blue 8.24.2010

The Field Guide to Getting Lost has been my guide all summer. Rebecca Solnit writes throughout the book about “the blue of distance,” referring to it as a beautiful magical blue that is only achieved by being separated from location. I tried to understand it in the beginning of the summer by climbing to the top of the jungle gym and documenting the distant deep blue hills with the Cannon Rebel but it was just another horizon snapshot. She wrote about gains and losses and their proximity to each other, longing being both about not having something and a way of holding something more closely. I was introduced to Simone Weil who wrote in, To Desire without an Object, “Let us love the distance which is thoroughly woven with friendship since those who do not love each other are not separated.” And now I am separating from the Montana that I love, hoping that she will love me back even in my absence. I think I understand “the blue of distance,” better. It is the dreamy mystery of where you are not, it is the melancholy and longing for what you love and hope to return to. Goodbye Montana.