It is more than fair to say that the state of Colorado has had a huge effect on me. I cannot explain it all at this time, but I can say for sure that the rapid change in my environment is a factor. The altitude is one thing. We are also surrounded by massive 14,000 foot mountains with height and length I have never seen in real time. The ranges (those of which I cannot name and feel I should have memorized by now) are what I see first thing when I emerge out of my room to the coffee. I look at them before anything else, to check in. I focus on them bleary-eyed, while trying, yet again, to perceive their scale. Their scale to me feels different almost daily- from newborn (early) light, to hard and direct to reflected or in shadow or through fog- they change. And the weather plays its part. It is radical. Wind (which makes me very angry), snow, bright white sun, half clouded, or white light trying to get through fog, sleet and white bouncing pebbles, sheets of rain.
The changes are something I am learning to contend with but I am not used to this drama. Yet at the same time, the changes feel constant, almost steady. I find this feeling hard to explain, but as I am experiencing shifts daily, hourly, or by the minute, life can feel unexpected, therefore unplanned. I think living (and attempting to work) here has thus far been a lesson. I am practicing just being. Being with what is outside at any given moment.
