Living in the Mountains

I fight it: talking about it all the time. No one wants to hear it. No one cares. But mostly, no one understands. Maybe some of that is true, maybe all of it, maybe none. But what is true is that living in the mountains gives me a definition for life.    

This morning snow fell from the sky, light and soft. The fog had crept onto our land and the dirt was dark brown with moisture. Here, I am at the mercy of the earth. It doesn’t matter what I want, or that I had hoped to go get ice cream tonight in town. It doesn’t matter what I thought, after yesterday’s sun that turned my body a rich brown. It doesn’t matter what I do. In this place high in the sky, far from the ocean’s floor and closer to the clouds, I am at the mercy of forces far beyond my control.

There are sacrifices you make when living in the mountains. The first is people. There aren’t so many of them, and the ones there are you might not get along with. Initially it’s a godsend, being so far from the idiocy that plagues society. And then it’s annoying — the effort involved in getting near to those good people you crave. Eventually, a loneliness sets in that’s only comforted by the soft caress of morning air on your skin, and the understanding that you accepted a trade fair and square. 

There is the sacrifice of your time. Everything takes more time, especially eating. You’re not so close to food, and growing your own is a lost cause when living in such thin air. Instead more planning is necessary. There’s no food to order, no delivery services, no restaurants. Shopping happens once or twice a week, and a list cannot be forgotten. It’s frustrating — getting home and realizing you forgot the eggs, as you’re not going back, that’s for sure. Meals become labors of love: of time, of preparation, of forethought and deliberation. 

Nourishment is the most important element in life — you learn this in the mountains, watching the ever-present shade of nature’s green work itself through the spectrum as time passes. With heavy moisture from the winter’s melted snow and summer’s storms the electric green is almost offensive and you’re tempted to look away from the exuberance of its youth. With its dull pallor and deflated limbs that come from too much sun and and an unquenchable thirst you’re demoralized and lose hope for the future.

Still, there is not a moment, a day, a temperature, or a season when the earth is not beautiful. At times it’s exhausting being surrounded by so much beauty, because living in the mountains brings a new awareness to your being, a hypersensitivity. In fact, you become entirely fragile. Every sway of the wind, every song of the birds, every drop of dew sends shivers down your spine and cripples your capacity to do things. Every change is noted and every sound is logged, because every thing affects what might come. Every thing affects you. 

And then there’s a transcendence, where you find yourself becoming an amorphous being who talks to trees and waves to the elk you recognize. The clouds roll in and envelop your melancholy. A new wildflower pops through the rocky terrain and explodes your heart. The sun drapes itself over your body while you engage in its dialogue. 

The truth is nature is ever-moving, ever-changing. It unfolds itself before you, halting your racing mind with every sunrise, stilling your soul with every sunset. It leaves space for difference, it adjusts for anomaly. It allows, time and time again, to be felt, seen, heard, smelled, tasted. It is bound by no definition, permitting you to simply — be.