In the end, however, we steer our own ship, our own path.

How lucky that we can do so. To all you venturers of the world I say "Bravo"! Steer your streams. The rest will be as it will.

Openings and Explorers

Con los brazos abiertos / With the opened arms
Originally uploaded by Ignacio Ábalos.

Sometimes an opening to beyond is as small as the wingspan of a sea bird. Sometimes it is as wide as a gulf.

Whatever the width, the traveler is compelled to peer through and ...... ponder. Many times the traveler ponders only a bit and then steps through to see what is on the other side. He or she is then an Explorer. What fun.

A BRIDGE TO UNDERSTANDING

Bridge to a perfect hike
Originally uploaded by JanetD.

Winter hikes offer a different perspective on things. I'm never sure whether its the low angle of the sun or the stretched shadows dancing on the bright snow, or both (since they're inexticably related).

Whatever it is, moments happen on such treks when everything fits together in a span that lingers for just a bit. And in that tiny fleeting nanosecond all things seem right.