Where We Come Alive: The Hidden Stories of the Mountain

The Embryo

You can read about it, hear stories, even see photos—but until you set foot in Tahoe’s National Forest, you haven’t truly felt it. The way it wakes you up. The way it stirs something ancient inside.

The Gorge

On a recent hike up Thunder Mountain Trail in Olympic Valley, I was reminded why this connection to nature matters so deeply. Every step offered a surprise—hummingbirds hovering over wildflowers, a twisted, gnarled tree I’d never noticed, the soft rush of snowmelt in a hidden creek, or that unmistakable aroma of sun-warmed pine.

Wildflowers

It’s never the same walk twice. And that’s what pulls me up the mountain.

There are few things in life more genuine, more thrilling, than this communion with the wild. It’s not an escape; it’s a return. A recalibration. It's putting your mind where your heart wants to be.

Survivor

Liberating and grounding at once. Up here, I feel awake... alive.

Every sense ignited. Every breath charged with raw, clean energy.

Over the Moon

And sometimes, it’s not the vast alpine vistas, or a rising moon that move me most... it’s in the smaller, less assuming things. A single flower, bold enough to bloom through rock. Or a weed waving in the wind.

Life

Or a forgotten, knotted swirl on the side of a tree - like the one below.

"Tree Knot" near the base of the tree.

As a writer and photographer, these quiet moments are where things start getting really interesting.

Take a closer look at this so-called “tree knot.”

What at first seems like a blemish becomes a marvel... a smooth, swirling fingerprint of grain, surrounded by bark roughened by time and weather. Likely, it's a healed-over wound, a limb broken by storm, or removed by animal or man. Maybe even the scar of disease.

Closer look.

What you're seeing is the tree's cambium layer growing back, nature’s version of scar tissue.

It doesn’t erase the damage; it transforms it.

Closer.

And that’s part of the magic.

The tree says:

Here is where I was hurt. Here is where I healed. And now, here is where I am most interesting.

Spun upside down, the knot takes on an embryonic shape, alien-like, like something from a Ridley Scott film.

It's telling us a story. It's telling us its story...

In the place where we come alive.

Tahoe Quarterly Magazine

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I’m Michael Kennedy, a resident of Olympic Valley, CA (in photo above). I’m a visual storyteller and I love exploring nature and getting lost in the Junipers high up on our mountains. I know we live in a world that demands our attention. I just want to say thank you for your attention. If you enjoyed this post, please share with a friend. For more photos and stories visit www.BlueWolfGallery.com.