TRAVERSE 139
I had rounded a bend, and the valley had fallen away so sharply that it seemed to pull at my balance. Mountains had risen in layers, each one larger than the last, until my eyes had struggled to hold them all at once. In those moments, I hadn’ t felt small in a diminishing way, but in a clarifying one. The world hadn’ t been built to accommodate me there. I had simply been passing through.
The road had demanded attention in a way that felt almost intimate. There had been no space for distraction. Sections had crumbled into gravel without warning. Corners had tightened unexpectedly. At times, the surface itself had felt provisional, as though the mountain had only just allowed it to exist. I remembered a stretch where a landslide had been recently cleared.
The earth had still been unsettled beneath the tyres, the edges dissolving into a drop that seemed to have no end. A line of trucks had forced its way through ahead of me, their painted exteriors bright against the muted tones of rock and dust. One driver had leaned out, shouted something I hadn’ t heard, and grinned with an expression that felt equal parts reassurance and
TRAVERSE 139