I remember standing on the summit of some mountain in the Selkirks in BC, looking out over an expanse of snow-capped peaks, a sight so breathtaking as to be almost unbelievable. The air was clean and cold, bracing, and summer wildflowers were blooming in splotches of red and purple low to the ground. I remember how awe-inspiring it was, and I remember how nothing about it spoke to me. It was like listening to poetry in a language unknown to you – you can hear the beauty of it, but there is no meaning.
Just a few weeks ago, I stood in the basin of a desert valley about 300 feet below sea level. About as far from the snow capped peaks of the Selkirks as you can get. The air was hot, so hot it felt almost pure. The sun so bright I could hardly keep my eyes open. It was so far from home, much further than the Selkirks, and it was in a different country, in more ways than one. And yet, it spoke to me, and I could understand it.
I don’t know if it was the glare of the sun or the quality of the heat, or the deceptive emptiness of it, but I recognized it. It spoke to me in my mother tongue.
from the gap 