If you had told me even a few months ago that I would be in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, I probably would have rolled my eyes at you while sipping iced tea from my front porch.

It’s a “far piece,” as the old folks used to say, from the mighty Mississippi River, after all.

The mountains are all around us. As far as I can see and in any direction, it’s truly enchanting.

All those year ago, Mama and I watched on the big console TV as Bob Ross painted his glorious mountain landscapes. He made magic appear so effortlessly. We were transfixed, almost hypnotized, by his gifts.

Wielding his artist’s tools and dipping his brushes into a palette of colors, he formed his own poetry. Now I am experiencing the inspirational magic first hand.

“The only thing worse than yellow snow is green snow,” he would say, adjusting the colors on the canvas.

When I look into the distance and see the glow of sunset illuminating Mount Blanca, it takes my breath away as I remember my favorite painter.

“Look around. Look at what we have. Beauty is everywhere. You only have to look to see it,” he would say, tapping birds to life in the horizon of a landscape. “Why don’t we let him live right here.”

He spoke the language of his art.

“You need the dark in order to show the light,” I heard him say. That one still stops me in my tracks.

It’s no secret to my friends that I am deathly afraid of heights. The idea of traveling through the mountains makes my heart beat fast. My palms get sweaty.

We have been in the San Luis Valley for about eight weeks, and I find myself shutting my eyes every time I ride through the mountain passes.

Last week I found my courage. A friend was visiting from the big city, a landscape painted more with concrete sidewalks, tall skyscrapers, and smog than Bob Ross would have liked, so I drove her high into the mountains for the afternoon. It began as a sunny day, but rather suddenly a storm blew in as we approached the first mountain pass.

Determined to confront my fears and show Stacee the unparalleled beauty of the mountains, I pushed on through the hail storm and its gusty winds.

We missed our turn as the rain pounded down onto the windshield, and we kept climbing higher and higher into the sky.

I imagined my painter saying, “We don’t make mistakes. We just have happy accidents.”

We looked at the panoramic views when the rain slowed enough for us to rejoice at the beauty around us. We found our way back down the mountain that afternoon, and wouldn’t you know, the sun came out again.

Bob would have said, “In painting, you have unlimited power. You have the ability to move mountains. You can bend rivers.”

I say, in life, too.

 

David Creel is a Mississippi native and a syndicated columnist.You may reach him at beautifulwithdavid@gmail.com.