Sunday, December 16, 2007
Looking up from the crazy stretch of the 15th to my road, there is a caravan trailer that the mountain reclaimed. It grew trees around it, embracing it, and lovingly decorated it with vines. There are many old bones of human habitation here. Some are old cars, sentinel chimneys and steps to nowhere. They stand, waiting for people long since dead, long since gone. And in the spring, their few living legacies, the flowers and alliums, will poke their heads above ground and weep for dead gardeners.
I woke to blowing snow that could not stay this morning. The weather, like the people, is transient here. It comes and goes, and while it is here, it pounds the earth. And when it is gone, it melts into the streams and springs and is never seen again.
It is folly to think that we make a lasting impact here. We are but snowflakes blowing on the mountain. The mountain doesn’t care that we leave our footprint here. She will lovingly cover it and take it into herself. Just as she does our bones, our lonely bones left in holes on the hillsides.
Happy Sunday.
This piece is about the insignificance of our existence when weighed against the longevity of the mountains. It is in our own best self-interest that we stop things like mountaintop mining. But in a million years, these mountains will still be here. We, most likely, will not.