The most beautiful-

[Harmon]

I was trolling through one thread recalling some visuals I saw earlier and realized that I needed to talk about something positive and beautiful when I saw that Raven had a daughter I knew what I had to ask.

What is the most beautiful thing/site you have ever perceived?

For me it’s my daughter’s smile, from gums to her six teeth, and her all out belly laugh.

My wife holding a note that would tell me what she already knew some fifteen months ago.

A sun set over the Rocky Mountains when I was fifteen.

The sight of my Dad’s truck sitting on the side of a dirt road after a night in the forest of northern California when I was twelve (or there abouts).

T’is all I can think of right now, right off the top of my head.

So what are your memories, what is the most beautiful thing you have ever seen, or heard or….

 

[Treebore]

Well, the newest is the double and triple rainbows I have been seeing around here. Watching the lightning storms dance across the top of the nearby mountains has been pretty breathtaking.

A similiar sight still is vivid in my memory. I was approaching Verde Valley, AZ from the south back in Spetember of 2003 (around the 8th). I came up over the mountain, Verde Valley opened up before me and on the other side was this raging lightning storm. It was so breathtakingly awesome I pulled over to the side of the road and spent about 20 minutes just letting it soak in.

Other than that the best memories have been of my wife and kids.

 

[dragonhead]

The northen lights on an Alaskan cruise with my wife on our honey moon, 'nuff said

 

[IamTheTest]

1. I referee soccer as a pastime. I love watching a well orchestrated play come to fruition, but thats not the most beautiful. I was doing a U-small game (U8) and before the game the teams were warming up. There was this little dude, little even for a 6 year old, trying his hardest to keep up with his team. It was pretty evident that he was outclassed the entire game. I watched him score and it took everything I had not to get excited. Just knowing that hed remember that for a long time touched me.

2. I spent a summer doing an unpaid internship in Bolivia. I stayed with a poor family that I paid rent to. I have a summer birthday and they found out about it. When I came home they had a cake and a two liter of Coke. Knowing that they were willing to do that for a relative stranger automatically made them family to me. I guess knowing there are people out there who still care for strangers just because they are human really makes me feel good.

 

[Harmon]

Treebore reminded me of a sight. About fifteen years ago driving into Grants Pass, OR- the power had been killed by lightning, the only light was from head lights as we drove down highway 5, then the lightning hit, blanketing the sky from one black cloud to the next. The thunder was immediate- well within a second. We pulled off the highway for fear of drivers over reacting to the flashes, and the deafening boom of the thunder. It was one of the most beautiful natural events I think I have ever seen.

 

[Aurora]

-The excited smile on my 22 month old daughter's face when daddy comes home from work (she's such a daddy's girl).

- One night we were driving home to Dayton from Tenn and we watched a semi in front of us swerve, hit the guard rail, jump it, and dissappear down a steep hill. It seemed like there was only a couple cars on the road, we stopped and it seemed like cars just appeared out of nowhere. Twenty people must have stopped to make sure the guy was okay (he was, minus needing a new pait of shorts). It reaffirmed my belief in the human race.

 

[Mycanid]

The most beautiful thing I have ever perceived?

Boy ... that's a tough one.

1. One of the most beautiful is a hard thing to describe. I am a fan of Celtic folk music, and especially the slower "airs". I have had an album for some time by Alasdair Fraser on which he (a fiddle player) plays a beautiful piece called "The Little Brown Island in the Middle of the Sea". The subject of the song is one of the islands of the Inner Hebrides off the west coast of Scotland. Anyway ... when I went to the Outer Hebrides in 1999 (lessee, I was 29 then) and was traveling on a ship between the islands I was humming this and suddenly to my great surprise I suddenly "saw" that the original music had been composed as a "harmony" off of the "melody" of the islands and the sea's beauty - both visible and audible. I cannot describe it any better than that.

2. Another experience happened when I was 11. I visited NYC with my family and went to a branch of the Met Mus of Art called the Cloisters. It is a recreation of a late medieval/early Renaissance Roman Catholic Monastery. I don't remember much specifics wise ... most of what I have still in memory are impressions ... but it made an overwhelming impression on me. My parents said I got a far-away look on my face and walked away from them touching the walls as I went. There was Gregorian chant playing over the speakers in the place. That is where I first knew that God existed and that he was a Creator of things that were beautiful and that this place and the things in it had been created by men who were striving to imitate God on a "mini-level". It is what J.R.R. Tolkien called "sub-creation", I later found out. But it was undoubtably an AESTHETIC experience. I came to "perceive" all this through beauty.

There are many others, but these are the two that spring most immediately to mind. I don't want to hog up all the space in here.