Off The Beaten Path – PhotoBlogging In The Woods

I can go into the woods.

I can walk the paths before me, wander under a canopy of beauty.

And lose myself in the mountains. Experience long moments of solitutude.

Intentional in my aloneness. Choose to separate self.

Restore my soul. Surround  myself with  a symphony of birdsong. By design.

A canvas of greens and earth-toned brown beauty warm my soul like a woolen blanket.

Beside a stream. Life-giving water gurggles. Soul-restoring haven by the rushing. I can stand.

And like Robert Frost, name them, the woods lovely, dark and deep.

A place to rest in the lovely and the dark.

Where light shines though the Rhododendon blossom like a call, the other side of this refuge holds hope.  A promise in light.

And the water heals, the sound, the smell, the cool, and all that it gives. All of my senses capture the gift of the stream.

But I was meant for relationship. And I was created for community.

He calls me back into the arms of relationship. Into the community that is my world. The intimate one and the larger one of which I am a member.

And there is love.

And there is hurt.

And joy.

And brokenness.

And woundedness.

And disappointment.

And hope.

And healing.

There is every emotion that we were designed and created to experience.

In relationships with each other.

So I draw on the woods. I take from the tree-barked harbor. I leave the sanctuary of the solitutde.

And I live my life in relationships. I seek to build, restore, re-fresh, re-new, and re-love, again.

Each one.

Each precious, tender, sacred one.

And not in my strength alone, but in that of Creator God, maker of Heaven and Earth.

But those woods that Robert Frost knew so well, will call and I will go, again.

Tomorrow.

I lift up my eyes to the mountains-

where does my help come from?

My help comes from the Lord,

The Maker of heaven and earth.- Psalm 121

“The woods are lovely, dark, and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.” by Robert Frost “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening”