The view from the top

At 10 a.m. I find myself sitting on the summit of Mount Douglas and looking out over the glassy water toward the islets and mountains in the distance. There's no one here but me and the birds and four other people: a jogger who passed me as I trudged sweatily up the steep hill, a fiftyish couple speaking French, and a lean and wiry woman walking a friendly white terrier. A gentle breeze sweeps away the sweat I worked up walking up this hill, and when the French-speakers pause, the silence is intense. 

It took quite an effort to get up here: an hour and a quarter walking from the campus to Mount Doug, all of it downhill--which means I'll walk the same route uphill on the way back, mostly through busy commercial areas. In the middle of a quiet residential neighborhood stands Mount Douglas, a dark crag that looks like a piece of the Jurassic jutting into our era. The lower slopes are covered with thick pine forest, ferns, and rhododendrons, but the terrain becomes less familiar as I move uphill. Near the summit are oak trees with shiny, curly leaves, and the rocks near the summit are studded with brilliant yellow stonecrop blossoms.  Someday I'll figure out what all this stuff is but at the moment my primary goal is to rest up for the trip back to campus and let the breeze blow the cobwebs out of my head. I'll attend a session this evening and more over the next two days, but today I decided to get away and get the view from the top.