Skywatch Friday ... Monterey Sunset

Last week, I had the opportunity to go to Monterey, for three days, on a 6th Grade school trip.

After 14 years of living in the High Sierra Desert, it was an absolute joy to be back by the ocean again ... I so miss it !!

These two photos, were taken on our first night there, just as the sun was beginning to set. It was glorious !!

It doesn't matter how huge you think your problems are ...sitting down on the beach and watching the waves crash in and seeing the immensity of the ocean in front of you ... makes those problems seem seem small in comparison. The smell of salt in the air and the rhythm of the sea is so soothing ...





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The Promise Of What's To Come ...

Ah! Sunflower

Ah! Sunflower, weary of time,
Who countest the steps of the sun;
Seeking after that sweet golden clime
Where the traveller's journey is done;

Where the Youth pined away with desire,
And the pale virgin shrouded in snow,
Arise from their graves, and aspire
Where my Sunflower wishes to go!

William Blake





Blue skies and cheerful sunflowers, from the end of last summer..

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My latest adventure...

Every so often I tend to shake my life up a bit. I think that in many ways I've always walked to the beat of a slightly different drum...

I moved to America from NZ ... which has left me with a mixed bag of feelings. I regret leaving my family and miss them constantly. I've had some pretty bad experiences here. There have also been some positive outcomes of the move ..my husband and my grandchildren (my daughter's children). Life over here has also had it's humorous moments as chronicled here , here and here !!

I went skydiving a few years ago. It was one of the most scary, but liberating, moments of my life. I have no wish to repeat the performance, but I'm glad that I did it .. even if I nearly killed myself in the process !! That story is here and here .

I've kind of become a bit lost at sea recently. Life has had a lot of stresses and ups and downs. Heavier on the downs than the ups. It seems that many of my goals and dreams are floating away .. becoming shipwrecked, for want of a better description.

My solution to finding my path again, other than a good kick in the bum .... I've become a martial art student !!

I'm learning Tang Soo Do , a Korean martial art.

So far, I'm rediscovering muscles that I'd forgotten I had ...mainly because they hurt ! I'm reaffirming the fact that I have abysmal coordination. I am firmly convinced that standing in the 'Cat Stance' for any length of time, is almost like the pain of labour !!

However ... I can now twist lids off jars by myself without having to ask Jay to loosen them first. I'm getting fitter. I'm walking faster. My coordination is improving. My balance is improving. Most importantly, I'm finding a new confidence in myself.

When I first started, about 3 months ago .. the height of my front kicks, would probably have hit an ant in the kneecap (if an ant had a kneecap) .. they were that low. Now I'm kicking about waist high. I've gone from having to lift my leg up with my hands, to get it to kitchen table height so I could stretch ... to now being able to throw my leg up on to the kitchen counter top, without the assistance of my hands.

In class the other night, our instructor demonstrated the correct way to move ones hips while going down the floor in various stances. It consists of twisting your hips back in the direction of where your block or punch is going to come from and then as you move your foot forward and down, you 'snap' your hips around. Needless to say, I'm still hunting for the 'snap' in my hips and hoping like heck that I don't snap something in the process !!

If you're interested in following my latest journey ..I have another blog where I'm posting Tang Soo Do related stuff .. you can find it here .

I love this quote by Eleanor Roosevelt ... it perfectly describes how I feel..

"I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on. Life was meant to be lived. Curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life."
-- Eleanor Roosevelt

Sunsets..

The smoke plume from a wildfire on the outskirts of Reno..taken in the early evening.

Two days later ..all the smoke particles in the air certainly made for some brilliant sunsets..




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