Water

The fast melting snow in the mountains is not melting fast enough for those of us who want to hike on higher paths, but it's making rivers and streams flow with rushing, gushing water overrunning paths and spraying faces as we try to capture its beauty and force with our cameras.

Beauty and force--how often do we think of those words as describing the same scene? Or the same person? The beauty of nature--the skies, hills, mountains, streams, flowers--have the force to change a bad day into a good one. Uplifting beauty and powerful force--both thoughts came to me as I viewed the falls and river's flows at Wild Basin yesterday. Earlier Bridal Veil Falls splashed down and gushed upward, spraying in all directions.

The news daily carries stories of rivers flooding towns, wiping out communities so that others can be spared. Our mountain streams flow swiftly, rushing as if to meet some unannounced deadline downstream. A bridge is washed out, another damaged on one of the most traveled and loved trails in the Park, the stream flowing too fast and high for hikers to risk crossing. An annoyance, but not a disaster.

Do we prefer to view rushing water through the trees (Ouzel Falls in the above photo) or through the mist, as at the Cascades? Or are we drawn to the rushing waters at our feet, spelling danger should we make a misstep? Do we look at life through the mist or the trees, choosing not to see the force, the danger, the beauty of the moment. Do we throw ourselves into the current or watch from a distance? That is the question I ponder today.

I've been in the current. I could go there again, but now I'm mostly on the sidelines. What does this stage of my life call for, what am I being called to do? Holy Spirit, I'm listening. What do you have to say?