 Bridal Veil fall Gary Snyder: "it is the world that gives meaning to each of us. The multitudinous and various phenomena of the world sweeping over us every day teach us who we are . . . the beautiful world of nature is for this marvelous sensitive human creature we are, but also and equally for the sleepy baby bat hanging in the eaves or the hummingbird on a courtship dive. Whatever sense of ethical responsibility and concern that human beings can muster must be translated from a human-centered consciousness to a natural-systems-wide sense of value. First, simply because such a bighearted sense of the world seems right, but also to help avert the potential destruction of the very processes that sustain most life on earth."
 It's raining when we arrive here, the rain becomes heavy and the wind is blowing, throwing the rain against my face, hands, body (and camera). We have only a short time here and it's cold, so pointing the camera I hope to make some image that will convey all that and the inexpressible awesomeness of what appears to one here. The mountain and the valley and the trees sit quietly, serenely through all the storm and drama—perhaps smiling a bit at the small creatures running up and down the rim looking out at them. A moment to remember . . .
 I'm back from California. It presented me with two different sorts of environment—beginning in the foothills of the Sierras, at a conference center which was peaceful and lovely. The other—Yosemite—is a world onto itself. This is from the conference center where I stayed, and now looks to me particularly apt for this time of year. It is summer here, highs in the 90s. Indeed a world away from mountains and a valley so unique that there are no words adequately to describe it.
 So now, enough of the Everglades for a while. I will be out of town next week, so no posts until I get back. I am going from one side of the country to the other, from Florida with its Everglades to California with its Yosemite—from very flat land permeated by a flowing river of grass to mountains (it may snow in the higher reaches yet before I arrive there) and valleys. Beautiful, astonishing country (well, in its natural environments, at least—not so much in its social and political ones—they are more polluted these days than much of the natural ones).
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