The Gift
It wasn't like I found Colorado, I think Colorado found me. In some kind of cosmic jigsaw puzzle in which every piece needs to be in the right place for us to be able to discern the hidden motif, things had to happen first – people, pictures and prospects had to come into my life and fall into place there, sending me on my way to find – or be found by – a landscape that moved me like no other before. It took an artist to put the finishing touches to that fragmentary scheme inside my mind ... a poet and a painter ... a poet painting pictures with words.
Some of us are gifted in a way that is hard to fathom – somewhere beyond themselves, in spite of who or how or what they are on a different level. It is a gift bigger than ego, a gift that – concerning themselves – may be a curse as much as a blessing: the unique ability to convey images and emotions regardless of self. It sure comes as a blessing when it leads to bring light, joy and comfort into the lives of others. How they do it though is hard to apprehend – inscrutable maybe – but isn't that how art should really be? Coming without purpose, brought into being by a force to create that is bigger than intent, pure energy finding it's way into the world, the artist merely a transmitter of a beauty and a wisdom hardly palpable to himself.
I have a very special friend who is gifted that way – capable of painting the most expressive pictures with his words, pictures that come alive with emotion, color, scent even – able to add shape and structure until they virtually turn into three-dimensional word sculptures – so vivid, so tangible, almost real.
For himself, he does not always seem able to sustain these pictures he paints so well for others – unable at times to draw upon the energy and strength they impart, intermittently blind to the unbelievable grandeur they transmit when they come from a place in his heart that is pure passion, pure love and true openness to the world.
It must have been from there that he described Colorado to me ... and his words found their way right into my heart, placing the cornerstone for a journey that was to become more than a mere "trip through the Rockies", a journey that seems like a key to yet another cosmic puzzle.
The Place
I loved Colorado. I can't explain why or how but it felt like a homecoming of sorts. I touched ground and was smitten – just like that – without reason. Like big love does, it came totally unexpected, taking my heart by surprise. Looking back now, I think I didn't even realize it at first. It wasn't spectacular. It wasn't the kind of love that makes you freak out. It simply provided me with a feeling of immense ease, depth and happiness. Being there felt just right – perfect even – yet in no way special.
I have been to a lot of places across the world. Quite a few have impressed me or made me want to return. Colorado was different – less striking than Utah, less spiritual than the Sinai, less craggy and steep than the Alps, less exotic than Asia and less remote and wild than Africa – and yet it was so much more. It opened up my heart – I felt at peace with myself, belonging – as absurd as this may sound but it felt like Colorado was simply where I was meant to be, coming back home to a place I've never been to before.
Some regions touched me more than others, some left me rather cold, but still ... finding those pictures I had seen with my heart already while listening to my friend's poetic outpours, exposing themselves to all their beauty right in front of my eyes now, it was sheer bliss - grace and wonder.
Walking and wandering for a full month through Colorado's hills, mountains and prairies, discovering it's manifold landscapes, I could feel an energy that was overwhelming at times, filling me with a serenity and strength I hadn't felt in a long time. I never expected it to be that intense. The worries I had felt before, they fell off my skin and mind once I arrived in the vast emptiness of western Colorado. There was not much room for egocentricity in this energy-laden place where all that matters is the moment and nature – and being in tune with them both. Where beauty is omnipresent, all scent, all color, all wide-open nothingness.
The Beauty
It's in the glitter of the granite, those twinkling silvery sparks on salmon-pink rock, reflecting the evening sunlight ... a sky so blue that it hurts at times ... clouds cumulating into giant celestial castles, tinted yellow and black, violet and red ... it's in the burning sun and the afternoon storms, and in the rain that comes as a relief at times, a curse at others ... it's in the shape of the leathern leaves of the scrub oak and in the pastel charms of the wild flowers ... in the sound of the wind echoing off ancient canyon walls, dissembling distant bygone steam trains ... it's in the luscious mountain meadows as much as in the austere prairie grasses ... in the buzzsaw sound of the cicadas and in the high-pitched cries of the hummingbirds ... it gurgles in the white water rapids and rustles in the aspen leaves ...
And then, it's in the air – in this peculiar Rocky Mountain air that surrounds you like a perfume: strong and spicy, balmy and brisk – an overpowering flavor of moss, pinyon pine and juniper, herbs, flowers and grasses. Nature's breath, enclosing your senses in an aura of scent – so lavish and invigorating, you want to get drunk on it, airily losing yourself in its magic and allure.
Colorado, that is an atmosphere so dense, an energy so full of spirit in certain places, it made my hair stand on end, giving me goosebumps when I sat down and went quiet, trying to open up and get a feeling for what was there around me. As if the air was abuzz with history, replete with the ghosts of long gone cultures ... in those wild rivers and red rocks, in those canyons and grasslands, in those mountains and woods and sacred springs ... one could divine their voices in the wind, whispering of a half-forgotten past, singing of ancient secrets and mysteries.
It cast a spell over me, this colorful state, an enchantment paired with the wish to stay on ... a yearning to return. And I shall – if the cosmos wills it too – as in this very second, on an airplane looking out at the stars and the half moon high above the Atlantic Ocean, I have a vague notion something is waiting for me back there ... something yet to be found. The cosmic puzzle is not accomplished, the picture not complete.
The Gratitude
Thank you my friends, all of you who played a role in making me come to Colorado: Michelle – you kindled the initial spark with your great passion for the land! So right you were about the ancient voices! ... thank you, Natasha ... thank you, Brian ... and finally: thank you, Jeff – wizard of words – for being a not so plain man after all.
Thank you all for your inspiration and motivation, sending my mind on this journey until I had no choice but to follow, 'painting' your poetic pictures, pouring your pictorial poems, praising those landscapes again and again – I can not tell you enough, all of you: Dankeschön!
(Author's note, added in the summer of 2009:)
And return I did, spending another month in the home of my heart, Colorado - made possible only by the immense hospitality of my wonderful and amazing friends in Lyons, Annie and Eben Grace. Thank you so much for your patience, for putting up with me for so many weeks, for making me feel welcome and at home. You guys are the best!
