The air is getting thinner, and its becoming harder to breathe.
The treeline is behind me the poor plants can’t survive up here.
The sharp scent of tree sap and fresh air is a wonderful change from the perfume clogged halls of my high school.
I’m the only one up here, my parents and brother are about a mile down the mountainside.
Off in the distance, I see a lone rain cloud floating in the sky.
It tries to look fierce and scary, but it lacks in that ability.
I lift up my camera and snap a picture of the beautiful sight. I’m almost to the top by now, and the air is even thinner.


Its my second trip up the mountain, but its different.
The last time I came here I was only about two, and wasn’t aloud anywhere near the edge.
When we came here the first time, my dad had to help me, but I’m doing it on my own.
Of course if there’s trouble I can go straight down the mountain to my family, but I have a feeling that wouldn’t happen.


It seems as if the higher up the mountain I get, the more I forget reality.
No longer does the rest of the world try to control me, not when I’m up here.
No one is telling me that I’m not skinny enough, or pretty enough like all of us hear in our daily lives.
Up here I’m me, and no one is telling me differently.
My parents aren’t here trying to get me to be more, and do better.
My brother isn’t here trying to tell me what his opinion of everything is.
And now that I’m getting closer to the edge, I can feel a change.


There it is, only ten feet away.
I’ve made it this far, and I will make it all of the way.
Its not a matter of pride, its a matter of knowing that I can do it.
As I get closer and even closer, I change my movement to crawling there instead for fear of falling.
There is a sense of vertigo for a moment, but then its gone, a feeling of awe replacing it.
I’m here.
Sitting on the edge.
By myself.
All my life I’ve heard people, the media, everything tell me that I’m not good enough.
I guess I’ve proved them wrong.


The sight is too much to explain to someone who hasn’t seen it.
Sure they’ll see pictures, but it will never be the same.
The feeling won’t be replicated, the smells, the sounds.
Only people who have been there know what its like.
People might go on to say they’ve ‘been there, do that.’
When in reality, they’re lying in order to seem cool, or the show off to their peers.
But right here, right now, I can see and feel this amazing view.
Its the Rocky Mountains, and they are aptly named.
Over to my right I can see more and more mountains in the distance, trying to out do each other. To my left is the same, but its all still beautiful.
There’s the treeline standing out on all of them, seeming as if someone had just painted over the trees, unhappy with the mountain being covered.
On the majority of the mountains is snow, bright white and long lasting.
The bottoms of the mountains is too hard to see, too far down and covered with trees.


Too soon, I here my parents coming up behind me, and its the same old, same old.
I get scolded for being so close to the edge, for even daring to sit on it, by my mom.
My dad just silently joins me, an understanding between us of the feeling of awe up here.
My brother is the same, he tries to act only semi-interested for the sake of hiding himself.
Its no longer just my mountaintop.
I snap a few more pictures and then head down again, to have some more of the peace I’d had before.

Some people will say that they know the feeling, but they’re lying to everyone.
Its not a feeling you get simply from looking at a picture, but you have to be there in real life.
The feeling of being on the edge isn’t like any normal feeling you get here in Minnesota.
Its something that comes with experience and adventure.
Now I know that I’m good enough, no matter what I hear in my life.
I can climb a mountain, a small one granted, but that’s not something everyone does in their life. No longer does the things I hear people say affect me, and I’m proud of that.