Bookends 2016

This is my review of the past year from the perspective of looking at photos from the first and last days of the year (or closest to that, if there were no photos on those days).

January 1st found us headed back home from Chiang Rai, where we had dropped off some folks who had come to visit us for a few days.  Following that we visited the Chiang Rai Flower Show and then took the back roads home.  The first stretch follows the Kok River northeast, and soon one finds himself riding along levees with the Kok River floodplain on one side and rices paddies off to the other. It is somewhat reminiscent of driving in the California Delta.

We stopped for coffee at Mana Coffee-a small restaurant/coffee shop just off the levee in Wiang Chai.  The coffee shop is is adjacent to a couple of fish ponds.  As I was admiring the flowers adjacent to the ponds, I noticed a minute spider on the head of this pink zinnia.  The body color of the spider matched the color of the flowerhead so nicely, I almost did not notice it.

The diversity of God's creatures is so amazing!



A year later we find ourselves in a different climate.  We are with Ingrid's family for a few weeks.  They live in the small town of Barrhead, Alberta.  The last time I was here, one day I walked most of the circumference of the town. There is a walking trail that goes around the town called the Blue Heron Walking Trail.  Some portions of the trail follow roads, other portions have an improved walking path.

I wanted to walk around the town again this time, but the weather wasn't so amenable, so I walked the east part of the town one afternoon and the west side on another.  It took just shy of two hours to make the walk around the west side--the town has grown a bit since the last time I was here.

When I walked the west side, the sky was overcast and dark.  I came to a part of the trail that follows the Paddle River and is on a boardwalk.  The snow on much of the Blue Heron Walking Trail was plowed, but they didn't try to get their small plow on the boardwalk, so it remained snowy.  I got to the boardwalk just as the sun was trying to break through the clouds for the first time that day.

The picture isn't framed quite like I wanted, but I had limited places to put my body on the boardwalk.  The Paddle River is in the recessed landscape between the trees on the right.




The year sandwiched between these two photos has been a very challenging one for me. Yet even though at times life seemed kind of gloomy, God has always made Himself known, like the sunlight breaking into the otherwise dim, gray landscape above.

For his invisible attributes, namely,his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. (Romans 1:20a ESV)