Fossil Peak

There is a poster at my doctor's office that says THE MAN AT THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN DIDN'T GET THERE BY ACCIDENT.

I would also submit that mountains don't become mountains by accident.

"The highest peak in northeast Asia is called Jade Mountain and it is in Taiwan. The mountains of Taiwan were created by the collision of two plates in the earth’s crust. The intense heat and pressure created by that powerful force turned layers of sediment first to limestone, then to the marble for which the east coast is famous. That same unseen power shakes and grinds and buckles the earth, eventually sending mountain ranges soaring into the heavens."

Chén Yù Chuàn, a tour guide that works in the Yushan National Park in Taiwan, likes to point out that Taiwan was formed from the bottom up.

“There are ripple marks on the highest rock, and there are sea fossils and other evidence of what’s on top having once been at the bottom,” he says. “If you want to understand the summit, you must understand the depths, because that’s where the summit began.”

I love nature analogies. They make sense to me. There have been times I have felt like a wimpy jellyfish staring up at a majestic mountain range. Everyone around me has accomplished so much, has everything figured out, is standing tall and casting shadows. Why am I the only jellyfish around? Why is everyone else a mountain? I isolate myself.

A rumor makes its way down to my sea bed whispering there are jellyfish fossils at the tops of all the mountains I am worshipping. How did a spineless water creature like me transport itself above the tree line? Did these mountains I envy enjoy sea level complacency before suffering collision, heat, shaking, grinding, and buckling? What did these mountains live through to move a jellyfish heavenward? I realize I have not endured as much as I think and the fossils reveal that I have something in common with every mountain I see; we all know what it's like to be a jellyfish. Boy oh boy, did I misjudge those mountains.

Now I talk to the mountains from my wet home in the river gorge. The mountains have so much good advice for me; they still remember what it was like to be soft sediment full of swimmers. I never knew a jellyfish and a mountain could be such good pals.

The moral of the story is to open up and talk to people about what you are struggling with. You will be surprised how many people know exactly what you are struggling with. Blue-haired grannies, empty nesters, soccer moms, newlyweds, singles, teens, and tikes have been through than you can reckon.

We are all so similar.

*indented text taken directly from "Making Mountains: The Parable of the Mountain Guide and the Mountain" by Adam C. Olson. Photo text by Adam C. Olson.