[Well, I couldn’t resist!] Rain has returned to the valley the past month, and despite a few frosty nites, the grass is turning green and growing… I may get another lawn mowing in. Kat and I did the annual craft bazaar at Crater Lake Rock Museum, [to which we belong] Saturday, with modest sales. Made some interesting contacts, also.
Today was absolutely stunning… a misty morning for our walk along the canal, acorns and oak leaves underfoot. Not even the surrounding mountains were visible, and the trees were a beautiful muted rainbow. A time of wonder. By early afternoon the sky was crystal clear, flooded with golden light.
There are sources that suggest that developing a sense of awe is highly beneficial to one’s spiritual development. Perhaps. But it is also a very fun thing to do. I have been in awe about soap bubbles in the dishwater, I’ve found. For me, I’ve found awe in remembering more dreams, about “strangers” I see in the streets, about my relationship with myself, worms under a pile of leaves I just collected, someone’s willingness [or not] to tackle a problem.
It seems a willingness to engage in awe leads to evermore opportunities. Sometimes it is a quick feeling, or I can spend time with it and almost get “lost” in the amazingness of a thing. Awe has no judgement… it just is. And it certainly gives me a sense of a more solid foundation.
The Hubble Space Telescope’s latest image of the star V838 Monocerotis (V838 Mon) reveals dramatic changes in the illumination of surrounding dusty cloud structures. The effect, called a light echo, has been unveiling never-before-seen dust patterns ever since the star suddenly brightened for several weeks in early 2002.