Imbolc and the Moon of Tides

Tuesday gratefuls: Safeway pickup. Shadow, muster dog. Ana. A clean house. Alan, my chauffeur. Shadow Mountain. Artemis

Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Yogurt

 

Kavannah: Groundedness. Yesod.    Yesod is about establishing oneself in reality, refusing to rely on comfortable illusions.

Tarot: Queen of Arrows.    “…represents intellectual mastery, logic, and honesty.”

 

One brief shining: The meaning of a mountain. Altitude. Peaks. Valleys. The crust of Mother Earth folded, compressed, lifted up from its underground slumber. Black Mountain. Shadow Mountain. The Rockies. Geological time made visible.

 

Each time I drive down toward Evergreen on Black Mountain Drive, I follow the declining northwestern flank of Shadow Mountain. Black Mountain rises to my left, ten thousand feet high.

The valley between Black and Shadow Mountains has four creeks that drain their snow and rain: Cub Creek, Maxwell, Blue, and Kate’s. As I go down toward Evergreen, I see snow melt flowing fast, filling, and sometimes spilling over the banks of Maxwell Creek. In winter snow-covered ice.

Shadow Mountain slopes up until it levels off at the top, giving me and my neighbors almost flat lots.

Orogeny. Mountain building. An example, the Laramide orogeny. A long, long time ago. The Rocky Mountains. The Wind River Range. The Black Hills.

I find the mountains mysterious. Their age. The Lodgepole and Aspen forests that clothe them. The wild neighbors who call them home. The fact that their rocky massiveness once resided in the earth’s crust. In a garden a weed is a plant out of place. Mountains are rocks out of place.

I often ponder my Mayfly life compared to the age of these mountains. How can I live here amongst these rugged mountains and not compare my life to theirs. It will take the creeks millions of years to drain them into the world ocean. We’re a blip. A lit match, soon snuffed out. This comforts me. Puts my ups and downs in a larger and longer context.

I am the universe experiencing these wonders it has built. I can feel their rough granite when I sit overlooking Maxwell Falls. I can smell the pines on a clear morning, wandering in my backyard. I can hear the wind racing through the trees, crying out, make way, make way. I can taste wild strawberries and wild raspberries that grow along Kate’s Creek.

I may be, certainly am, a blip. But to me. A day, this day, is a life full and overflowing. Nourished by the forests, creeks, wild neighbors. Sustained on my steady, stable mountain.

We may be short-lived creatures. Our lives weightless compared to a mountain. The mountains take our breath away. Yet. We sing songs about them. Write poems. Run away to them when press of urban life overwhelms us.

I-Charlie. Thou, Shadow Mountain.

The meaning of a mountain.