It is the desire to return, to move on the trails, to feel the weight and presence of those massive natural monuments that have stood for millions of years, reshaping themselves over time, always in motion, even if we can't always see it, that brings us back to the mountains.

The sense of time stretching far beyond us, of space that doesn't need us to exist, and yet offers itself fully when we enter it, is beautiful. 

A lot of us can find a kind of peace, or clarity, a reason to keep moving in that knowledge of something much larger, older, more permanent than ourselves, especially when we can move within it. And it is also a reminder of our humanness, and maybe even our reason for being.

Because we are not separate from nature. To go back to nature, to the wild, to the discomfort and to the rewards within it, is to let it remind us of who we are, who we aren’t, and who we can be. We are the Earth.