The Weight of Stillness

In the quiet hours of the morning, when the house is still settling into its bones, I often find myself thinking about the nature of distance. We measure it in miles or minutes, but there is another kind of distance—the space between what we see and what we actually perceive. It is a strange, thin layer of air that sits between our eyes and the world. We look at a mountain and we see a geological fact, a jagged line of stone against a pale sky. But if we sit with it long enough, the mountain stops being an object and starts being a presence. It begins to exert a kind of gravity, pulling our thoughts toward the horizon, demanding that we acknowledge our own smallness. It is not a comfortable feeling, to be so thoroughly eclipsed by something that does not even know we are watching. Yet, in that surrender, there is a peculiar kind of peace. If the earth can hold its breath for an eternity, why are we always in such a hurry to exhale? What happens when we finally stop trying to name the view and simply let it hold us?

Laria Saunders has captured this exact suspension in her work titled Aspire. It is a gentle reminder that some places are meant to be felt rather than just visited. Does the silence of the mountains ever speak to you?