story time

I have a lot of favorite memories, like driving around with friends at night or sitting at the beach with my boyfriend after our first date (which also happened to take place at night, nighttime just has these ethereal and memorable vibes). But my favorite memory was around 2019 / 2020 while I was at a summer camp.

It was the last year I was eligible to attend as a camper, I was 15. Every session at this camp, everyone goes on a huge two day hiking and camping trip. At the time I identified with the gender I was born as so I was in the girls group. We walked up along a super steep incline, through a mountaintop field, to an old wooden pavilion. The food we ate was homemade pita pizzas, cooked on V-shaped sticks over a campfire. I remember sitting in the field, the tall grass swaying in the evening breeze. The stars were starting to poke through the pink veil of sky while we had a group reading session, like we did every night. Later we turned in for the night at the pavilion, situated next to one another in sleeping bags on the floor. 

There was a huge and violent storm outside, it was calming to fall asleep to. Little did we know that the boy's group, who only had a tarp, was suffering through a thunderstorm and had to leave early. My brother was among them and he recounted the entire ordeal when we all got back to the main camp. During their traumatic experience, we were laughing and making shadow puppets on the pavilion walls, and falling asleep to the seemingly calm sound of rain on the roof.

Waking up bright and early, I could smell the post presence of rain in the air from the opened pavilion front. Everyone was gathered in front of it, looking at the scenery. I walked over to check it out and I saw the most beautiful thing I'll ever see in my entire life. The ground was covered in various blankets of fog, layering the mountain with its gray curtains. The sun rose behind the mountain peak, creating an almost heavenly glow of the area. I could see the fog and mist crawl along the treetops below, and the steep meadow hills with their tall grass disappearing over the edge. I really wish I could have been able to capture its beauty, but I didn't have my phone and my polaroid pictures would just never come out right. However, I'll never forget what I saw that morning. The feeling I had while looking at the mountains made me want to keep on living. I felt so alive. Whenever I'm in an episode; this memory, this feeling, this experience, is on the list of reasons why I should keep on living. It reminds me how beautiful raw natural life really is.