Walkin' and Talking under the Red Sun Part 4

Piles of Earth forming over years and years and years, eroding, morphing, adapting, always changing, but always existing, never ceasing, unlike the humans and animals that may have tread on it, lived below it, thrived on it, it still stands, firm, allowing riverbeds to form and animals to flourish, majestic, only asking for peace, tranquility, that repose of solitude even if it is fleeting. We don’t see many mountains back in Chicago. Nature has been brushed aside for the development of civilization. Cities in general tend to try to mask the fact that there used to exist verdure growth, applying makeshift gardens to hide the fact. Even with Chicago being one of the pioneers of a “green city” it still neglects Mother Nature and all its glory, with such insipid noise, and blasting lights, and pollution: that lurid mustard glow peppering the sultry nights on Michigan Ave. We tend to want to forget there is life outside the city. Gazing upwards at skyscrapers instead of at wilting flowers and muck filled river beds. Anyway, I climbed one of the numerous mountains sprouted out around my village. It was only a 15 minute cab ride, trundling through “back of the yards” type settlements on my way, eyes peering through the window at the American bobbing left and right. A husband and wife live at the base, offering you to jaunt up the mountain for a small fee, providing you with a map, and some fruit for your journey. A vibrant path greets you, with a few temples and houses scattered near the entrance, people living off what the mountain provides, and then eventually you are merely emerged into the flourishing life that exists on the rocky path towards the top. Arrows guide you towards your destination as you scavenge higher, on a path at the start, until a certain point where the climbing begins. A small river curves from the top of the mountain, clear, pallid, rolling like marbles, a murmur, like a voice. Cries from birds stealthily hidden within the sprawling greens and yellows and creeping algae covering the peeks of the mountains towering around you as you walk. Doddering from rock to rock, so not to collapse into the puddles, facilely clamoring higher till you reach a small waterfall. The arrow pointed though it, my friend and I glanced at each other, then upwards at the rushing tide crashing through this small cavern leading even higher, feeling the brisk shutter as we placed our hands in it. After some contemplation we shrugged, stripped to our boxers, placing them under some shrubs till we returned, and decided to tread through the falling riverbed. Once you hit the water the cold punches your chest, I grabbed for the nearest rock and lunged into the stream, it knocked the life out of me, I struggled to breath, gripping for any support as I fought forward through the ice water, cymbals pounding my ears, slippery, chest exhaling and inhaling intensely, lifting my head through the small opening above felt like being reborn again, the air was crisp, I pulled myself out and shook off the fear that jolted through me while I was battling the water, taking in the vantage point of the amount we have conquered, the Sun baking the emerald and brown in a bronze hue. After some more climbing we reached a second waterbed, this one larger than the one we climbed through, falling elegantly into a pool, ferocious, but gentle. We scaled higher and higher up first a ladder, than pulling ourselves by bars, reaching a drawbridge, then the to the top of the second waterfall, in my boxers, shivering a bit, gazing at the falling lemonade painted mountain edges fading softly with the calming wind, bushes and trees fawning, rushing water singing, animals chirping their tenor tones, everything moving and still at the same time, sighing, wishing everyone, anyone else can see this, and be there, here, and enjoy it, cause’ it is worth a moment, for appreciation, if only for a few minutes…