At the Lake, with Quotes

Lake Cumberland 2016

"The enormous lake stretched flat and smooth and white all the way to the edge of the gray sky. Wagon tracks went away across it, so far that you could not see where they went; they ended in nothing at all." --Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House on the Prairie, Chapter One

Well, our recent journey was not in the winter as was Laura's nor to Minnesota, and yet our tracks did take us to a lake that stretched far and to a destination that offered new and memorable experiences: Kentucky's Lake Cumberland. This is where we went for a 'mini-vacation,' kids and grandkids all in tow. We did most of those things you do when you go to a lake--fishing, boating, swimming, hiking--but mostly it was all about good family time and beautiful sights and sounds. Sharing favorite snapshots along with accompanying quotes. Hope they brighten your day as the trip did ours.

"Instructions for living a life: Pay Attention. Be Astonished. Tell about it." 

--Mary Oliver, from her poem 'Sometimes' 

" 'Now shall I walk or shall I ride?'

   'Ride,' Pleasure said;

   'Walk,' Joy replied." 

--W.H. Davies, Welch poet

"The sky is the daily bread of the eyes." 

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, 

somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. 

Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be." 

--Anne Frank

"Never be afraid to sit awhile and think." 

--Lorraine Hansberry, playwright

Where is your favorite place to sit awhile and think?

_____________________________

Last Days of August: Photos and Latest Favorite Quotes

August was a good month for photos--and for quotes, too, actually. Enjoy!

August 2015 on walk

"Downtime is where we become ourselves, looking into the middle distance, kicking 

at the curb, lying on the grass or sitting on the stoop and staring at the tedious blue of 

the summer sky. I don't believe you can write poetry, or compose music, or become 

an actor without downtime, and plenty of it, a hiatus that passes for boredom but is really 

the quiet moving of the wheels inside that fuel creativity." --Anna Quindlen

August 2015, skyward surprise

"Be prepared as you write to be surprised by your own writing, surprised by what 

you find out about yourself and about your world. Be ready for the happy accident. 

Open yourself to the numinous, to the shapes and shades of language, to that first powerful 

thrust of story, to the character that develops away from you...to the surprise of the exact and perfect ending. You are--after all--the very first reader of what you write." --Jane Yolen

August  2015 and fishing on the Scioto

"Everything we do, even the slightest thing we do, can have a ripple effect 

and repercussions that emanate. If you throw a pebble into the water on one side 

of the ocean, it can create a tidal wave on the other side." --Victor Webster

August  2015 at a roadside rest

"For me, a landscape does not exist in its own right, since its appearance 

changes at every moment; but the surrounding atmosphere brings it to life--the 

light and the air which vary continually. For me, it is only the surrounding 

atmosphere which gives subjects their true value." --Claude Monet

August  2015 on a roadtrip

"One's destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things."--Henry Miller

August 2015, catching an elusive moment

"All my life I've looked at words as though I were 

seeing them for the first time." --Ernest Hemingway

August 2015 and backyard favorites

"In a meadow full of flowers, you cannot walk through and breathe 

those smells and see all those colors and remain angry. We have 

to support the beauty, the poetry, of life." --Jonas Mekas

August 2015 , a most beautiful day

"These beautiful days...do not exist as mere pictures--maps hung upon the 

walls of memory to brighten at times when touched by association or will...

They saturate themselves into every part of the body and live always." --John Muir

What favorite images or words are you taking with you from August of 2015? What writing goals have you set for September?

________________________________________