"At Home in the World" razorbacker's Profile

That's why they call them the "OHHHH-zarks"!!!

The Ozarks - Home of My Heart

As you can all tell from my map I have lived many places and traveled through even more. I have to say that the world is full of beautiful and awesome places. I am very grateful to the Creator for providing the unimaginable variety and range of wonder, for allowing me the opportunity to visit and experience so many of them, and my hope is for the chance to see and learn so much more.
That said, I have never found a lovelier land than the home of my youth in Northwest Arkansas. There are so many lovely places there that I hold in my heart but are so numberless I could never begin to express them all to the world. Whether it is water-spiders and minnows in a little "crick" pool down in an unvisited "holler," a thunderstorm approaching over the hills at night, the plaintive call at dusk of a lone whippoorwill, the massive oaks standing sentinel for ages, the song of rain on a tin roof over your cozy bed, traveling Highway 23N in the glory of autumn foliage, or any of a lifetime worth of unforgettable moments, you know why this land is loved.

"When you come to a fork in the road, TAKE it!" - Yogi Berra

The Four Corners

Trout Lake. Aaron, Amanda, & me in "Boaty."

Cortez, Colorado was home for 10 years. It is a magnificent place with so many different choices easily accessible depending on which direction you set out. To the east are the La Plata Mountains, to the west high desert and plateau, to the south the mesas and spires that whisper of Canyon de Chelly and Monument Valley, and to the north rivers, lakes, and the San Juan Mountains.
Cortez is a marvelous place to visit or to live. Unforgettable.

"If you're not getting flak, you're not over the target!" - Anonymous

Valley of the Sun - Phoenix, Arizona

Tubing the Salt River, east Valley of the Sun

For 7 years I made my home in Phoenix's West Valley, Glendale and Peoria; for the past 4 I've been in North Phoenix/Paradise Valley. The Desert Southwest is amazing, too. The experiences are so limitless. Anyone who is familiar with the beautiful photography of Arizona Highways magazine can attest to the surprising palette of vistas in this popular state. The Grand Canyon, the White Mountains, Lake Havasu, Slide Rock in Oak Creek Canyon, Tombstone, the alpine region of Flagstaff, armies of the famed Saguaro cactus that symbolize the American West, even the simple pleasures, enjoyed by so many locals, of "tubing the Salt" [River.] And it's a short and exciting drive to Mexico and the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California.) And not much further to my favorite American city, San Diego.

"Don't be so open-minded your brains fall out!" - Ann Landers

TV's "ER - It's Sensational, But Pretty Dang Close

Nursing Student - University of Arkansas

I've been an RN for over 27 years, an Emergency Nurse for 25. Somebody asked me yesterday if I'd seen it all. I told him, "Not yet!" But I've seen a lot! I could probably write a book (...and just might!)
Anyhow, it is a fascinating profession and very satisfying to try to determine the probable cause of a person's illness and work to resolve it. There is a lot of hard work, dramatic to humorous to mind-boggling to riveting experiences. Emotions may be raw, moments indelible, extremes of exhilaration or sadness, triumph or tragedy.
In the end you walk out the door, and you know what you are doing is important and valuable and worth everything you put into it! It's great!

"Try a little harder to be a little better." - Gordon B. Hinckley

La Mia Famiglia - Don't We All Put This One In?

Aaron O

I am thankful for the parents I was given. I owe them everything. While they are both long gone, I look forward to seeing them again along with my brothers and many others.
I have led a very interesting life. Many of my forebears did as well, and I'm fortunate to have many of their stories.
But as my favorite author, Nevil Shute, has illuminated so wonderfully well even the most ordinary life is extraordinary.
And in a larger sense my belief is that we are all of royal descent with a heritage and birthright greater than that of any king or emperor if we fulfil the measure of our creation.

"Vi faccio vedere come muore un italiano!" ["I'll show you how an Italian dies!"] - Fabrizio Quattrocchi

Marysville and Puget Sound

Puget Sound from the bridge over Deception Pass.

This was my home for several years. Another verdant place of beauty. The rains come often but are welcome. The sound, the lakes, the forests, the mountains, and the man-made wonders are all sights to behold. And don't forget Alfy's Pizza!

"If my critics saw me walking over the Thames, they would say it was because I couldn't swim." - Lady Margaret Thatcher

Madison County Reveries

Madison Hollow

What called forth that forlorn hidden hollow seen but once in forty years?
Transported magic through a lifetime, not bidden, yet it still appears.
Surprising water-spider dancing on a tiny, bright, transparent stage,
shiny, going nowhere at a trickle. Why? Maybe only as a word upon a page
of a book that is intimate in detail, limitless of palette, epic in its
scope,
that can show how this single moment in a single life full of tragedy and
hope
is the single most and least important brushstroke on the canvas where we
all begin and end
as we wander, as we wonder through a gallery our eyes are not yet wise
enough to comprehend.

Still Dancing

Long as I have a rose in my lips,
a light in my eye,
a dream in my heart,
I will tango 'til the day I die!

"I'd a whole lot rather be the guy who bought the Brooklyn Bridge than the guy that sold it!" - Will Rogers

Homilies

Bessie Braddock: "Sir, you are drunk."
Churchill: "Madam, you are ugly. In the morning I shall be sober."

"When the people fear the government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." - Thomas Jefferson

"What would men be without women? Scarce, sir ... mighty scarce." - Mark Twain

"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" - Ronald Reagan

"I'll be on you like a chicken on a junebug." - Randall Prince

"If Hitler invaded Hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons." - Winston Churchill

"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." - Benjamin Franklin

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt." - Mark Twain

"It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so." - Ronald Reagan

Nancy Astor: "Sir, if you were my husband, I would give you poison."
Churchill: "If I were your husband, I would take it."