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Christmas 2017


I realize it has been a long hiatus since the last post but in keeping with tradition, here is our 2017 Christmas Card.  Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone who stops by here!





The raucous Red Dog Saloon in Juneau, a
touristy testament to miners and prospectors, 
offered a warm respite from a cold cutting mist and
food for our band of city slickers who'd spent a day
amid real sled dogs towing momentary mushers.
But Alaska's gold rush frontier is a withering footprint - 
a transient mark on a place much greater than its geography.
Midmorning next we saw clouds being birthed on the bay
and rising inch upon inch unmasking mountains and
glaciers riddled by blue ice formed long before
any human would leave a footprint anywhere.
All engines stopped.  The big ship drifted.
Its wake dissipated and the bay rebalanced.
Slow rolling ripples hit the hull sounding like polite
pats on a toddler's tush urging us to move along.
"Eternal" seems apt in Glacier Bay, but the
permafrost is no longer permanent and the Bay 
is littered with shards splintered from receding ice.
Time pauses there, as if every night is Christmas Eve.  
Every pause is the end of the world as it was and
the beginning of the world that is becoming.  Every 
sight, every sound, every smell announces clearly - 
God is here - just like Christmas morning.
                                                                                                                         --td

God is Here!

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