I went to the mountains last week…

And it knocked my friggin’ socks off.

I’ve been to Colorado before. Last trip was about fourteen years ago. Before we went this time, I looked back through the photos I’d taken in 2003 and had a little chuckle. These were actual hand-held photos. You know, the ones you used to have to capture with a camera. The kind of camera that was just a camera. No other gadgets attached or included. You had to put film in it. You had to send the film somewhere to be developed if you didn’t have your own darkroom. And you had to hope what came back was decent. What I got from that trip was a stack of photos of mountains. This mountain, that mountain. This mountain from this angle. That mountain from that angle. This mountain in the morning, that mountain in the afternoon. Two rolls worth, and I had double prints! This should have been a forewarning of what I was about to experience, what I’d forgotten: the mountains get right into my soul and turn me into a crunchy-granola nature freak.

We flew to Denver and then drove to our rented house in Boulder. I got my first good view as we were coming down the valley on the Denver-Boulder turnpike. I sucked in a breath and said to my husband, “Imagine you’re a settler, back in 1880, coming down this valley in your covered wagon, and you see THIS!” It was beyond anything I could imagine. And the view just got more beautiful, the closer we came to the mountains. Everywhere I turned there was a new vista, more breathtaking than the last. It fried me.

I got up in the morning all week at 6 AM, my body and mind screaming at me, “GET OUT THERE! GO BREATHE THAT AIR! WALK HERE! LIVE HERE!” It was beyond my capability to sleep in, everything in me needed to be taking it in, to be present, front and center, to those views. I walked in the cold, in the altitude and I saw people with dogs everywhere. I saw the sun rising on the Flatirons and it brought tears to my eyes. The words to Rocky Mountain High played in my head and I smiled and laughed to myself. I GET YOU, JOHN DENVER! I GET YOU!! I was a total GEEK.

Whenever I travel, I see sights that amaze me and I think, “I hope those who live here really see how awesome this view is. I hope they know what a great thing it is to live here. I hope this doesn’t just fade into the background and become part of the mundane.”
And of course, it brings me back to my part of the world. My state (mental and physical). My town, my view out my front window. And I question myself — do I really see how awesome the view is? Do I know what a great thing it is to live here? Does this fade into the background and become part of the mundane?

Would I take two rolls of photos of my surroundings and then have double prints made? I think I would. I am so grateful to have this life, this home, this space on earth. And I’m thankful I can travel and be reminded of what I have right here at home. It’s all good.