One thing that is constantly and wonderfully borne in on me as I travel is how utterly beautiful our world is. Everywhere I go, there is magnificent scenery easily at hand. For someone who spends as much time driving as I do, this gorgeous wayside beauty along the way is crucial. As important as the beauty that can be found hiking into the wilderness.
It’s true that I can’t hear birds or crickets or silence while I’m in the truck. Or smell sagebrush or pine trees or feel a soft breeze. But I can see dappled sunlight in forests, mountains with crowns of clouds, deserts stretching to the horizon. Streams flow past, sometimes cascading into waterfalls.
I see the history of the planet in the jagged upthrusts of rock and the millions-of-years-old canyons cut by patient rivers. I can see storms in the distance, sunsets, slivers of moon.
This tends not to be true of the places where we live. We possess a tragic willingness to meet the grandeur of the world with strip malls, box stores, and flat rugs of grass. Getting off the road in an inhabited place is often an exit from the sublime into dreariness.
Because the landscape gets wilder as you go north, the roads in British Columbia, the Yukon, and Alaska are startlingly beautiful. Mile upon mile of roadside wonders in every direction..
Driving through all that wayside beauty has a bewitching effect. The catch of breath and expanding heart that comes as a snow-capped volcano rises from shimmering blue water happens over and over again. Around another bend, magenta flowers frame a glacier in the distance. Another bend, sunlight glitters on the cascade of water down a lush, green coastal slope.
Driving becomes an open heart meditation. Even after a whole day, and a complaining back, it’s hard to return to the reality of towns, RV parks, dinner. We are here to see this. To be the consciousness of the universe reflecting on itself, to be participants in its continual unfolding.
Of course, it’s best to be out in it, not driving through it. But since traveling requires the latter, I’m celebrating the great gift of the moving panorama I can see from the road. Magically lit mountains, still water at twilight, the coming of fall on the Yukon road to the Arctic, clouds, rivers, reflections.
The Irish poet John O’Donohue said that one gift of the Celtic imagination is that landscape isn’t just matter. It’s as alive as we are, just in a totally form. Maybe my love of Earth is a legacy of my Irish heritage. But most indigenous cultures feel the same way. Not so long ago, we were all indigenous to a living landscape somewhere on our planet.
Perhaps what gets stirred when we leave our settlements is an ancestral sense of kinship with our vibrant world. Of emerging from it, being an integral part of it. We travel through a landscape that speaks to us of history, endless beauty, mystery, and presence.
(Top photo is a mountain being lit from below by the setting sun in Donald, British Columbia.)
The photo collections from my Alaska adventure can be found on the Galleries page.
~ RELATED POSTS ~
Living on an ancient, vital landscape had a profound effect on me. It was my call of the wild. As I did in childhood, I could feel the aliveness of the landscape itself and my place in it.
Human history is barely a whisper in Earth’s 4.5 billion year timeline. A lot of wild things happened before we came along. Utah is a perfect showcase. Standing on ancient stone, I can find both the history of Earth and my soul’s bedrock.
In Missouri, I found a country road full of wildflowers and other beauties. Walking grounds me on our green and breathing planet, weaving me deeply into the plants I love. And, in this case, into some curious cows and an adventurous baby bird.
Hello, Betsy: My brother, John Boettiger, wrote me about your work. I have just taken some peeks, and am so grateful to you for sharing such beauty – comments, reflections, and photos. What adentures you had, and are having, finding our worlds, near doorsteps and along our highways. Thank you. Ellie
Thank you, Ellie. I’m so happy to welcome you here. I seem to remember John telling me that he’d like to introduce us, so I’m delighted he did.
Your words are as alive as the land. ❤️❤️❤️
Thanks, love that!
Here is my compliment: I can’t tell the difference between you and the living landscape. So your “celebration” is complete, completely successful, completely engaging and completely engulfing.
When Carl Safina wrote his first book, “Song for the Blue Ocean,” his amazed, yet-of-course-admiring, mother asked him, “Who wrote the title?” (Carl quietly smiles.) So, in that spirit, I’ll ask, “Who took the photos?” : )
Ineffable is all I have to say. I hope they are copyrighted, flickerized or whatever.
Kudos to you for doing this — AND sending via e-post. And kudos to me for responding — with this doable form. Send more, so I can take small rests between by nose-to-grindstone.
Love….
(ps These darn computers think they know it all. So if one of my words like “flickerized” comes out as “flickered,” blame it on them. They, with no soul of the earth. As my NYT editor used to call me and say, “Forgive the Time-eze editing of your excellent writing by my mignons.” kb (as in KB Madigan-McCormick)
” I can’t tell the difference between you and the living landscape.” My work is done! Thanks, my dear.
It is a breathtakingly beautiful and alive experience to take in your post! I love your words of wisdom- “We are here to see this, to be the consciousness of the universe reflecting on itself, to be participants in its continual unfolding.” It gives me goosebumps. Thank you for the gift of awakening consciousness through your words and images!
Thank you for your beautiful response, Marcia.
Dear Betsey,
Now that I continue as follower and friend, I continue to savor the depth, integration and beauty of your prose and photographs. “Wayside beauty” is stunning. I’ll be leading a small midweek meditation group here this afternoon, and will share your wayside with my fellowship. These days I travel less than you, and my feet are my main mode, but I still take to the road and always the wayside beauty. I’ll be driving to spend a couple of weeks at Thanksgiving with children and grandchildren in Oregon, with many stops at the wayside.
Warm wishes,
John
Thank you so much, John. I’m delighted to be part of your group’s meditation. Once beyond the cities, the trip to Oregon is so beautiful.
Never has “Oh… My God…” seemed so totally appropriate as right this minute…
One of Dr. Seuss’ last books was titled, “Oh, The Places You’ll Go.” I so often think of that when I see, and read, your posts.
The book! I WANT THE BOOK!! YOUR BOOK!!!
MLAA, Dear Friend
Ahoy, I was a co-pilot on some of these miles…Let those who have eyes let them see through a glass clearly.
:Behold I make all things new”..Peace my love GAW
Revelations, first thing in the morning!
Thank you so much for this wonderful enthusiasm! I love that book, too. My favorite line is when he sends him off ‘with a head full of brains and shoes full of feet.’