There’s not much left of summer. The Labor Day weekend is just over two weeks away. Where did it go, we wonder. Have we made use of the summer? Have we done any of those things we wanted to do? There’s still time unless, of course, unless your desire was to drive across the country and back, stopping at every national park on your trip.
But wait! You can still take that trip through a book about two incredible women who decided in 1938 they were going to document the plant life of the Grand Canyon by going down the Colorado River. The story of Elzada Clover and her graduate student Lois Jotter is told in Brave the Wild River by Melissa L. Sevigny.
Their story is interspersed with accounts of adventurers who preceded them, and their findings on the effects of dams on the environment and the Native Americans living in the region. As the old song goes, “when will they ever learn?”
Prayer for the Day
How to come to you, O God, acknowledging you as Creator,
For your creation is so vast and we are so small?
How can we see you in a roaring river, the silence of rocks,
In the fish raising their heads to the heavens?
Come, O God, and remind us that we are not the owners
Of your earth and your creation, but caretakers.
In the name of the One who walked among grass and lilies,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
A river is time in water; as it came, still so it flows, yet never is the same.
Leonardo da Vinci, artist, inventor, genius (1452-1519)
A river seems like a magic thing. Magic, moving, living part of the earth itself.
- Laura Gilpin, photographer (1891-1979)
The wild isn’t just a place untouched by humans. It’s a place that changes us.
- Melissa L. Sevigny, from Brave the Wild River
Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked,
Or take the paths that sinners tread, or sit in the seats of scoffers,
But their delight is in the law of the Lord on which they meditate day and night.
They are like trees planted by streams of water,
Which yields their fruit in its seasons, and their leaves do not wither.
In all they do, they prosper.
Psalm 1: 1-3