A View From the Top

Mount Sopris: A view from the top.

The soul singer Solomon Burke has a song, "Diamond in Your Mind," in which Burke advises the listener to always keep one of those in their mental archives, a special place where one can go when the external world refuses to cooperate.

I have such a place, and although it is among my favorite places in the world, it's not a place that I've ever spent a lot of time.It's exposed, so if there's rain or snow, it will find you there. Hot, cold, or any other climatic moods are inescapable. Despite its natural beauty, the place is in cell phone range and it has a good view of the highway, so from the moment you reach it, the world is drawing you back.

It is the top of the Arbaney Kittle hiking trail, near my hometown of Basalt, Colorado. It sits at the top of a steep path up a narrow valley, a hard half hour's walk from the parking lot. It is an exposed butte marked with a single gnarled juniper tree, and from the top the geography of my childhood unfolds. To the east is the Frying Pan River, where I swam and along whose banks I biked growing up. To the west is Mount Sopris, the peak that towered over my high school years and is featured in the logo of the prep school where I spent them. That school, the Colorado Rocky Mountain School, lies to the north. To the south is Aspen, middle school, skiing, and my Grandmother. I can see it all.

What I like most about the spot is the simple lesson it offers about work and reward. When I reach it, I am almost invariably huffing and spitting, and my lungs are sore. I kneel for a moment to recover, and when I rise to take in the view relief washes over me, the sweet relief that comes after hard, almost intolerable work. Endorphins accent the landscape, and perhaps a habit of mind kicks in: up there, I have learned, I feel good. The top offers security, in the knowledge that what I have just done is almost certainly the most difficult thing I will do that day. After the hike, domestic life down below will seem easy.

Location