Archives for category: Healthy Living
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Feeling the Chill

September 25, 2025 //
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It’s a chilly morning out on the trail. I’m okay with that, I’ve got a warm sweater on. The afternoon is forecast to be cooler, too. It definitely feels like fall now. I walked briskly, hands jammed into my pockets. I forgot to grab my cane, but so far my ankle is not failing me. I get to my halfway point still steady on my feet, and the pain I am in is “only” my arthritis. That’s not stopping me – it’s not even slowing me down, it’s just annoying.

I stop and take a seat on this rock that is “my usual spot”. It’s still fairly dark, though after I turn off my headlamp, I see that daybreak is here. The sky is a hazy gray, a combination of cloudy skies and distant wildfire smoke. It’s been a pretty dry year. I find myself wishing it would rain. I sigh to myself. Wishes aren’t worth much. Yearning doesn’t take me farther along my path unless I also put in the necessary work to walk it. There are reliably verbs involved. Choices to make. Actions to take. Will and effort and follow through required. We each have to walk our own mile, and no amount of yearning or daydreaming or wishing will take us to our destination.

I sit with my thoughts awhile. Daybreak becomes a hazy gray dawn, with a streak of orange on the eastern horizon as the sunrise begins. I’m grateful to see another. For a moment I wonder how many sunrises have there been in all of human history, and whether our earliest conscious cousins among primitive people also watched the sun rise with eyes wide with wonder, enjoying the rare hues and splendid colors? Surely they must have…?

I exchange a few words with my beloved Traveling Partner as the day begins. I feel relaxed and merry in spite of pain. It is a pleasant day, so far.

The trees are green now, with hints of yellow and russet, instead of appearing as dark smudges alongside the trail. The sky is a softer hazy pale blue. The trail is clearly visible and the start of the work day is on the other side of this walk… It’s already time to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, autumn, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Practices, solo hiking, The Art of Being, Words

That A-ha Moment

September 23, 2025 //
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Yesterday was a beautiful and fulfilling excursion into a single prolonged moment of self-reflection and wonder. Meaning to say, it was a lovely day spent mostly in my own head.

What enlightenment looks like.

I walked miles of beach at low tide, close to the water’s edge where the sand is most firm and walkable. I ventured across slipping loose sand to explore rocks piled at the foot of steep erosion prone cliffs. I peered into tide pools ankle deep in waves as the tide turned. I walked,  and wondered as I wandered.

I saw empty limpet and crab shells on the beach, and pebbles tumbled smooth by ocean waves. I saw anemones and starfish clinging to the rocks exposed at low tide. I saw a variety of sea plants uprooted and tossed along the beach, and even corals torn from wherever they had been, and carried to the chilly Oregon beach on which I spent the morning. Name it? Nah. Go find your own. lol The adventure and satisfaction are not about the specific location, they are more to do with how I spent the time and where I turned my attention; inward.

What you see is often a matter of where you look. This is a picture of a starfish.

I enjoyed the day. I feel more rested than I have in a long while. I sit now, alongside the local trail I’ve been walking most mornings lately, enjoying a few minutes of quiet reflection as the sun rises. Today is an ordinary work day. I feel easy in my skin and comfortable with myself. I’m in a ferocious amount of pain, which is neither surprising nor particularly consequential. It’s just a “feature” of this mortal life.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. This morning, the world’s stress and chaos, the violence, the bullshit, and the jockeying for power by the already powerful is nothing to do with me, directly. I’m here, now, in this moment, in this local place. My heart feels light. It’s enough.

I look down the trail, as the eastern horizon turns a bold orange. A new day begins. I smile and get to my feet. It’s time for me to begin, again, too.

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, inspiration, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, solo hiking, The Art of Being, War and News of War, Words

Finding Balance, Getting Centered

September 22, 2025 //
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It is the fall equinox. I took the day off from work to reflect, and to find balance. It’s the equinox, after all. It is a time for balance, day and night briefly the same length, a reminder that balance can be found, but not held static. Balance is not a permanent condition.

Lincoln City, at Road’s End, before sunrise.

I sip a hot coffee. The paper cup is warm in my hands. The morning is chillier here on the coast. I’m grateful for the foresight to have worn a warm sweater. I listen to the roar of the waves and the sea breeze, watching the sky begin to lighten, as daybreak, then dawn, each arrive in turn. As the dawn lights the horizon, I begin watching the waves roll in, in rows, stretching along the now-visible beach. The horizon itself is obscured by morning fog or dense clouds. I hear sea birds taking flight, calling to each other.

Where do I find balance? I guess anywhere that I create it, from whatever chaos is handy in the moment. Balance is in the choices I make. Same with “finding my center”. I create that center, that firm foundation, that moment to pause, to reflect, to breathe, and to simply be. I know that I’ve made it sound too easy. It’s not reliably easy. I sometimes choose poorly, or attempt to snatch a sense of balance from a moment that wanted something else of me entirely. As with painting, composition matters – just because a sight exists, doesn’t make it visually beautiful, worth putting on canvas – and so too with moments and seeking (or finding, or creating) balance. It’s not always “time for that”.

Moments later, same location, different perspective.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. This is a good place for meditation, and a good moment for it. I take time for that as the sun rises, watching the waves, listening to the sea breeze, letting my thoughts float gently by, observed but not engaging with them. I focus on my breath, and the waves, and the distant horizon. There is time later for other things. For now, this is enough.

… Time passes. What’s left of my coffee is now cold. So are my hands. Curious gulls stand very near the car, eyeing me curiously. The misty western horizon has taken on a delicate shell pink hue, and the waves are steely gray edged in frothy white as they reach the shallows along the shore. Beautiful.

After meditating, before walking on the beach.

Certainly there is enough daylight now to easily see the steep path down to the beach. It’s quite chilly this morning, but I’m warmly dressed, appropriate for the chill of an autumn walk along the ocean beach early in the morning. I’ll take my time and enjoy the sights. The morning is mine, for finding or creating balance, on a lovely fall equinox. Later, I’ll return home and prepare a lovely meal and celebrate at home. It’s nothing particularly fancy, and doesn’t need to be (although the recipe I’m following is complex, and the dish suited to a celebration). I’m simply observing the change of seasons my own way.

…Then, I’ll begin again.

Pause and reflect.
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Categories Allegories, autumn, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, inspiration, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Practices, The Art of Being, Uncategorized, Words

Sometimes It Rains

September 21, 2025 //
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I slept well, and deeply. I woke later than usual, and in less pain than yesterday. I quickly dressed and left the house, hoping I was sufficiently quiet to avoid waking my Traveling Partner.

I stepped out of the house, pulling the door closed behind me. It took me several steps down the walkway to recognize that it was raining. I wasn’t yet completely awake. Instead of the much closer local trail, I head up the highway to the nature park, hoping to catch a break in the rain – at least enough to walk the trail there.

I am here, now, and it is still raining, and not yet light enough to walk the trail safely in these conditions. I could give up and just go home, but chances are good that the household is still quiet and dark, the occupants still sleeping. I decide to wait for daybreak and see how things look then.

… The equinox is Monday. The rain feels appropriate for the change of season…

It’s still another 15 minutes or so until daybreak, and another half hour, about, until sunrise. The hourly weather forecast suggests the rain will stop with the sunrise, conveniently enough. I settle in for the wait, and spend some time meditating.

My timer chimes softly as daybreak arrives on this gray and rainy morning. The rain has stopped. I put on my boots and stuff a travel pack of tissues into the pocket of my fleece. My rain poncho seems a wise choice, and I rummage in my gear bin for it in the gloom, unwilling to light a light, enjoying the gentle dimness before dawn becomes day. I can make out the pavement of the parking lot quite clearly now, and see the sheen of recent rain reflecting streetlights and passing headlights. A sprinkling of rain falls, then quickly stops. I put on my rain poncho, and grab my cane. A rainy breeze stirs the trees and lifts my hair, still dry for the moment, but that won’t last. I chuckle and pull a hair tie off the gear shift knob and tie my hair back, out of my face and less likely to vex me if I get rained on for any distance.

Pain or rain, doesn’t really matter; it is easy to let circumstances stop me doing what needs to be done, or the things I enjoy. It can be a real effort to drag myself past whatever obstacles lie in life’s path, but it’s worth to push on, to get past the momentary heartaches, obstacles, and assorted inconvenient pains in the ass, and get on with living, any time I can. It’s going to rain sometimes – but that doesn’t have to stop me. (It has required so much practice to get to this place!) I’m grateful for each new beginning that has lead me to this moment.

I’ve got enough light to see, now, though sunrise is still some time in the future. It’s sprinkling gently, but not raining hard enough to stop me, and I’ve got the luxury of having the trail entirely to myself this morning. I smile at the rain drops falling on my face, and taste the drops on my lips. It’s a fine time to begin again. Let it rain, I’m fine with that.

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Categories Allegories, autumn, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, inspiration, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, solo hiking, The Art of Being

Look and Listen

September 19, 2025 //
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As I left the house this morning, I spotted the crescent moon rising, almost appearing to chase Venus up the night sky.  I took a picture of it when I got to the trailhead, from the wide open vantage point at the edge of the vineyard on the road in.

Crescent moon rising, Venus and Regulus close by.

I was surprised to get a clear image with my cellphone camera, and even more surprised to see a second star in the image when I zoomed in. “What is that?”, I wondered. I looked it up on Space.com and learned that it is a somewhat unusual sighting, and that the second star is Regulus. I was delighted to get a picture of it.

The morning is quite chilly, and the dawn sky is clear. My footsteps seem loud as I walk past deserted preparations for some event set up at the edge of the trail, filling the area where I usually park. White tents and rows of folding chairs and tables are set out, ready. I walk on by; it’s not for me. I think about that as I walk. The idea that relatively few things in life or the world, generally, are “for me” or about me at all fills my thoughts. It’s a big world, and I am one human being.

I get to my halfway point, still contemplating the many sights I will never see with my own eyes. Events I’ll never attend – or even be invited to. The people I will never meet are a vast multitude larger by far than the number of people I have met. There are books that I’ll never read, having never known they exist, and others I may choose not to read because they aren’t “for me” in some recognizable way. There are groups I am excluded from, and accolades I do not qualify for. There are places I will never visit – it’s a big world, and time is finite. Hell, I’m not even “allowed” to visit some places, for one reason or another. I’m not vexed by any of this. Our mortal time is too limited to do and see everything, anyway.

These are not musings to do with unfairness, inequity, or unjustly placing restrictions on accessibility of places, events, or experiences that should otherwise be open to a particular demographic being out-grouped by shitheads for some trumped up bullshit justification. These are simply thoughts about limitations in life, and those do exist. Some people (maybe most) won’t wake early enough to see this morning’s crescent moon. They weren’t excluded – though they did miss seeing it. There’s a distinction to make there.

Daybreak comes. The sunrise begins. The sky lightens. A new day dawns. We see what we turn our attention to, but we still have to look, and observe, and bring awareness to the moment. We make choices. We are easily distracted. The more of our precious limited mortal lifetime we spend staring at our phones, tablets, and screens, the less able we may be to sit quietly and watch the sun rise.

I sit awhile longer with my thoughts on a chilly autumn morning, watching the crescent moon climb the dawn horizon, as though seeking to make room for the sun. Soon, it will be time to begin again.

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Categories autumn, breathe, Free Will, Healthy Living, inspiration, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Practices, solo hiking, The Art of Being
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