The Blossoming of the World: Essays and Images by Brian H. Peterson

The Blossoming of the World: Essays and Images. Brian H. Peterson. Tell Me Press, LLC. July 2011. 256 pp. with photographs. ISBN #: 9780981983585.

Brian H. Peterson has a definite, creative way with words and photographs! Add to that this is a unique look at life, with emphasis that life is just as much about contradictions as it is about the every day observations and experiences we all encounter in our life's journey. Take for example a meditation on September 23, 1987 in which the author describes nature's effects, "a certain, inexplicable warmth...from the center of my being and I begin to feel whole, complete" and a paragraph later, "Sometimes when I sit in the woods as I am now, I feel empty. Not void or dark, but more like a house whose doors and windows stand wide open while the wind blows through."

Perhaps the reader will find the comments about Oprah quite different from the public's normally empathic reaction to her problems with weight loss and popularity. Either way one sees it, honesty is what one finds in these pages. Yet at the same time, we are told that "empathy and compassion and 'do unto others' have become part of my wiring, my DNA." Numerous comments like these are not only refreshing but deeply inspiring for their lack of triteness and their frankness without any ego-enhancement. It is what it is!

Or perhaps the reader will be intrigued by the thoughts and feelings the author experiences about The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, a tale that excites the imagination because it binds the soul, remakes the author in its image, includng the dark voices within it elicits. Some wonderful pages describe the faith in each other, in the "simple necessity to love and be loved" that his parents knew in their elder years.

Nature is gorgeously, wildly, and enigmaticlaly presented in numerous photographs mixed throughout these short essays.

The Blossoming of the World... defies a neat, tidy summary. It's a tough and tender book to slowly relish, ponder, revisit, and share with others who hunger for embracing the finest and richest values and aspects of a life truly lived well! Put this on your gift list not only for everyone you love - and don't love - but especially for your own true self!