Oracle State Park

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.






This afternoon we took a short drive away from the city of Tucson and visited Oracle State Park Center for Environmental Education. Information on the website describes:

"A 4,000 acre environmental education park and approximately 15 miles of hiking trails; Historic Kannally Ranch House Tours; Oracle State Park is located approximately 45 minutes from Tucson, in the northern foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains near the community of Oracle in southern Pinal County. Ranging from 3,500 to 4,500 feet in elevation, the nearly 4,000-acre park consists of oak grassland, riparian woodland, and mesquite scrub habitats which contain a diversity of wildlife and plant species."

"In 1902 Neil Kannally arrived in Oracle from Illinois. Moving to the area for relief from tuberculosis, he homesteaded the land that would later become the park. Later, other members of the Kannally family joined him."

"The ranch grew substantially over the next several years and eventually 1100 cattle grazed the land. In 1976, Lucille Kannally, the last surviving family member, donated the land to the Defenders of Wildlife who later transferred the property to the State Parks Board."


The adobe Kannally Ranch House, constructed between approximately 1929 and 1932 after "Italian Renaissance and Mediterranean Revival Style architecture with Moorish influences" turned out to be amazingly spacious inside,


although it looked like a mini-cottage from where we parked the vehicle. I especially loved the clean, spare style of Lee Kannally's southwestern paintings displayed in the living room.

Sea Dreams among the Mesquite

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.





Over on an inactive blog I posted a basic and perfunctory Noel 2007 narrative, but about a third of the way into January I have a really good one for today! For starters, during my recent visit to Tucson, the ride toward the international border as we drove out to Rio Rico-Rich River was amazing! Remember, this is the Sonoran desert with its exceptional biodiversity that absolutely for sure does not include coastal, shoreside, seashore, seaside or beach habitat. I love the title I gave this post—back in my cultural anthropology classes, the professor frequently commented on people stereotyping to such a degree they talked about customs, etc."among the whomever whatever whichever" culture in question, but today I truly am writing about things I witnessed amidst desert plants like the (yes, stereotypical, usual) mesquite and similar.

Street names included nautical language like océano, mar, ballena, mariscos, embarcadero, muelle, playa, langosta, huracán, agua linda, agua salada, (plus Finlandia and Dinamarca).




I've blogged and posted elsewhere some pictures from the seafaring town of Harwich, Massachusetts and about Salem, Massachusetts—we'd drive up the shore from Boston to Salem when we lived in Boston and later up the Shore to Marblehead, Ipswich and Gloucester when we lived in Salem, but in those cases you'd expect the vocabulary to align with the land—and seascape, which it sometimes did, though lots of streets and roads and churches and buildings got named after historical people or happenings.

On our exodus out of Rio Rico, we enjoyed cattle crossing—javalina, too, but didn't get any pics of the javvies. Given the considerable size of the bovine population cohort, we were able to get some great cattle pics; you can see four of the best right here!

Ramsey Canyon Preserve 2

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.

• The Nature Conservancy's Ramsey Canyon Preserve website

Ramsey Canyon Preserve 1

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.

• The Nature Conservancy's Ramsey Canyon Preserve website

Ramsey Canyon Preserve

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.



Late this morning we drove south toward growing, increasingly dynamic Sierra Vista to The Nature Conservancy's amazing Ramsey Canyon Preserve.

Some notes from the site:

Ramsey Canyon, located within the Upper San Pedro River Basin in southeastern Arizona, is renowned for its outstanding scenic beauty and the diversity of its plant and animal life. This diversity―including such highlights as 15 species of hummingbirds―is the result of a unique interplay of geology, biogeography, topography, and climate.

Southeastern Arizona is an ecological crossroads, where the Sierra Madre of Mexico, the Rocky Mountains, and the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts all come together. The abrupt rise of mountains like the Huachucas from the surrounding arid grasslands creates "sky islands" harboring rare species and communities of plants and animals. This combination of factors gives Ramsey Canyon Preserve its tremendous variety of plant and animal life, including such southwestern specialties as the lemon lily, ridge-nosed rattlesnake, lesser long-nosed bat, elegant trogon, and berylline and white-eared hummingbirds.

A spring-fed stream, northeast orientation, and high canyon walls provide Ramsey Canyon with a moist, cool environment unusual in the desert Southwest. Water-loving plants such as sycamores, maples, and columbines line the banks of Ramsey Creek, often growing within a few feet of cacti, yucca, and agaves. Communities ranging from semi-desert grassland to pine-fir forest are found within the vicinity of Ramsey Canyon Preserve.

Ramsey Canyon and the Upper San Pedro River Basin are situated within the Apache Highlands ecoregion, which encompasses central and southeastern Arizona, southwest New Mexico, and the northern Sierra Madre of Mexico. These programs are part of a science-based ecoregional approach to conservation in which the Conservancy works across broad landscapes with many private and public partners, sharing resources and knowledge to expedite the protection of species and habitats throughout the state.

Together, The Nature Conservancy works with partners to achieve much greater success than any one entity working independently. Multiple partners also ensure a broader perspective and more enduring conservation solutions.

As contrasted with (here's my Southern Arizona Travelogue) two years ago, this time we got some updated trail guides―adult's and kid's versions. I'd like to quote some from both, but that'll have to wait until I have a time to sift through and select some of the most interesting stuff.



At Boundless Gallery I bought this glorious bird card by Lisa K. Walraven; the self-titled site listed on the back of the card wasn't live when I tried.

Returning to Tucson through Sierra Vista, we stopped for late lunch at a McDonald's characteristically decorated with southwestern desert textiles and metalwork.

Desert Museum Too

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.

Desert Museum

• From my mostly Arizona chronicles city! life! style! I'm reblogging some good ones here. Photos by Carla, unless otherwise stated.

• The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is a zoo, natural history museum, aquarium, and botanical garden all in one place.

StarWord 2024 Flourish

Choosing a single word to help guide your journey through the year the same way a star led the Magi to Jesus has become popular around New Years and Epiphany, although it's not exclusively a Christian practice. There are many ways to get your one word. Some churches hand them out during Epiphany worship. In the past I've had an online friend choose mine.

This year I just happened to notice someone on social media (ok, on the platform most of us still call twitter) had a list of about fifty possibilities. I needed something organic and grounded to confidently take me beyond what's been close to a holding pattern, so I sifted through the list, started with a dozen, and finally picked up the one that felt best.

When a person, an idea, or any entity flourishes they've gone beyond basics onto a higher level. You thrive, you prosper. You blossom, you bloom. You're on the map! In addition, an artistic, musical, or culinary flourish adds a nice extra non-essential.

My flourish illustration shows bright flowers in the foreground surrounded and supported by garden siblings; it's no surprise that this picture comes from early summer. Autumn's past, winter's happened, spring's done its thing, and summer's promise is here.

Have you chosen a star word this year? What are your needs and your hopes for 2024?

My StarWords OneWords from past years:

2015 – Grace
2016 – Daring!
2017 – Faith
2018 – Freedom
2020 – Stillness

December 2023

• Urban Wilderness / City Paradise for December

Posada Gifts

Posada Critters

Christmas Quad 1

Christmas Quad 2

Nativity Scene

Five Minute Friday :: Store

• Five Minute Friday :: Store Linkup

Here's an older one that already says what I'd like to say today:

• Stored Value: from Lent 2005

Retail stores are places that hold a fair amount of stuff. These days they come in brick and mortar and virtual. Maybe your family practices food storage in case of need or disaster? That type of store always is wise, particularly in more remote rural areas.

Pantries store or hold canned, boxed, and other ingredients at the ready. Whether a place to shop, or a location to gather fixings for a meal, we fully expect all those stores to be depleted and later restocked. After all, even food that's dry needs to be fresh. When we consider non-food items, clothing, household décor, outdoor supplies, and other "stuff" rotates seasonally. Besides, clothes you bought for yourself a few years back may be seriously out of style, may not fit, and if it's your kids' apparel, they've plain outgrown it.

No stored physical provisions last forever. But we have stores of gifts in the Holy Spirit that are eternal and expansive. They don't need restocking or restoring. In fact, you may have noticed the more you gift others out of your store of love, mercy, compassion, and grace, the more your stores of those spiritual gifts expand and grow?

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Five Minute Friday :: Turn

• Five Minute Friday :: Turn Linkup

I love to write about Advent! I love Advent music! I love Advent's promise of hope, of God among us is such a paradoxical way, God's promise of the end of the world as we've known it: the end of death, destruction, empire, violence, exploitation. The dawn of hope and possibility. Last week on FMF I wrote, "Hope for the death of death starts with the birth of Jesus of Nazareth."

In the wilderness alongside the Jordan River, John the Baptist preached a "baptism of repentance for forgiveness of sins." Repent, turn around, the day of the Lord is at hand is classic prophecy. And "after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the good news [gospel] of God and saying, 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news [gospel].'" Mark 1:14-15

"Turn around and repent" is our daily action of turning toward the sunrise and trusting God through the new day. It may or not be factual, but have you heard how reformer Martin Luther reminded himself "I am baptized" as he washed his face every morning? Repent. Turn around. Umkehr. Metanoia. Live into your baptism!

During Advent, we hear Mary's Holy Spirit-inspired canticle called the Magnificat you can read in or sing from Luke 1:46-55. You may be aware of how well people memorized scripture – literally taking it to heart – two millennia ago; although we have the words Luke wrote, it's very likely Mary sang a very similar song because this passage is closely based upon Hannah's song in 1 Samuel 2:1-10. Mary would have been able to recite and make Hannah's words her own.

Paraphrasing Mary's Magnificat, Canticle of the Turning announces the world is about to turn! God turns toward us! God turns and comes even closer to earth! This is global change! As the world turns, the whole world changes!

Because so many YT videos aren't there forever, I no longer link to any, but you easily can find many wonderful solo and choral versions to enjoy. Maybe you've sung Canticle of the Turning in a choir or as a solo? Maybe your church musicians have sung it or you know it as a hymn?

Canticle of the Turning

1 My soul cries out with a joyful shout
that the God of my heart is great,
and my spirit sings of the wondrous things
that you bring to the ones who wait.
You fixed your sight on your servant's plight,
and my weakness you did not spurn,
so from east to west shall my name be blest.
Could the world be about to turn?

Refrain
My heart shall sing of the day you bring.
Let the fires of your justice burn.
Wipe away all tears, for the dawn draws near,
and the world is about to turn.

2 Though I am small, my God, my all,
you work great things in me,
and your mercy will last from the depths of the past
to the end of the age to be.
Your very name puts the proud to shame,
and to those who would for you yearn,
you will show your might, put the strong to flight,
for the world is about to turn. Refrain

3 From the halls of power to the fortress tower,
not a stone will be left on stone.
Let the king beware for your justice tears
every tyrant from his throne.
The hungry poor shall weep no more,
for the food they can never earn;
there are tables spread, every mouth be fed,
for the world is about to turn. Refrain

4 Though the nations rage from age to age,
we remember who holds us fast:
God's mercy must deliver us
from the conqueror's crushing grasp.
This saving word that our forebears heard
is the promise which holds us bound,
till the spear and rod can be crushed by God,
who is turning the world around. Refrain

Gary Daigle, Rory Cooney, and Theresa Donohoo
© 1990, GIA Publications, Inc.

• Mary Icon by Scott Ward

Five Minute Friday :: Left

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• Five Minute Friday :: Left Linkup

Intro

Much more often than not I illustrate my blogs with my own photographs and art, but sometimes I don't have the right stuff, so I search the interwebs to find something that fits. I believe Kate usually sources from Unsplash for FMF, and how excited I was to see this week's was one of my faves I've used here at least twice: with the caption "absence" that only a scant three months ago illustrated my FMF on September 1st; five years ago, it headed my August and Summer highlights that I captioned full futures… empty plates.


Left

The word "left" has quite a few connotations. Many people seem to view my political stance as pretty far left, but I consider myself only a little left of center, or "left-leaning." Historically left has related to the latin word for left that's "sinister." But a keyboard score that includes instructions to play a passage with MS – or mano sinister feels not only benign but helpful. Yet keyboard instructions to play a section with your right hand or mano derecha uses language of just and righteous, though in the piano case it's simply a location on the opposite side of left and doesn't assume any particular value.

After a loss, we often consider "how much is left now?" What remains? Enough to work with, to grow a future from? Sufficient leftovers, too. Many culinary leftovers are much tastier than the original meal or dish they derived from, though some seem scant and feel like a last resort "this is all we have left for lunch." At least in some of those situations of [almost] empty plates, can we find or invite another ingredient or another person to augment or even complete the meal?

After a loss, we often consider "how much is left now?" What remains? Enough to work with, to grow a future from? What have you lost? Your dreams? A friend? A family member? Your way in the world or around this neighborhood? How does something or someone being absent relate to whatever's left, whether it's a person, a home, an opportunity, garden produce, or a meal ingredient? But is anything left? A memory to inspire and motivate you? A still reasonable career plan? A nicely-done center portion inside the meal you singed on the outside?

As the church opens wide a new year of grace with the season of Advent, we know, we acknowledge, we announce, we sing, "hope is left." Hope for a new creation, hope for new ways of being that subvert the old. Hope for the death of death starts with the birth of Jesus of Nazareth.

Run, come, see! Little baby Jesus, born in Bethlehem. Run, come, see! The stone rolled away. Is anything left? God's presence, God's love and mercy is left. In the promise of resurrection, God's future is left. And did you know we don't need to see it in order to believe it? Amen? Amen!

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