Tirra visits the high country

Tirra passed purposively through the open woodland with Trixie trotting steadily behind. She kept up the pace all morning moving constantly uphill through the thinning trees. By the middle of the day she found herself at the top of the ridge looking out across the wrinkled layers of mountain ranges. She stood in the airy space under the wide blue sky with only the wind blowing around her and Trixie at her side.

Expansively, she felt an easing and opening within her.

Breathing slowly and deeply, she turned to each direction and gazed out to the horizon where the dark blue dome of sky softened to pearly grey and met the last ridge of mountains soft and misty in the far distance. Time, space and wind played around her. Her skin tingled in the wind, her heart beat with the eternal rhythm of ages past. Here she was, her feet solidly on the rock, the weight of her pack anchoring her to earth, and her head and heart flying in the airy spaces - immersed in the living world.

Looking down, she saw the rock at her feet. Little stones lay on the textured surface bound by lichens and tufts of grass. She saw the dark contrast of her shadow, her familiar weathered boots and the tough, dry plants shaking in the wind. A few grains of sand blew across bare rock to be captured by a clump of russet lichen. She saw that the rock was slowly breaking up - eroded, particle by particle, by the heat of the day, the cold of the night and the constant wind.

Each grain of rock, each little plant, stood sharply outlined in the clear mountain air. Tirra let the wind blow away the last of her own haziness and felt a pure clarity within. Opened to the forces around her, she stood balanced between heaven and earth.

Sweet life - break my heart open and come inside.