Reflections and Celebrations

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Reflections in Pond

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.”
~ Angela Schwindt

Six months ago I got an invitation I couldn’t refuse. My younger daughter me asked if I would like to go an a destination birthday celebration. That kind of question only has one answer, as far as I’m concerned — an unqualified YES! And to double to fun, we invited her sister to meet us. And so we are celebrating — reminiscing, laughing, walking ourselves silly as we try to hit the favorites at DisneyWorld, Epcot, and Universal Studios. (10+ miles each day, so far…)

I will resume my more regular schedule of posts once we run out of energy (and vacation days) and return to our respective homes!

Until then, there’s more celebrating to do…

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She is still celebrating and will return after Memorial Day.

Home Again, Home Again

Iowa Farms

Abandoned Barn © 2013 Bo Mackison

The Ninth Day

Sioux Falls, South Dakota. 7:17 am. 41˚ and a cold drizzle.
I study the map with intention.
450 miles from my destination, and suddenly I yearn to be home.
Damp, the gray clouds spread before me, hugging close to the ground.
It’s farther than I want to drive, but I throw my preferences out the car window,
and phone home, “No stops today. I’ll be there by 3.”

Fog thickens, the spinning windmills disappear,
only the brown-black soil drenched with slick puddles is visible.
For distraction’s sake, I turn on the radio, listen to an interview in progress,
Maya Angelou recalls her youth, the words of wisdom she lives by,
I catch bits and pieces as I concentrate on steering
around wide load trucks and semi trucks, double strung.

“Love liberates love,” she says. “Doesn’t bind.”
I think of my four month stay in Arizona.
Angelou speaks her mother’s words: “I’d love to have you near me,
but if that isn’t possible – go.” The ultimate gift.

The exit sign for Rushmore, Minnesota shifts into view,
Red wing blackbirds dart from field post to billboard post.
Worthington, Minnesota.
“Love liberates love. Love doesn’t bind.” The radio informs.

I take a break from the steady rain, pull out my umbrella,
pace the pavement in front of a square rest-area building.
Winded and chilled, I wipe the raindrops from my arms and face,
resume my drive.

Piano notes fill the car’s interior, Bill Evans plays Peace Piece.
My chest tightens, the need to drive safely is stronger than my urge to weep.
It’s been a long drive, a long stay away.
A swarming flock of crows mobs a hawk.
Skies lighten, blue sky window,
only a glimpse before gray returns.

Iowa Farms

Glimpse of Sun © 2013 Bo Mackison

In central Minnesota, I exit I-90. Back roads cut the angle.
State highways wind through the countryside. Snow covers fields.
Shooting Star Scenic Highway.
At the VFW east of Adonis, I wait in a traffic jam.
Drivers park cars along the road, there’s a crowd
standing outside, neatly in a long line.
Flashing neon sign tells all — Chicken Dinner, 12 Noon to 2:00.
I munch on almonds and string cheese. My apple rolls on the floor mat.

LeRoy, Minnesota.
Upper Iowa River at flood stage.
More music on the radio – Unchained Melody by the Righteous Brothers,
James Taylor crooning You Are My Only One.
I’ll Make Love to You by Boyz II Men.
I’m at flood stage, too.

MN 56, US 63 South, IA 9 East.
I zag across state lines, searching for short cuts.
Lionel Richie’s Truly plays on the radio. Really? Universe, I am listening.
I pull to the roadside, take deep breaths, open another bottle of water,
turn off the radio to concentrate on the road.

My breathing comes easier as I cross the Mississippi at Marquette
and two hawks dive from the limestone cliffs, land on a sliver of river island.
On the eastern shore, the governor’s sign welcomes me to Wisconsin.
At Mount Ida, in a 20 mile an hour zone, I study a woman
as she spray paints her yard’s dried seed heads a bright iridescent blue.
I smile. Then I grin.

An hour later, I pull into my driveway.
Home again.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. A cross-country traveler by day, and an occasional poet by night. This poem is in nine parts, because the trip lasts nine days. This is Day Nine, the final day of traveling. This entry is dedicated to Sherpa, who is close to my heart, wherever I am.

Traveling the Badlands and Beyond

Badlands National Park

Entering the Badlands © 2013 Bo Mackison

Rapid City. 6:27 am. Sunny and 37˚F.
Filling the car’s gas tank is morning’s first priority – $2.94 a gallon,
cheapest gas on my travels. I buy sunglasses as I pay for my gas.
Standard equipment in Arizona, I’ve three lost pairs in the car,
and I’m driving due east into sunrise.
Streaks of angry orange flames decorate the cheapest pair that fit.
No matter, I buy them, in a hurry to find the back road to the Badlands.

I am the sole traveler on Highway 44 for miles, the country’s rough, desolate, beautiful.
The Badlands rise from prairie, stark layers of sediment,
rock ribbons in tan, gray, yellow, black.
Grasslands and badlands – a contrasting combination
of pale green growth and rock erosion. Soul soothing.

Badlands National Park

Badlands National Park © 2013 Bo Mackison

My hike is brief – an hour in, an hour out – I make the time.
Hiking in rocky wilderness is good for what ails me.
I celebrate with lunch, Indian Tacos at the Cedar Pass Cafe,
visit the Badlands National Park’s Visitor Center.
Roam through the twenty site campground – more family trips
come to mind. I am grateful I’ve held tight to these decades-old memories.

I’ve avoided the mindless Interstate roads for 2100 miles, but no longer,
Back roads that head east are no longer an option.
Roads in South Dakota head to outlying ranches or farms, or towns 50 miles to the south.
I pull on I-90 East, set the cruise control, and become traffic.
Destination: Sioux Falls, a decent dinner, a quiet hotel room.

On my last night on the road, I wade through puddles in the cold rain,
enter the nearest restaurant,
and order a steak. It comes with a first class salad bar –
bowls mounded with fresh veggies along a twenty-foot table.

Contentment eases into my being.
Tomorrow I will be in Wisconsin,
but for now, a walk in the rain soaks me in Midwestern welcome.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. A cross-country traveler by day, and an occasional poet by night. This is a poem in nine parts, because the trip lasts nine days. This is Day Eight.

Pictographs, Buffalo, Mount Rushmore, Memories

Pictograh by Native American Artist, Agate Fossil Beds National Monument Visitor Center

Pictograph by Native American Artist © 2013 Bo Mackison

Day 7 – Nebraska Panhandle to Black Hills

Scotts Bluff, Nebraska. 7:10 a.m. 34˚F. Sunny. Windy.

Smoke hangs in the air as I head north, leaving town.
Cook Oil Road.
Gas Engine Road.
Narrow valleys shrouded with heavy fog.

Wild turkeys on the roadside look ready for a butterball feast,
No kin to the elongated, scrawny fowl in Wisconsin.
Black calves peer though the wire fencing,
one has a pure white face, striking in his difference.

Agate Fossil Beds National Monument on the Nioroba River.
The ranger unlocks the Visitor Center, it’s early on a Friday,
He story tells his way through the exhibits, proud of
the people in the murals and their discoveries and kind deeds.
A calendar pictograph covers the wall – a peoples’ history. Striking.

Horses in Custer State Park

Horses in Custer State Park © 2013 Bo Mackison

Trees appear in the distance as I drive
the battered road in Ogallala National Grasslands.
Antelope stare, then break into an elegant run.

Ardmore, Nebraska, nearly out-of-town before I notice it’s a ghost town.
Old houses and churches, broken windows in faded businesses, out of business signs,
old cars, but no people, no voices. No signs of movement, of living.

Driving turns hypnotic, I jerk alert when I see a curve sign.
Enveloped by soft greens, soft mounds, soft sounds, I continue –
Me, my car, the narrow asphalt road.

Historical Sign Ahead: Wood Stage Memorial Marker.
Cheyenne River, a narrow ribbon of brown.
Wild Horse Refuge. and the hills turn Crayola Crayon Green.
Cascade Falls, Black Hills National Forest.
Bison chili at the Blur Bison Cafe in Hot Springs.

Buffalo Right of Way

Buffalo Right of Way © 2013 Bo Mackison

Wind Cave National Park,
I skip the cave tour and watch the buffalo instead,
often I wait, my foot on the brake, as the buffalo ignore me.
Huge beasts, shaggy and disheveled, shedding their winter coats.

Mount Rushmore from Afar

Mount Rushmore from Afar © 2013 Bo Mackison

I detour through Custer State Park, relive memories of a family summer vacation
twenty years past; there was a pop up camper,
a hotel-preferring husband, three kids and me, all on our big explore.
Memory making moments, still precious, favorite childhood memories.

I pull out my camera when Mount Rushmore, framed in a narrow tunnel, takes me by surprise.

Flags at Mount Rushmore

Flags at Mount Rushmore © 2013 Bo Mackison

Miles down the road, I hesitate.
Stop at Mount Rushmore National Monument? I’ve already seen it…

Once more memories crowd my thoughts, I stop, pay exorbitant parking fees,
and walk to the empty benches in front of the four Presidents.
That vacation long ago…
I remember the 9-year-old boy who sat next to me for a half day,
craning his neck, staring, studying
stunned into silence by the thought of a mountain, a sculptor and a chisel.

The memory alone was worth the stop.

______________

Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. A cross-country traveler by day, and an occasional poet. This is a poem in nine parts, because the trip lasts nine days. This is Day Seven.

Imagination – A Desert Wisdom Card

Imagination - Desert Wisdom Card

Ocotillo Birds ©2013 Bo Mackison

But if we learn to read the signs of life all around us, and if we discover that we are indeed created to be creative, then we can rediscover the power and resourcefulness of imagination — another aspect of soul.
~ Marjory Zoet Bankson

Ocotillo bloom throughout the Sonoran Desert.

They are one of the most reliable flowering plants in the Sonoran Desert, so reliable that migrations of hummingbirds rely on its nectar for sustenance. The bright orange spires pop from the ends of the ocotillo branches in wildly imaginative clusters.

Whenever I see clusters of ocotillo in bloom, my imagination awakens.

I see images of fluttering birds, or celebratory pennants waving twenty feet in the air. When the spent blossoms drift to the ground, I imagine the pavement studded with orange sapphires or paper confetti. What a rich life one has with an imagination unleashed!

Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and, therefore, the foundation of all invention and innovation…it is the power that enables us to empathize with humans whose experiences we have never shared.”
~ J.K. Rowling

Imagination not only allows us to expand creative thinking, it also encourages new thoughts, connections, and understanding. It allows us to travel where we have never been, to dream of possibilities, and to identify with strangers as fellow members of humankind.

Without leaps of imagination or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all is a form of planning.
~ Gloria Steinem

IMAGINATION offers questions/reflections for journal writing, an art prompt, and a call for action:

  • Imagine the life of an acquaintance or even a stranger. In your imagination, compare and contrast your lives. Reflect on the above quote from J.K. Rowling as she equates the power to imagine with the power to empathize.
  • Spend fifteen minutes (or more) letting your mind wander. Imagine “what if?” Day dream. Doodle or draw while you are noodling with your mind. Yes, doodles can count as journaling, but also include words or phrases, if desired.
  • Art Prompt: Try this activity on a sunny day when you are indoors. Notice the shadows that reflect on the interior walls from the window light. Capture these shapes with a camera or sketch them on paper. Let the wall shadows trigger your imagination. Embellish the shadow photos or drawings using your imagination.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC.  Bo is creating a deck of Desert Wisdom Cards for exploration and discovery, using photography, with a Sonoran Desert theme – its myths and stories, cultures and heritage, and the desert’s remarkable natural beauty and resources.