Beauty on my doorstep

My dear friend Pascale recently wrote a SoulPancake post challenging others to find beauty even in the midst of chaos. We have a lot of chaos around us at the moment, between the upheaval all over the Middle East, the plate-tectonic upheaval along the ring of fire, nuclear disasters, floods, fires, and war and violence. I spent part of my morning scrolling through hundreds of photographs of the lives of those whose entire cities were literally obliterated in mere seconds by the Japanese tsunami a few days ago. It made me feel deeply sad for the thousands of people who have just lost everything except for their lives.

After I finished looking at the photographs, I found myself wishing that I were closer so that I could help out. I do not have a lot of financial resources right now, but I do have my time, and if I were in Japan I might have been able to volunteer and make myself useful. Being so far away from Japan, I was feeling tremendously helpless, so I decided to take Pascale up on her challenge, and head out for a walk in my neighbourhood looking for the endless sources of beauty and hope in my world, that help to balance out the vast amounts of loss of life and destruction. It is springtime in Sacramento. An incredibly wet springtime, but springtime nonetheless, and everywhere I looked there was beauty pressing up through the soil, out of branches, out from between leaves, and through fresh stems. I walked through lots of puddles, and wandered into numerous gardens. I also spent some time in the park near my house, and in the amazing rock garden that is in the park, that is filled with plants from all over the world. It was chilly, with a breeze blowing. The air was sweet, and large and small birds crossed my path many times. The sun started to break through the clouds while I was out there, casting that magical, surreal light that saturates the landscape when light shines through cloud over everything.  I thought I would share some of the beauty that I came across with you here. Bring a little beauty to you, mid-week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I challenge you to find and photograph, draw, paint, write or sing about something beautiful on your doorstep. If you do, post it in Pascale's SoulPancake entry, and bring a little more beauty into her life. Life post-earthquake is tough when you have no home, and your business has no customers because everyone is struggling to get by...since so many of us have so much beauty, perhaps we could share some of ours with her until things start looking up in New Zealand.

Have a beautiful Wednesday!