The summer heat is ramping up and the desert is in bloom. Everywhere I look there are delicate little sexpots clamoring for attention and the impregnation of the next generation. What spectacular gifts reproduction blesses us with.

Let me send you a high resolution signed postcard of this beauty…

Scrabbling down the backside of Cathedral Rock, this particular patch of lichen demanded my attention.

Yucca and prickly pear at 5,700 feet in elevation on the trail to Bear Mountain in the background.

Off of the Bear Mountain Trail near Sedona, shot in near infrared with my trusty Minolta Dimage 7.  Man am I sorry Minolta cashed out of the camera business – they made good stuff.

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There it was, screaming at me from across the desert, a brilliant beacon of flaming magenta. Hedgehog cactus, in bloom. Spring is in process. The local brittlebush blossoms have passed their peak in only about 2 days. So fast. The hedgehogs will take a more leisurely stroll through the mating process. Come hither, come hither…

Desert Varnish is a wonderful and strange coating that forms on rocks in the desert from heat, clay, biologic stuff and other magic. Flowers, of course, are flowers, and they seem to show up everywhere, even in the desert. And they are espcially dramatic against the backdrop of dry and seemingly barren. Which may just make them ever more magical and special and more effective as a reminder that life is a gift not to be taken for granted, which of course is what I do most of the time except when I don’t. I hope you don’t some today, too.

If you’d like a beautiful high resolution postcard print, made by me, the photographer, for you, the magical person enjoying this image, just let me know by sending me a donation. I will take great pleasure in personally printing, signing and mailing this bit of my eye off for your pleasure.

- A.