Out in the World
You’ve been cooped up too long to follow some bird around. “Buckaroo Holiday” sounds like fun though. Tossing Vaughn Williams aside, you get ready to “Cowboy Up,” before realizing that nobody says that anymore.
Copland doesn’t give you a chance to feel bad about your dated slang, though. The music crashes in, and as you close your eyes, you see a dusty trail starting beneath your feet and leading straight up that mountain. You take your first steps as the raw, wild land and deep, open sky unfurl around you.
Quickly your feet find the rhythm and your pace quickens. For the first time in a long time you feel like you are heading SOMEWHERE, not just spinning your wheels in some wagon rut.
As you work your way up the trail, your breaths come comfortably hard and your legs burn, but it’s nothing compared to the weight of standing still. Copland's music urges you on, sometimes inviting, sometimes pushing, but always moving you closer to the top.
After your climb to the summit, you’re more alive than you’ve ever been.
You stand at the top, drinking in the view of the valley below, and the late afternoon sun dipping below mountains you’ve yet to climb. The sweaty sheen you’ve built up now dries in the mountain air, and suddenly, you’re chilled.
Shadows soon grow longer as the sun fades. The few lone pines and scraggly brush near you leave you feeling exposed. No one knows you’re here, but, somehow, everyone, everything knows. Something feels off about this moment.
Do you investigate at the summit with Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain?”
or