What is it about the desert that weaves a spell around me?
It is the fear of standing on the edge of something vast and totally inexplicable -
and the giddy exhilaration,
that comes with such a fear
There is a definite but peculiar exhilaration to be felt when standing on the shores; nay on the brink, of a vast ocean desert that can and will (without scruple) kill you. You think; when you are full of food and water and guts and adrenaline, that you can take it on. You want to take on the desert because you want to beat it and conquer it. But it is so much vaster and so much bigger and older than you. Compared to it you are a mere blip in time. You will always be so much smaller than it. You may 'beat it' today - but tomorrow it will still be there - unmoving, defiant. And you? You will be gone on your heels. The desert will still be there when you die and who gets the final say? The mountain or the mountaineer? The desert or the deserter?
I love the desert. But it's not just the finely wrought landscape that I am in love with. Nor the colour and textures of its surface. It is how I feel in the desert; or how the desert makes me feel. This vastness and emptiness that stretches before me, makes me feel small and utterly insignificant - thrillingly insignificant. And I love feeling insignificant! And there's no better place to feel it then in the desert.
The Atacama is doubly effective in instilling this feeling of smallness because it is really two landscapes. And when you add these two landscapes together, you'll be taken on a journey to new levels of insignificance. There is of course the usual desert landscape itself. But at night, when you are sitting underneath the cover of your tent, if you look up, you'll see another even vaster desert. The desert of stars. And if you are made of the same stuff as me - you will go blind on your insignificance. Heady and drunk and happy make you feel the stars. And that ribbon! Oh, that silvery ribbon! See how it girdles the night sky like a belt? - that is our Milkyway galaxy and it hugs the Atacama night. What am I to such heavenly wrought stuff? A blip on the highway of eternity? A tear on the cheek of time? Or a smote of dust in a sandstorm of billions upon billions lasting millions upon millions. Gazing up at the sky is like standing on the edge of a ledge - looking down at the abyss - with the stars and deep-time swirling abouts you, like singing dervishes. You are the centre, of everything and nothing. I play with this thought like a Rubik's Cube. 'I am everything and I am nothing'. Through me the world exists. Through my eyes and through my senses and through the comprehension of my consciousness I make the world come alive. And when I am gone, the world too is gone: I am everything and I am nothing.
It's all about the feeling. How a place makes you feel. That is what is most important and what you remember most. Sights and sounds and smells you will likely forget in time, but feelings...ah, feelings you will hold onto forever! The wise traveller seeks and collects not souvenirs or sights or sounds - but feelings.
And there is no better place; no better souvenir shop for collecting feelings, than at the edge of desert space.
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