It has been slow in coming but coming it is & I didn’t have to wear a jacket on our desert walk this morning. Temperatures are slowly rising & the ice wasn’t as thick on the water bucket this morning.
PHEEBS & I STARTLED A RED TAIL HAWK & BY THE LOOKS OF THE SECOND PHOTO IT WAS SURE GIVING US SOME BEAK AS IT FLEW AWAY
After parking the Jeep Pheebs & I stretched out our desert walk a little farther this morning sticking to the hard packed sandy road. At one point I noticed 5 surrounding mountain ranges were all visible. Ahead of me & closest were the Date Creek Mountains with the higher Weaver Mountains behind them & off to my right. To the East were the Wickenburg Mountains & due south was the Vulture Range. Looking to the west I saw the highest mountain range in southwestern Arizona. Harquahala Mountain peaks at 5,681 feet. Here’s a link to the day we Jeeped ourselves all the way to the top of Harquahala Mountain a few years ago. It was quite a ride & a nail biter to boot…….Our Toughest Jeep Challenge Yet.
VULTURE MOUNTAINS ON THE HORIZON
LOOKING TOWARDS THE SOUTHEAST END OF THE WEAVER MOUNTAINS
DATE CREEK MOUNTAINS THROUGH THE PALO VERDE TREES
SPOTTED THIS COWGIRL IN CONGRESS TODAY
We have company arriving Wednesday & staying with us for 3 days. Fellow RV Bloggers even. Can you guess who is traveling in our area at the moment & who they might be. Tune in tomorrow:))
No Cowboys in the desert this morning but we did have F-16 fighter jets overhead twisting & turning in mock combat under a clear blue sky. Finally managed to get a few photos of one F-16 firing off flares as the second F-16 closed on him. These photos are for you Joe.
I have been finding myself in reflective moods as of late & while walking this morning it occurred to me I seem to be out of dreams. Remember how as a kid we always seemed to have many dreams of doing & seeing things. A typical dream for many was a trip to Disneyworld. Many dreams as a teenager as well with one of the biggies being a driver’s license & a first car. There were dreams of marriage, kids, & owning a home. Dream jobs were sought after as were dream vacations. Always in our lives we had our dreams. It was that one constant that we realistically or unrealistically looked forward to. Some of those dreams came true & some didn’t. But always in the face of sometimes impossible odds we always had our dreams. Retirement was & is a big dream for most & what to do after retirement could easily lead to another set of dreams. RVing became a dream for me as far back as the mid 80’s & despite the unrealistic goal at the time I always had it in my mind that someday, yes someday I could maybe travel & explore the wild & wooly ways of the American Southwest.
WATER HAS A WAY OF CARVING IT’S WAY ACROSS THE DESERT FLOOR
That dream quickly picked up momentum after meeting Kelly in the summer of 1993 & with her like minded dream combined with mine we were able to finally make our RV dream come true. We are in our 10th Snow Bird year now with no regrets & as I reflect back on those 10 years I am so glad we were able to spend those 10 years the way we have. Being realists we know our best RVing days are behind us. Nothing to do with positive or negative thinking & everything to do with accepting the realities of life. We are both aware of mental & physical changes as we move forward with our Senior lives. Was it Bob Dylan who once wrote in a song, ‘the times they are a changin.’ And so they are and so they are………
Walking this morning with Pheebs a sobering thought occurred to me in the form of a question. What is our next big dream?? I couldn’t think of one & maybe for the first time in my life I have been caught without a dream. We can see the sun beginning to set on our RV lifestyle. No idea when, maybe a year, maybe three, don’t know. Do know though that everyone’s RV days will end & it’s just a question of time for each & every one of us as to when that day will come. Again the questions come back, what is our next dream and really, do we have any dreams left?? It’s a serious question & as I walked quietly across the desert floor I couldn’t come up with an answer……or a next dream.
GROANER’S CORNER:(( An evil Atheist explorer in the deepest Amazon suddenly finds himself surrounded by a bloodthirsty group of natives. Upon surveying the situation, he says quietly to himself "Oh God, I'm screwed!!!!!."
There is a ray of light from heaven and a voice booms out: "No, you are NOT screwed. Pick up that stone at your feet and bash in the head of the chief standing in front of you."
So the explorer picks up the stone and proceeds to bash the living heck out of the chief. As he stands above the lifeless body, breathing heavily and surrounded by 100 natives with a look of shock on their faces, Gods voice booms out again: "Okay ..... NOW you're screwed."
dreams never die..just the dreamer?..we all have dreams or sometimes nightmares?..here's hoping we all get to live out what ever dream we wish..
ReplyDeleteJean and Skip get my vote as to who your company is next week?
My guess is RVSue but not sure...
ReplyDeleteLife is better with a dream to look forward to. You'd better invent one! Fabulous bird photos by the way!
ReplyDeleteHow old are you really? A few months ago we ran across an "especially experienced" couple in Oregon. She was 86 and he was 89. She does all the driving now as he is not comfortable maneuvering their 40 foot Class A diesel pusher. :-)
ReplyDeleteAl, Joe sat upright in his chair and slowly scrolled those pictures with a big smile on his face. "Great Pictures" he said..more than once. Thank you so much for taking such great pictures. Please don't ever quit dreaming. It's what keeps you young and going. Joe has a dream and a goal... the dream is that the chemo will shrink the tumor on his liver to where it is operable, and the goal is to one day return to his beloved desert to watch those F-16's Thank you again for the wonderful pictures.
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful that when your dreams seemed to subside, you were able to appreciate the moment with Pheebs, Al. Those times are pretty special. :)
ReplyDeleteI seem to be in your same spot Al. Thanks for putting words to my feelings. I will admit being dreameless makes me feel a real loss. I actually have dreans, things I want to do actually mostly places I want to go but they all seem not possible any more. In the past there was always a way, over time to turn dreams into reality but those possibilities are what seem gone now. Feels very sad to me. Stuck is the word that comes to mind. Dreams are really important to life's sense of purpose.
ReplyDeleteDreaming about perfect weather, more amazing scenery waking up every morning healthy, one day at a time.
ReplyDeleteDreaming of new places to explore and experiences is always fun,
but I also dream about food, weird eh?
Hmmm company eh ???
I'll just have to be surprised by who your visitors are :-) Love the hawk!!! We had a couple fighters pass over us yesterday near Desert Center, CA - their maneuvers are always great to watch. How fortunate to have realized so many dreams of the past, to find oneself unable to think of a single thing more to dream of even for just a short time! I often dream of unrealistic things - either outside my fitness level, or outside a "realistic" time frame - have to rein myself in from those sometimes! You'll "reset" your framework for dreaming and once again be setting your sights on something you hadn't thought of before :-))))
ReplyDeleteAl,
ReplyDeleteA quote that always sticks in my mind from a Tom Robbins novel: You're never too old to have a happy childhood........nuff said I think.
Dick
Well Sue, you are wrong, not us, we are not seeing anyone until the end of December. I think it's George and Suzie
ReplyDeleteDang I see I was wrong.. Oh well .. Can't be right all the time lol
DeleteRe. the dreams and the dreaming, I think I will never be without a dream, never without a plan. I know it keeps me young at heart and as long as our health is OK there will be ways to get those dreams turned into reality. And even if one or the other dream does not become reality...it is important to have those dreams as they inspire and lead us to new horizons, how ever far away they might seem now. Keep up the good dreams, Al. You are both waaay too young to give it up.
ReplyDeleteI always have dreams, some very big and seemingly not about to happen. Yet lately my short term dreams have been lacking. Time to do something about that.
ReplyDeleteNo matter where one is on the scale of dreams, I can always count on you to make me think. Of course, after reading your blog and all the comments, I had to review my own place on that scale. I do still have dreams, and I am older than you, Al. Like Sherry, there are times when the dreams seem impossible, and I feel stuck, but not lately. I actually think that getting older can be a good thing, and that stuck feeling gives way. Maybe the dreams are a bit smaller...something as simple as a quilt that is in my mind waiting to be started. Or maybe something as complicated as the dream to build another house someday in Grants Pass at the cottage. Or that short term thing of breathing desert air again come January. My guess is, this might be only temporary, and your dreams will again reappear with a new day. I hope so.
ReplyDeleteI have thought of life after RVing and the transition to what you have called Plan B. I have always appreciated your discussions of this difficult subject. But I had not thought of the reality of life without a dream. It certainly seems for me a giant step into a vast depression. But then living with a dream deferred is like living in the grey sky of neverending winter. I live between life with a dream for many months of the year followed by three months of living the dream. I hate to think of my mental state would be without the glimmer of the distant dream. Hmmmm this is beginning to sound like a blog post I should be writing...
ReplyDeleteOxford Dictionary defines Dreams as " a cherished aspiration, ambition or ideal" From your writing, it appears that you have been lucky enough to accomplish the majority of your big dreams! That is amazing for anyone and something to celebrate! We always hear the phrase " Dream Big!" but is that really necessary? Small dreams can inspire us through our days such as hoping to meet another cowboy on the range, wanting your newly planted cactus to grow and thrive, imagining tasting a new cookie recipe that Kelly bakes, wishing to see a falling star in your desert sky soon. You get the idea, small dreams are as valid as large ones and I am sure you have many of them.
ReplyDeleteSweet Dreams to you Al.