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Lighting up Dolly's Right One

This is from yesterday morning, Feb. 11. That line of cloud is the contrail of a jetliner, headed for Los Angeles from South America. Every morning, that contrail appears and provides me a terrific lift before my day even begins. I am so happy not to be on that airplane.


Earlier this week, the Sun began its transit of Dolly's Right One, which is the most prominent feature in the Alta Mira Calendar. Through binoculars or a telephoto lens, the Sun, just as it begins to appear, lights up the distant ridgeline as if it had caught fire. On some mornings you can see the silhouettes of individual trees outlined for an instant against the brilliance. The sequence below offers a glimpse of that presence. In the top photo, you can just see the first speck of Sun, then the ridge catches fire, and then the Sun appears. The last photo is pulled back to show Tut on the right as a reference of where we are on the calendar. This morning, the Sun would have transited the summit of Dolly's Right One, but it was cloudy, darn it. For a closer look, you can click on the photos to expand them.






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About me

  • I am a journalist, educator, writing consultant and author, living in La Mesa, CA. I am a native of Texas, which shows in most of my work. I believe that anything is possible. When I was 35, I realized that the ideal life would be to have the imagination of a six-year-old, and the wisdom of a 65-year-old. I can still get to the imagination (as you can, simply by cutting away all the data you’ve learned from first grade on) and I now possess the wisdom of a 65-year-old. Being 65 can be unsettling – too late to plant trees and enjoy the shade – but the wisdom that comes with it is terrific compensation. I learned in 50th grade that, no matter how bad things get, there is always compensation. Now I am in the 60th grade, and I am learning things that I didn’t know in 59th. This September, I’ll start 61st grade, and learn things I don’t know now. To find what grade you’re in, start with the year you started 12th grade, and count up. My newest book is “Warbirds – How They Played the Game.” My new company is The Write Outsource, quality media writing on deadline, at www.writeoutsource.com. I am working on a book about the media, and I am about to revise my cookbook about home cooking on a tight budget, such as so many of us face at this time.
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michaelgrant2 [at] cox.net

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