| Several years ago, an enormous awe for mountains | | | | mining and lumber companies that don't grasp when |
| revisited me while flying into the Tri-cities Airport in | | | | and where to stop. Maybe, that's why some |
| Tennessee. I was reading a novel when the pilot | | | | mountains blow their tops because they can't take it |
| announced that we were nearing our destination. | | | | anymore, as in the case of Mt. St. Helens. |
| When I looked up, I was stunned by the view of a | | | | While people like me enjoy the vista from an airplane |
| spectacular blue horizon, except what awed me was | | | | or a helicopter when they dare, a good climber will |
| not the sky but the Blue Ridge Mountains, rising | | | | start from the bottom up. An average person's |
| dome after dome over each other, in a chain in the | | | | mountain climbing from sea level usually consists of |
| distance. It was toward the evening, not yet dark, | | | | driving up in a car to a place 800 to a 1000 ft above |
| when the sun must have just set behind the | | | | sea-level, say Jamestown in Upstate NY. Now, that |
| mountains, because the mountains looked as if they | | | | can't be called climbing, can it? |
| were made of Steuben glass, airy, precious, and | | | | One thing about climbing a mountain is not just |
| dream-inducing. | | | | climbing up, but rather scaling the peaks up and down |
| To the question, "why climb a mountain?" Sir Edmund | | | | until one reaches the highest peak. From the top, the |
| Hillary answered" "Because it's there." | | | | view may be awesome but happiness and |
| Because it's there, anytime I lift my head to look at a | | | | satisfaction is in the climbing. Even if one hasn't |
| mountain, I also feel my spirit lifting; even though I'm | | | | reached the top, he may have gained something truly |
| not much of a mountain climber. Even a good photo | | | | important in the process. |
| moves me for lack of a mountain where I live. I find | | | | Earth is not a perfect planet and its mountains are |
| climbing a mountain to be a great metaphor for life; | | | | not set according to a general rule. Each mountain |
| therefore, I have great respect for mountaineering. | | | | has its own rule, trail, rocks, crags, and slippery |
| Whether the climbers follow already set trails or are | | | | surfaces. Each mountain leads its climber to an |
| trailblazers themselves, what they are doing is getting | | | | individual focus and a different understanding of |
| the mountain's grace and injecting themselves with | | | | himself against the universe, just the way each |
| goodwill and serenity. | | | | mountaineer carries his own map. |
| A mountain may possess false summits or official | | | | A hiker or a climber finds his own heart and solitude |
| peaks. A mountain climbing enthusiast once | | | | in the barrenness above the tree-line. Once he |
| complained that he and his buddies thought they | | | | reaches the top of a mountain, the scenery is not |
| reached the top; yet, when they looked up, they | | | | only spectacular looking down but also looking up, for |
| saw that the peak they were trying to climb was | | | | it's in man's essence to look up and try to see as |
| even higher. The best a person can do in this | | | | high as he can. If he's there in the summit and is |
| situation is to send good vibes to the mountain and | | | | camping at night, he is nearer to the stars; Ursa |
| try again. | | | | Minor, Ursa Major, Orion's Belt, The Milky Way, The |
| Since mountain climbers leave too many footprints, it | | | | North Star, Dog Star and others to make him proud |
| is argued that they are as destructive to the | | | | of his purpose and to make him feel insignificant |
| environment as any other pollutant; however, it isn't | | | | inside such a vast universe, despite the clammy mist, |
| the climber that ruins the mountain but the insatiable | | | | blinding fog, the wind and the frigid air. |