How Did You Find This Place?

I took one of my former students on his first backpack trip. We hiked cross-country over a pass down into a beautiful meadow. As we hiked back the last day, Bill asked “How did you find this place?” Some surface answer moved towards my tongue but then I paused. There was a good answer I sensed but it was complicated, hard to explain to someone not familiar with the land. As I sorted through possible approaches, one truthful word emerged. “Gradually.” Once that truthful word was spoken, it opened the space so I could take the time to explain how a hike twenty years ago led to another hike that went a bit further that led to another to another until I came upon this meadow which then led to attempts to find an easier route to it. And after all that, the true answer that Bill needed to hear emerged, “By continually exploring my edge.”