Time Sneaks Up Fast

These Wednesday posts are sneaking up on me faster and faster. Tonight I’m in a mood, so I get to center myself as I continue to type. I’ve spent the last few days in the Canadian Rockies with my Mom, and I’m channeling the magic from those snowy rocky peaks to bring me some peace in my current moment. Breathe in, hold, breathe out.

Time slows down in the mountains. The magic of the mountains has always soothed my soul. I’m incredibly lucky and feel blessed to live a life in the mountains. It has always been my happy place, and a place where the world gets to zoom out, and then it’s just me and the peaks.

I was privileged to grow up skiing in the winter and backpacking and hiking in the summers. The ability to access the mountains in both the summers and the winters has been a gift that I am always grateful for. There have been times when I wasn’t doing so well mental health wise, and I would go into the mountains and feel a lightness and aliveness. The depression that felt like it had a choke hold on me couldn’t handle the altitude, and its grip would loosen and I could breathe. Breathing in the mountain air, and being in the energy of such grand masses of rock, ice, and snow healed a part of me. There was a palpable weight that I felt as I drove back down toward sea level.

Those moments that I just spoke of were from three years ago. I’m grateful to be able to look back and not be IN that space anymore, and I also know that the mountains provided me with what I needed to stay afloat as I sorted and processed the real work of all the shit I was carrying with me. I’m grateful for my community and proud of myself to be where I’m at and to feel as happy and as capable of my dreams as I do. Part of my dream continues to be spending time in the mountains.

There’s a wonder there, a sense of home, and completeness, and I know I will keep coming back for as long as I live as the mountains live in me as I live in them.

Mama shredding on a double black diamond