“Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit, and as vital to our lives as water and good bread. A civilization which destroys what little remains of the wild, the spare, the original, is cutting itself off from its origins and betraying the principle of civilization itself.”
―Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire
There’s a particular moment when you sit on the edge of the world and stare into the vastness laid bare before you. Perhaps you also know it. It’s a moment where things go quiet, where your present awareness becomes overwhelming and drowns out the thoughts and fear, hopes and dreams … when you melt into the surroundings and wonder how you ever could have been blinded to that calm sense of being washing over you. In many ways, you suddenly feel home.
And, these wild moments are becoming exceedingly rare—the plastic facades papering over and digitizing them in favor of artificial assurances of meaning and belonging that leave us feeling more alone. With each passing year, the knowing that comes from wilderness, integral to what it means to be human, seems to get lost a little more in translation, and our connection to that wisdom weakens. Deep and profound wisdom—that eons of time renders trivial our individual problems and concerns, that life in balance with its surroundings is perhaps the most precious thing of all. And simple wisdom, like: you belong here, too.
Whenever you find yourself in one of these rare moments where wilderness causes words to lose their meaning and the past and future collapse into the singular present and it all mixes together, pause.
Breathe.
Be.
Don’t try to capture a fleeting moment, for wild things are best left where they’re found. Savor it instead, and then …
—A.J. Plummer