I pulled into the visitor’s parking lot at Devil’s Tower National Monument and noticed there were only a couple of spaces left. A small car followed behind me as I made my way toward the open spots. We both pulled in. Full house.
The Tower loomed overhead, its ancient form quietly transcending and silencing the stream of thoughts running through my mind.
I creaked out of the van, my legs tingling in that relieved, grateful way they do after a long drive. The woman from the car beside me stepped out too. We both stretched, eyes drawn upward to the Tower. We exchanged a brief smile; a shared nod of luck at having found parking in the nick of time.
The Tower Trail
I felt the pull to get closer. There was a trail — the Tower Trail — that looped all the way around Devil’s Tower. It seemed like the right way to experience it. Apparently, she thought the same. We started walking at the same time, and smiled again. Before long, we were hiking together.
We clambered over round, timeless boulders and laid our hands against the cool, solid side of the Tower. Not many words passed between us; just enough to share how we each ended up here, hiking around Devil’s Tower with a stranger.
I was driving east, heading home after a short visit with my brother in Montana. She was heading west for a new job in Seattle. We were both drawn here by the same impulse: we may never be this close again.
East and West
When the trail looped back to the parking lot, our foreheads glistened with sweat. The day was warming up, but the Tower stood quiet and unmoved. She got into her car, and I climbed into my van. She turned west. I turned east.
I’ll never forget her. And I’ll never forget Devil’s Tower.
Moments like this remind me that not all journeys are measured in miles. Some are measured in brief connections, in quiet recognition of a stranger, a place, or ourselves.