Prompt: Moment. Pick one moment during which you felt most alive this year. Describe it in vivid detail (texture, smells, voices, noises, colors).
Author: Ali Edwards
Memory Keeping Idea Books
@aliedwards
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There isn’t a single moment in 2010 that made me feel the most alive. Rather, it’s a series of moments & experiences – the time I spent trail running.
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It’s early spring and everything is coming to life.
The sunlight filters through the canopy, lighting rather than warming. The shadows dance over the surface of the trail as the trees move in the slight breeze. In places water flows over the trail, occasionally stopping in muddy pools. Everything is greens and browns – earth tones, of course; with pale yellow highlighting the sharp features of tree branches and the roots & rocks that litter the trail.
I feel the path under my feet, the rocks and roots adding texture that is absent from sidewalk runs. The mud splashes up onto my calves, shockingly cold and deeply satisfying.
The only sounds are birds chattering, calling to each other, and flitting around in the brush (sounding much bigger than their actual size); the small streams – most temporarily formed by the spring rains; and me: my breathing, my heartbeat, and the rhythm of my feet.
The forest feels clean and purifying – almost meditative. I feel clean and purified and calm. I can almost smell the new growth in forest, fed by the spring rain. Everything is green and new and alive. I am alive.
