Stone to sand

My cousin Terri sent this picture from Moab in Utah. She writes:

"...it was the desert heat, plus hiking on gravel to stone, stone to sand, back to stone. It was grueling at times but a great workout. The elevation was approximately 7500 so that's a great training point...all is well and I feel like I'm home."

It seems to me that you could make a religion out of that sky, and that landscape. That a person could, if they desired, see hiking in the desert as a hegira. The origin of the word is from the flight of Muhammad from Mecca to Medina to escape persecution in 622 AD. Now it also means any flight or journey to a more desirable place. Joni Mitchell produced an album in 1976 called Hejira, and this is when I discovered it.

When I think of my cousin, Terri, I see, in a larger sense, a woman embarking on her own personal hegira under a sky so blue its like the bottom of the sea. Ironically as I write this post, there is a roaring jackhammer outside my window in the 90 degree heat and humidity of the city.