it feels like home to me

Shannon Page
Period 7
Advanced Composition
Sept. 16, 2009
Home
Nightfall presses the sun into the body of Mount Madison. The moon illuminates their abundance of love and the crisp air breathes heavy. The stars gaze down on us, emitting watts of positive vibes. I open my lungs and the mountain’s oxygen crawls in. I exhale, releasing more than my breath. I let out all the angst and negative vibes that puncture my serenity. I pick up rocks, and one by one throw them down the cliff. Every single one of them has a worry, a regret, or an anxiety attached to them. I am healing my wounds, one stone at a time. I throw, I sit, and I contemplate. Here on Chapel Rock, I am at one with myself.
On this hard surface, lies my core. My shell cracks open, scattering into the bowl of pine trees below. Here is where acceptance wraps its wings around me. It is comforting to know it is okay not knowing everything. This home teaches me that not having all the answers to my questions is fine. As I sit, this rock and ridge silently nurture me with positive affirmations. They are here to give me what I came for. They release a substance that is tempting to my body’s pours. My desperate heart can’t help but begin to absorb. It quenches my mind’s driving thirst for simplicity. Here, on this rock, on the peak of this mountain, everything makes sense. That is because I realize there is such little to actually understand. I begin to realize that my complications are self-inflicted. I throw a pebble down. I am at one with this mountain.
Up on this spot of the mountain I am a part of something bigger than myself. I grasp that I am not as important as sometimes I feel. The first time I realized this, I was up here, on Chapel Rock. A wave of disappointment and depression washed over me. I began a downward spiral of thoughts, questioning my own existence. However, I changed my mind’s direction. Soon the thought of being insignificant became comforting. Knowing that my troubles really don’t matter in the big picture felt relieving. Realizing that there are things bigger than my school’s daily gossip is enlightening. Since that day, I have lived a different lifestyle. I filled the hollow space in my body. I became the soil under my feet. The pine trees below me didn’t seem so far away, nor did the mountains. I was a part of the rain that was dripping down. I felt replenished.
When I finish my last moment of the year on Chapel Rock, drenched in love, I begin to walk down the trail. I follow the path through the school hallways, around my house, out in the fields for a year straight. Then I become drained. Just before I begin to wither away, Chapel Rock saves me. Summer rolls around and my parched body aches. I climb up to the peak of my mountain. I am reminded again that I am one with this earth.