Way up there

Yesterday I made it. I succeeded in reaching the top of Bow Peak mountain (a.k.a Goat Mountain). It was a lot of work but well worth the pains I now harbor within my muscles.
There is a portion of tree hiking that on the way down seems really short, a river is forded and a mountain side is taken one step at a time.
As I say the tree section seems short, this is in comparison to the gravel/rock/bolder portion of the climb. Half way up the scramble one (if that one is me) wonders if the end will ever truly come or is it only a lie you are being told. A figment of someone elses imagination and they have convinced you it is true to the point where it has becomes a part of your own imagination. This is when it feels each step you take only causes you to sink lower from the ever evasive summit.
But Suddenly, just when you have finely given into the fact that each "summit" you reach is only the beginning of a small valley you did not see from below, the truth is before you. The top does exist just as the picture book says and there you are looking down the cliffs of the other side.
What jubilation, what sheer joy, what a sense of accomplishment, what a tired body.
As I rested on the top of the mountain I enjoyed every minute of it. To see the world from a whole new vantage point, invigorating.
The time always comes when you must descend that mountain which you have climbed (unless you really don't have a problem living up where the stars are closer and the wind is frozen). And so we did, down we went. I am thankful the up portion of a climb is always put first in the order of things to do. I find, though going down is tuff, it is a little more manageable then going up. And so with joy in my heart and the mountain tops in my camera I descended back into the real world. Where a sore body is known only to well.

I miss the down

Today as I was working I was just wandering in my mind and I ended up in the Down. You see it all started with a thought about a book I had bought at a garage sale two weeks ago. It was a book that I had read in India but did not own. I wanted to cause I knew one day I would want to read it again. That got me thinking to how I have read a few book a few times. One of the most memorable for me is the Watership Down. The first time I read it was when I was in my teen years. We would go into Brandon about two to three times a week. This was half an hour from home. We would spend the entire day in the University as that was where our music lessons were held. It was so boring at times that I learnt to go to the library there and read a book. I couldn't take them out cause I was not a university student but I would just sit in that library and read for hours. So over a years time I was able to read the Watership Down.
I then read it years later when I moved into my great little place here in Calgary. When my dad had seen that it was a basement suite that was like crawling into a small hole he called me a rabbit. That inspired the name of my small but well loved home. I called it the Down. I then had to read the book again. Reading the Watership Down in the Watership Down only seemed right.
That got me thinking about the Down and how much I loved that place. It was home. I loved the community I lived in. I loved walking to work every day. I loved being on my own.
I loved this place

Little girls love for a puppy

My nieces have gotten their very own puppy and oh my word is it sweet. I don't know about the puppy, I have not met him yet. What is sweet is the story of love that intermingles the arrivel of this pupp.
My brother has been adamently against getting a dog. For years it has been a strong "no" from him. But in the end his love for His little girls gave in. He realised that he loved his daughters more then he loved a puppy free home.
Now the love has grown again. The puppy is now home with my little nieces and they love him so much. The softness he creates in the hearts of my brothers family is appernt but the stories I have heard and by these pictures.
The stories are of my brother and his moments of play with the little guy. When we were kids We had a dog and I remember He loved that dog. I think Gregg cried harder when it died then any of us.
In the end I am over joyed that they got this little puppy. I am happy to see what love there is around all of these happenings. And next week I will go and visit all of them and see first hand how sweet this all is.

Claustrophobic skin

Do you ever feel like your skin is too tight? Either that or it is just too close to you. I think my sister-in-law would know what I mean. Hers would be different then mine but still same complaint. You see she is pregnant with her first so the skin is just learning how to stretch.
I, on the other hand am most definitely not pregnant, For me it is a feeling of wanting to run from my skin cause at this time it incases a cold that is just taking too long to run it's course.
I have been sick less then a week and already I am so bored of the state in which my body is in I would be more than happy to escape.
The coughing will not leave me alone. When I wake at night with this stupid dry cough I am ready to scream. This would only cause more problems in the end so therefore I stick to only whining silently to myself. Really, if anyone had to spend the night with me they would go insane, I sure do.
Well I just needed to vent that. Now if you are reading this when I am in bed you can know that I am struggling to keep my sanity. If you read it during the day then you can know that I am most likely napping to help replace the sleep I missed.

The prairies, the lands I love

I missed them. I really did. As I drove through the prairies this past week I realized how much I had missed them while I was away in India. The land that goes on forever with what seems to be no end. The rolling of the hills with rhythmic consistency that has no real pattern to it. AS I drove through the land watching the colors melt and mold together while at the same time being separated by a fine line, one field to the next. The beauty of the land is wonderful. And the nostalgia it brings up within is intense. I am drawn back to the days when I would roam freely in and out of field and forest with dreams of life to come. Now I sometimes wonder what that little me would think if it saw where I was and had been. I don't think she would be to upset. She may regret some things of the past but those melt into lessons learnt. Somehow lessons learnt lead into new and greater opportunities. I look back and forward with the same excitement. It is good, I think.