They came from all over the world, to the top of this mountain.  In one way, they were similar.  They loved home for all the adequacies and inadequacies.   A fifteen minute tram ride would take them from the lake to a world that was new, different and exhilarating.  They would look at adjacent mountain peaks on an equal level.  To be this high up is to see that flattening of clouds as they pass overhead on their way over the summit.

          Everyone has to stop, and with wide-eyed wonder admit that they aren’t at home anymore.  As my wife and I chronicled events and observations, people seemed drawn to us as perfect strangers.  Questions and answers passed back and forth like who are you and where are you from.

          A British couple stops by our view point.  They point out that there is nothing like this in Great Britain.  They quickly add though that they have history and stories of great Kings and Queens.  It seems to be written into who we are.  I think that is the thing that we all have in common.  We all carry around stories of home.  It seems to be written into our DNA.  Our British friends our a product of a culture with a history and they know their story.

          As a westerner in the United States, how does home affect us?  We don’t have much of a history.  There was little here before 1860.  I feel the breezes coming up from the canyons.  I have felt them before.  I know them by the way the effect me.  It’s almost at a soul level.  I think home is more than what we see, it’s what we feel.  My British friends felt that about history.

          What do I feel for certain?  I need to know because I think my definitions are tied up in those things.  No home is perfect.  In just a few months this place on the Mountain top will be uninhabitable with cold winds and feet of snow.  But for now it is enough.  There is this feeling that I have been here and a peace for a long time.  This place for now is home.