Where Green Stones Flow Like Water

The River of Green Stones, Kachina Peaks Wilderness, January 2012

I'm knee deep in last year's snow, working my way slowly along the face of the mountain when I finally see light ahead through the thick spruce and bristlecone pine forest. I head for it, hoping to see the sun. When I break free of the crusty snow and gloom I find myself on the banks of a river of green lichen and gray lava.

I wade out into it, mindful of the rollers and tippy flat plates, and look upstream. The great river of rock extends upwards for a million years. Downstream is the same. It is a raging torrent frozen in time, the rumblings and stirrings of earth paused in mid flow. Around me I can feel the trembling potential energy in the ancient rocks, all that repressed gravity waiting these many millennia.

 

The River of Green Stones, Kachina Peaks Wilderness, January 2012

They say the San Francisco Peaks are extinct, that they've been asleep for a quarter million years or so and unlikely to ever reawaken. Extinct. Dormant. I guess that's technically true as far as geologists and science is concerned, but standing there in the middle of the frozen jumble of stone with the ancient lava rapids roaring in my ears, somehow it doesn't feel true.

I poke at one of the lichen covered boulders with the carbide point of one of my snowshoe poles. It moves imperceptibly, tips ever so slightly. I hear it grate softly against its mates. I can't help but think about Aron Ralston and his 127 hours.

A little unnerved I stand and work my way across the expanse of rocks quickly and carefully. I let out a little sigh of relief when I reach the other side, having safely forded the river.

No, it doesn't feel true at all. Dormant my ass, this damned mountain is alive.

Comments

[Brandon]

Ultimately, depends on how you define both "mountain" and "life". I'm in agreement.

[del]

I was waxing a little poetic in this post, trying to convey a bit of the magic and wonder and danger of wilderness exploration, but yeah, those mountains are alive - maybe not in the strictest scientific sense, but alive nonetheless. I would go so far as to say that *all* mountains are alive. They have the power to make you feel brave (or afraid), strong (or weak), and they always speak to you if you care to listen, although they never do it in words. And not just mountains but all places. If that's not a good definition of "life" then I don't know what is.

[Still feeling a bit poetic... heh heh]