To Live Again, For the First Time!

I slept like a log after that long, long day of travel. God, I can't believe I walked for so long without stop. While walking I barely felt anything, actually, I felt like I could still walk for another day or two without stopping. 

In retrospect, that was probably just the adrenaline talking. I mean, I was too preoccupied thinking about everything else, I really had no time to think about how my body was holding up. 

'Now is the time to regret it.'

'After a good night's sleep, it's sore. EVERYWHERE!'

The hard ground didn't bother me at all even though I had been sleeping on a soft mattress throughout this lifetime. 

I wasn't one to twist and turn in my sleep and so the small space didn't bother me either, it's just that, my legs were so stiff afterward. But I guess the blame can't be all placed on sleeping on the floor, of course in a tent, but still, the floor. In fact, I think most of it was due to the nonstop hiking.

No matter how much I exercise on a daily basis, being always on the move is still taxing.

Well, thinking about it wasn't helping...

The tent that I brought for this trip was one with a transparent top, with the option to pull up an attached cover, and so I was able to slip into sleep watching the stars and wake up to the sunrise.

It was quite upsetting to wake up so late that I missed daybreak, but I was too exhausted to move anyway. Even so, I missed a good opportunity to take a shot of the sunrise in this part of the mountain range. One that wasn't going to come by very often. 

Chances are that on my trip back, I wouldn't be stopping at this exact location and so I didn't really know if I was going to be seeing the sunrise here any time soon.

After changing my clothes in the tent and stretching out, I quickly packed up the tent and set off after eating some trail mix for breakfast. 

Trail mix is just some of the blandest of foods to eat for long periods of time. At least if I had the option, I wouldn't ever resort to trail mix in this lifetime again. 

'Maybe I should get someone to make a better alternative.'

'I'm saving my jerky for later.'

I then set off, continuing in the direction opposite from which I came from.

Well, I could care less which direction I am headed in, but I'm not too fond of getting lost. Even if I picked a random direction I would have to remember them well so that I wouldn't lose my way when I have to make my way back.

'What a pain.'

'But it's worth the experience.'

Everything seemed to go perfectly well, and time flew by like an arrow. I just kept working on my camera work, stopping to stretch out once in a while to relieve some of the sore spots, and working on those breathing exercises I talked about a while back.

Of course, I don't actually know any real breathing exercises so I just made some up.

[Emilin: Wait what about going to the bathroom?]

[Author: Oh darling! Don't you know? Characters in novels apparently never have to go to the bathroom when it's not convenient enough!]

[Emilin: Well, I guess I didn't want it talked about anyways…]

A lot of time was also spent deleting some of the worse photos of the bunch, not wanting to max out the storage space on my camera chip, even though it was incredibly unlikely that I would have the skills to do that on this round trip.

Anyways, when I went back to the apartment, I would have to go through the photos and sort them out anyway, so it didn't really make a difference if it was deleted now or later, plus it wasn't like I didn't have any method to recover them later, if necessary.

It was around 10 AM when I stopped. I walked at a much slower pace today compared to yesterday so I covered less ground. Well at first I was planning to travel more, but with Grandma Charlotte's warning, I decided to take it slow.

'I'm glad I did.'

'There would have been tons of sights I would have missed. Wow, Grandma Charlotte. I guess I still find it weird calling her Grandma. Weird in a good way.'

'God I think I'm going to blush.'

'What is this?'

I bring my hands to my face and I can feel it heat up. Fanning myself uselessly thinking that it would cool me down.

'Ack. Concentrate on the view!'

'Stop thinking about it.'

I looked down, thankful that I don't have a phobia of heights.

I couldn't help but be amazed and entranced at the view below. 

Though this was also a forest, like the one I was looking at when I was with Grandma Charlotte, it was occupied with a different kind of tree.

I let my legs dangle off the cliff as I stared off to the ground below, sitting quietly on the ledge.

Of course, I'm in no way suicidal. I know that I'm not going to fall off no matter how careless I become since I carried my handy dandy heavy bag on my back as I sat.

It serves me as both a safety pin and an anchor.

The trees that made up the forest underneath my feet were all growing very closely together. The branches looked as if they would expand indefinitely, each layering one on top of another. As the trees were so close, they all connected at one point or another.

If I had to say what it looked like, I would say that it would be layers of webs, white webs all interconnected.

Besides that, there was a reason I was so admin about sitting here! No matter what kind of dangers I may have to face! [Thinking back, this was simply a retarded thought coming from a retarded mind housed in the brain of a retarded person.]

This is where I took my first decent photo! [That's the sound of desperation right there.]

Ah yes, to explain this I would have to take this to just a few seconds ago, it was more like a slip of the hand. It kind of just happen and then.

*Click*

I was going to delete it since it was a misclick, but thank god I looked at it before deleting it because it was definitely my best shot yet.

You could see how the horizon met the forest trees in the distance in the background of the photo. Some of the trees in the distance as well as the birds that flew so far that even I couldn't see them properly were somewhat blurry too.

However, this blurriness only served to enhance the characteristics and structures of the trees in the foreground. 

I could clearly see each branch and how they extended out as well as how they overlapped.

Most importantly, when I looked at the photo for prolonged periods of time, I felt like I could feel something.

It's quite strange to describe it in words now, but when I looked at the photo, I felt like I could distinctively feel the shock I felt when I accidentally clicked the button on my camera and heard the shutters.

The photo simply reflected that instance.

It was spontaneous just like the instance in which it was taken.

Spontaneous just like this trip to the mountains.

When I looked at the photo, I felt like doing something impulsive.

To start moving right that moment and do something dumb during my youth. I felt like shouting 'It's now or never!' and then proceed to do whatever it was I thought of doing.

Like finding my own path.

Strange right?

Well at least that's how I felt while looking at it, I can't really promise anything to anyone else.

Now that I finally took a photo that was satisfactory, at least to me it was, I couldn't help but want to linger here and see if I could come up with something else like this.

I took numerous photos after that first one, but as usual, there was nothing of substance. Everything was worse than mediocre. Quite sad to be honest.

I kept swinging my legs like a child who didn't fear the unknown and well, you know what happens when you know no fear and walk into the tiger's mouth willingly. 

You get in big trouble.

It was sudden. Out of nowhere, I heard a loud sound that was like a mixture of thunder and someone crumpling paper next to my ear.

I don't know what it was about that moment, maybe I was being too impulsive. Why the hell did I sit there on the ledge? Even if I wasn't going to fall, it was still dangerous right?

Why didn't I put that caution that was in my mouth onto my legs so that I could have moved out of there?

But to be fair, it wasn't really my fault...

Who could have seen it coming?

A fucking rockslide out of nowhere!

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