Monday, 28 November 2022
I awoke early, called not only by the glacier, which had been on my mind all night, but by a grand flood-storm. The wind was blowing a gale from the north and the rain was flying with the clouds in a wide passionate horizontal flood, as if it were all passing over the country instead of falling on it. The main perennial streams were booming high above their banks, and hundreds of new ones, roaring like the sea, almost covered the lofty gray walls of the inlet with white cascades and falls. I had intended making a cup of coffee and getting something like a breakfast before starting, but when I heard the storm and looked out I made haste to join it; for many of Nature’s finest lessons are to be found in her storms….
—John Muir, Stickeen,1909
I am not tough. Nor I do not aspire to be. That’s not to say I’m weak. Rather, I’d characterize myself as cautious, intelligently so. I am open to challenge, but I wish to be prepared, and would like to see myself as resilient.
Continue reading On Being Tough