All the smoke from the fires in CA & OR would make the skies overcast & the sun so dim my ample solar panels would not keep up. It hid the beauty of the mountains as I traveled NW. It may have dampened my views but not my spirits. As I drove through mountains & valleys, the haze hung like a thick fog.
 I thought about the fact that beauty & majesty was still there even though it was cloaked. It reminded me of the beauty within people. So many the beauty is long hidden. Long obscured from view from their fellow man. Some from pain & hurt. Some from the sheer busyness of life. Overwhelming them with distractions. Loosing site of the Sun. People forget that this life is a life of beauty & magic. We forget that our fellow citizens are people with a whole universe within each of them because we can not see beyond the fog, beyond the smoke.
 So I ask you to take a moment & Pierce the smoke & mirrors. To see the beautiful, magical souls around you. Allow yourself to connect with them if nothing else in spirit. We live in polarized times & we forget no matter what sides we are on, we are, in fact, in this together. Spread some grace because none of us really know what we are doing & we are all just doing the best we can.