how do you just… breathe through it," they asked, and i thought of the wind on the aiguille du midi, how it strips everything down until there's just the sound of your own lungs working, not fighting it, just moving with it, letting the cold air scour out whatever doesn't belong in the chest, leaving only what’s essential, the beat of the heart against the ribs, and i realized it's not about being a container for their storm, not really, it's about being the ground beneath them, solid and unmoving, letting the earth take the reverberations, the shock of it all, feeling that deep thrum of connection run through my own calves into the granite, not a drain but a grounding, like the root systems of the oldest pines clinging to the rock face, unwavering, even when the storms come through and tear at everything else, and i remembered every rock i've carried from a summit, each one a memory of a moment i thought i couldn't stand, but the mountain stood, and so did i, and that's the truth that settles, always.