Throughout my 13 years of writing this blog, I’ve mentioned numerous times the joy of traveling to and from Alaska following one of my favorite travel publications, The Milepost. I’ve bought their travel guide through the years, even when I’m not traveling the AlCan highway. Why? There’s just so much good information about the Northwest American continent. It’s good reading.
It’s also good for memories and imagination.
Planning is vital when you begin the journey, but also enjoyable. Knowing where you are headed is important to the enjoyment of the trip. Experiencing surprises along the way only makes your effort that much more enjoyable.
No travel guide can prepare you for the real event!
As with all good things, you often reach the end of the road and stuff the planning material into a file or on a bookshelf. That’s when you know. It was worth the effort.
All good things must come to an end. I read this morning (June 30, 2023) National Geographic has terminated all staff writing positions as they prepare for the ending of their mainstay publication. Yes. The print version is going away. Maybe all those NatGeo maps in my file cabinet will become a prized possession. I used to hang various ones in my office and imagine the turf they represented.
Paper Maps are just about an anachronistic view of the past.
Life has a way of changing the trip as new tools pop over the horizon and favored mechanical methods disappear in the rearview mirror. My old flight planning tool is a museum piece since computers have replaced its need.
Where Am I Going With This?
I woke in the middle of the night, and this thought was on my mind. Today is the last day of June in the year of our Lord, 2023. (Makes me sound wise, right?) We will never come back to this date again. This is a unique slice of life.
What will you do with this day to deem it special?
For 13 years, I’ve written thousands of posts and never worried about readership. I keep writing. Since I was born on the 13th, this number does not bother me, but I’m just thinking to myself. My writing is jumping into the teen years; maybe it’s time to fire it up and do something I’ve been dreaming about.
Beginning with this end-of-the-month posting, I’m changing my habit. I seldom miss a writing day and have landmarked hundreds of days without a break. Then life happens, and you start the count all over again.
I’ve been grooming myself to focus on something NatGeo is shutting down. A paper read that can be handled and loaned just as we used to do with our Hardy Boy Books. Will it be a best seller? I’m not so sure I care.
Along my path of life, I’ve learned many lessons. Along with my Judeo-Christian values, I’ve challenged myself to keep getting better. Before I hit the end-of-life milepost, let’s make these next 101 days a focus on getting my book published.
Embedded in this thought is the idea that I’ve experienced life and have lessons I would love to share.
“Nothing is ever solidified as what one does with what one knows.”
~Michael Gurley
If you are one of my solitary readers, share this post with someone you know. I hope to communicate my mental and preparatory process as a milepost in a favored travel guide. Who knows, maybe this is the impetus someone else needs to celebrate a milepost in their life.
Mileposts and End-of-the-Month: Nothing is ever solidified as what one does with what one knows." ~Michael Gurley Click To TweetImagine the Mileposts in Moses’ Life…
I’ve stood in the place where Moses lived in his last moments…
Deuteronomy 34:1-7 NKJV
Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo,
to the top of Pisgah, which is across from Jericho.
And the LORD showed him all the land of Gilead as far as Dan,
all Naphtali and the land of Ephraim and Manasseh,
all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, the South,
and the plain of the Valley of Jericho,
the city of palm trees, as far as Zoar.
Then the LORD said to him,
“This is the land of which I swore to give Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying,
‘I will give it to your descendants.’
I have caused you to see it with your eyes,
but you shall not cross over there.”
So Moses the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab,
according to the word of the LORD.
And He buried him in a valley in the land of Moab,
opposite Beth Peor;
but no one knows his grave to this day.
Moses was one hundred and twenty years old when he died.
His eyes were not dim nor his natural vigor diminished.