Lent Photo-a-Day: Near


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Lent Photo-a-Day 2/26: Place

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"Evenglow" Sunset at Clingmans Dome  Great Smoky Mountains National Park © 2014 Kristina Plaas, All Rights Reserved Over the course of my life I have enjoyed an intimate relationship with special places -- places that have significant meaning and importance for me. As a phenomenologist I have explored the relationship of space, an infinite expanse, and place, a "center of significance or meaning that may be used as a guide" (Thomas & Pollio, 2002). A phenomenological geographer, Yi-Fu Tuan, talks about place as space "made into an object." We attach names to objects, we can describe the characteristics of objects, and often we are able to express our feelings about objects. We do all those things in describing our experience of special places, also. There are a number of places on this planet that are very special to me. Great Smoky Mountains National Park is one of those places. I have favorite locations in Cades Cove, along the Little River, an...
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Countdown to Christmas Day 1: A Great Light

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"Sun Crest" Sunrise over the crest of the Smokies on a frosty winter morning. Hyatt Lane, Cades Cove. Great Smoky Mountains National Park © 2014 Kristina Plaas The people that walked in  darkness  have seen a great  light :  they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. Isaiah 9:2 Perhaps more than any other time in my life I feel a strong need to focus on Jesus Christ in the days and weeks leading up to Christmas. It's not that Christ hasn't been my focus in the past, rather I need to feel His love and celebrate His birth more consciously in order to get through my first Christmas without my mother. Mom was the bright light in our family and our family's celebration of Christmas. Jesus Christ is the Great Light. Because of His birth, atonement, and death I never have to walk in darkness. There will be shadowed paths, to be sure, but never utter darkness as long as I am faithful and obedient to the commandments ...
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Persistent

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Sharp-lobed hepatica (H. acutiloba) blooming along Cove Hardwood Nature Trail the first spring after devastating wildfires scorched the area in November, 2016. Great Smoky Mountains National Park © 2017 Kristina Plaas Persistent (adj): lasting or enduring tenaciously. Every year at the time I take my camera out to find wildflowers. I look for them everywhere, but I have specific locations where I know I will find the flowers. One of those locations, a nature trail through old growth forest, was one of those places affected by the Chimney tops 2 wildfire last fall. The fire, once small and well-contained, was whipped up by hurricane-force winds to wreak much devastation in the Smokies. All winter wildflower lovers asked themselves, "What ab out Cove Hardwood, what will happen to the wildflowers?" In my first foray up the trail after it's reopening this week, I found the flowers. They were small and many were a bit bruised and banged up from recent rains and storms, b...
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