Anthony's Nose

Yesterday was such a nice day that I decided to take a hike up Anthony's Nose, and spend some time at the top. For various reasons, it was not as heavenly as the last time I was there, in September, which I wrote about in the second half of this post, but I remembered to bring my camera this time, and I'm attaching some photos to this post (click any of the small images to see it in its full size).

This time, as I've usually done, I went up the steep side, via the Appalachian Trail — a short hike, only half an hour from car to top, and rising some 600 feet above the road. I took my jacket with me, against the wind, but there was no wind yesterday, just a gentle, warm breeze, bright sun, and a clear sky; a lovely spring day, with ten days yet before spring. I could tell from the number of cars parked on the road that it was a popular hike that day, and as I ascended I passed several groups of people on their descent.

I wandered around a bit at the top, taking pictures and looking around, before settling into my favourite spot, eating my sandwich, and soaking in the surroundings, both external and internal. No kayak "Pooh sticks" today — nothing on the river at all, in fact — but plenty of hawks "making lazy circles in the sky", and lots of human visitors, large and small, coming and going.

I stayed there for about two hours, listening, looking, being, and feeling. It's certainly true that how one experiences things is directly connected to the context in which one experiences them. A corollary of that is that one can adjust one's experience by adjusting the context — the internal part, the part one has some control over. It's a feedback system: changing one's attitude affects the way one experiences the world around, which in turns affects one's attitude, and so on.

I think I'm starting to sound too much like Pirsig here, so it's time to stop writing and just let the reader enjoy the photos. I'll just add that to finish an active day, I spent the evening at the Greenwich (CT) contradance (see this post for more about that).