Gloating over the beauty of nature hundreds of miles away, one forgets what one has in one's own backyard.

This is a chance picture of Cherokee Lake from Panther Creek State Park, just round the corner from our house. When I lived near the ocean in my childhood, I rarely visited the beach. It was always too crowded, too dirty, too polluted, or too hot. When in my adult years I lived in a city on the coast, visits to the beach were more frequent, but now I realize: not often enough.

When you are landlocked, and the nearest beach is at least seven hours away, you long for that proximity to those vast miles of endless water..daunting, challenging, yet strangely calming.

Lakes are fine too.. even man-made ones. Who cares?

They give the same calm, the same silence, and the same awe that the mind needs to feel grateful.

"Everybody should have his personal sounds to listen for - sounds that will make him exhilarated and alive or quiet and calm” - Andre Kostelanetz