Late autumn through the rainforest

Up early in the morning to fix a problem with some timers on outside Christmas lights at our church, and then onwards for a nice cup of coffee and a scone (decaf for me) in South Granville. Then, the high point of the day, a long walk through the endownment lands forest (Pacific Spirit Park–a much nicer name, we think) and home.

Click on the image to see the rest of the photos

But then, errands to run. One of the timers was defective, necessitating a trip back to Canadian Tire for a replacement. And an electric razor blade, ordered from a shop in Toronto, arrived and needed to be collected from the post office. So long periods standing in long lines in the afternoon.

Never give up hope

Lights remind us that the future holds moments of kindness and beauty.

…success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long run–in the long run, I say!–success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think of it.

–Viktor E. Frankl, in the introduction to his book Man’s Search for Meaning.

Autumn Rivulets, by Walt Whitman

I do not think seventy years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that seventy millions of years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that years will ever stop the existence of me, or any one else.

 

Is it wonderful that I should be immortal? as every one is im-
mortal;
I know it is wonderful, but my eyesight is equally wonderful, and
how I was conceived in my mother’s womb is equally
wonderful,
And pass’d from a babe in the creeping trance of a couple of
summers and winters to articulate and walk—all this is
equally wonderful.

 

And that my soul embraces you this hour, and we affect each
other without ever seeing each other, and never perhaps to
see each other, is every bit as wonderful.

 

And that I can think such thoughts as these is just as wonderful,
And that I can remind you, and you think them and know them
to be true, is just as wonderful.

 

And that the moon spins round the earth and on with the earth, is
equally wonderful,
And that they balance themselves with the sun and stars is equally
wonderful.