The other night I took a drive around the city, and I listened to the song Never Saw Blue Like That by Shawn Colvin (click on the link for a listen). It was late, and the darkness seemed to curl around me, making the car feel safe and warm. I pulled into the Rock Canyon parking lot, the mountains looming before me in the darkness. Gazing at the stark, cool stars, I wanted to get out of the car and hike up, up, up. Maybe it was because of the song -- but I felt very nostalgic. I thought about the night hikes that Scott and I took up that canyon when we were getting to know each other. That nervous moment, off the path, when we looked down at the river in the moonlight -- and I think both of us knew it would be the perfect moment to kiss, but we headed back to the path instead. Long conversations up that canyon in the darkness. Using our bums as sleds to fly down the hillside in the snow. Leaving my parka at the first bridge and hiking up higher, only to forget and leave it when we (literally) came running down the canyon to the car to get me home for my date with a different boy at 8:00 that night. Hiking up that canyon on a frosty February 14th, knee deep in snow, where he asked me to be his wife in the serenity of that beautiful place. Gorgeous moon, river thundering below in the quiet dark. I think we were the only two people there. And then, later, pregnant and heading up in the afternoon sunlight when burnt afternoon amber bathes the canyon. In that light, bouldering on the rocks with Scott, he turned and looked at me and told me I was beautiful.
Just being there brought all of this back. It's where we got to know each other, where my perspective was forever changed because of this man that I love. Like the song says, he figuratively made me see blue with a brilliance I'd never seen before.
My heart felt lighter, life was prettier, things were funnier, love was real and thick.
Seems symbolic that it was a canyon where much of it began. Seems the perfect analogy.
Sometimes it's rocky, but as we climb higher and higher, the vastness on either side of us is more breathtaking.
I look at our two beautiful boys. Think about what we've shared together since those early memories. Although this terrain has never been traveled before, and isn't for the faint of heart, it is what I wanted.
The dark stillness reminded me of this.
(And it made me want to hike again.)
I love this man of mine.
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