Yes, I know this Journal is about adventures, travels, my good looking inseparable passenger wearing his goggles and helmet, people we meet, some photography, some maps, sometimes some recipes, the roads taken, and yet it seems often coming back to the core of my feelings that drives me forward day after day… My heart pours out on these pages, my heart pours out toward this comment from Ellen. I don’t know Ellen, I hope to sometime down the road.

“Ara,
I was drawn to your blog by the beautiful pictures and then I started reading. I was really struggling with watching my beloved husband battle the indignities of a prolonged war with cancer. I just couldn’t get my head and heart around what we were facing and how I was going to cope and support him. Your words, pictures and struggle helped me many, many times and I wanted to say thank-you, for being so honest and sharing what you are living at any given time. Lots of times in the middle of the night, my mind just won’t be quiet, I get up and look at your pictures and read the blog and I know I can go on at least one more day.”  Ellen [quote]

We left alone 3 or so years ago. I dug deep, scratched my soul with my bare hands, I still do, I seeked over and over answers of questions I have now stopped asking. I stumble daily on this uncertain road and it seems yet that this little Journal here is humbly helping others. Yes of course it joys me to read those words, and at the same time saddens me knowing another soul also is going through that dark phase that Life manages to throw at us so sometimes nonchalantly. When someone else’s “now” suddenly lets in the dark shadows of our vulnerability to Life, so many around them are also taken in sliding that slippery slope toward a bottom too easily reachable, and yet so hard to get back up it’s walls. I speak for myself Ellen, but I think I can also speak freely for everyone reading your words “we are all here for you both”. Aren’t we?

There was a rainbow tonight when Spirit and I arrived back to camp after a long day, a few stops on the way. I had for a couple hours much “fun” at the Moab Art Festival, an event which lasted all day in between the thunderstorms and the low gray clouds that have been lingering in this area these pasts days. I met some incredible photographers, glass bead and jewelry makers, the food was abundant reminding me of “Fair Food”, the Music was playing and the local Taiko Drum Teams where a hit, full of Life, giving out Life, these youngsters with so much yet ahead of them.

It has been a long time taking photos of other than Mother Nature and the change was challenging and pleasant all at the same time. As I went through them tonight, maybe because of time I have, maybe a mood induced by the weather, I decided for the first time to manipulate some of it’s colors, actually only one. I wanted a bit of the characters to stand out, background maybe to match a bit of the atmosphere of the day, a happy one and yet not a bright one unlike the days filled with sunshine we have had.

The youngsters where everywhere, look at that smile, can you not smile back?

What a beautiful child, what a “Gift”, what a miracle, and this one’s expression below…

These are my “happy mood” photos… I waited, and waited, camera pointed and suddenly he noticed me, I cannot help laughing at his expression. The adults, well, that is a different story, I don’t have such a long lens so I get caught sometimes…

…and sometimes not!

Well, my own afternoon did not end up filled with joy truly as suddenly, as they say, with a vengeance my ear decided to let me know of a mind of it’s own. I had been already thinking about heading to Grand Junction, Colorado, on Monday, and camp out at St Mary’s Hospital parking lot for the emergency room and eventually see an ear, nose and throat Dr. The teeth are now fine, they did have much needed work, the ear is not.

After taking Spirit for a short stroll, a short ride ensued and a few blocs away I joined the Medical Festival going on. I was lucky to have a good Dr on call and the prognosis truly is of a complicated and painful one. It is called “Trigeminal Neuralgia”, sounds important and a true non sense even though described as “People with the condition are begging to be killed”. Trust me that I was almost there this afternoon. Basically translated in English, the main nerve navigating throughout the jaw has been pressured so long by a blood vessel that it has lost it’s protective layer. Looking back this is nothing new, but has always been a mild ear ache at times which I always attributed to riding. The years are stacking up, I do have medication for it now which will not do a thing for at least a week and is a nerve numbing of some sort. Not crazy about all this.

So I am a bit taken back by the situation. I have been reading a lot about it, my plan to get a second opinion in Grand Junction still remains and so does coming and going this excruciating pain making me wonder if Van Gogh maybe had this problem in mind also. The medication is a real “whammy”… it is Monday now, one a day for one week, building it up to three a day as I can understand why, it is a nerve medication, one that actually controls seizures as eventually will control this nerve exposed freely to pain. It is an obscure condition as no one knows exactly how to diagnose it except from the patient’s say so, no one knows the dosage needed, only from trial and error. That is if a second opinion concurs.

How can I say this? My pain, physical, at times mental, does not phase me much. When it does, my memory only has to go back a few years and watch the frames of a past Life unroll from this spool from which within Lance himself has suffered so much. My own pain is nothing compared and again his own thoughts and courage has been passed on for me to go on braving the moments as he himself has done. We both live quite a Life I must say… it is rich, and again as I know he also does, I can only “Thank You” for coming along on this ride.

Almost three years of Photography is finally in order on Smug Mug… In “Your Favorites”, in “States”, some labeled “first year” and second year”, now also “Utah the third year”. Feel free to browse, you can even use the slide show mode and have fun. Merchandise is also available through Smug Mug. If you like to order prints, all sizes are available as I store the originals myself considering the huge bandwidth needed to upload them on the Galleries.

Your support will help us continue these endless chapters you read. It will be more than greatly appreciated.

Be well…

Ara & Spirit