Awakening To Nature’s Music

Awakening To Nature's Music

I sat quietly on a rock shelf overlooking the pristine mountain lake some seven hundred feet below. From this perch I could barely make out an osprey circling then plummeting into the lake only to be foiled over and over in its attempts to land a trout dinner.

I came here to get away from the harried life I lead, a casualty of past choices and poor decisions. I came here seeking unknown answers to unasked questions. To this day, I can't be sure of the forces that brought me to the mountain, but I sat there recalling and reliving phases of my life hoping to find some resemblance of peace within.

Above me loomed another twenty six hundred feet of rock and sparse tree line that completes the wind blasted body of Mount Crandell. Above that loomed a shadow of angry clouds and a solemn reminder that I was but a small pebble on this mountain of life.

A tandem of "rock whistlers" scurried between boulders barking their namesake call at me as if to inform me that up here, I was the stranger, the intruder. An outsider who must adapt in order to fit in. Soon I could see more of these fat little marmots, each one whistling, then perking tiny ears to hear the response from their mates. I found it intriguing that only one would speak at a time, while all others listened.

In this high country, the wind brings in the storms fast and furious. Soon their whistling stopped and the marmots holed up in burrows, poking curious heads out to see if the stranger was smart enough to find cover. I wasn't. Instead, I sat still, overwhelmed by the magnificence of nature.

A few well placed rain drops found their way inside the collar of my jacket and snaked down my skin until evaporated by my body's heat. The chilling sensations created brought me to my senses and I sought and found shelter under a small rock face jutting out like a spoilt child's pouting lip.

The storm picked up momentum, and an electric flash briefly painted the darkening sky a menacing, purplish color. Seconds later, a loud crash reverberated over the mountain as the cymbals of thunder were struck with violent force. Over and over, this rhythmic pattern continued as the rains became heavier. I looked for my marmot friends, but they knew better than to be out when the air gets charged and rain falls in heavy, iron sheets upon the mountainside.

The rain seemed to impregnate the granite rock somehow, and I could feel the mountains come alive. I heard them yawn, then a much deeper breathing as they filled their lungs with air. The mountain gods exhaled, and the resulting winds whipped and drove the rain against the rocks I huddled under.

The winds, lightning and thunder all became orchestrated in some grand philharmonic arrangement as suddenly I was no longer apart from nature but an instrument of it. Black and white ideas soon transformed into colorful emotions as I felt instead of thought, dreamed instead of devised. The rains washed over me leaving behind only a remnant of the man I was. Still clothed in the same garb, still of the same skin, but now of a new mind.

Clarity and knowledge comes to those who listen to the wise. Who has seen more, done more than Mother Nature? She teaches those willing to learn. One just has to open their senses to be intimate with her. One just has to hear her music within their soul to gain understanding.