No One Came

In 1992 I was just out of high school and mountain biking daily when I heard the news about the Ridge to Rivers partnership. Five agencies had combined and drafted a Memorandum of Understanding to preserve large tracts of the foothills for public use. I was relieved. I had already watched with horror as housing developments crept up the base of the foothills. I knew they’d keep coming, as that sort of thing always does.

Thirty years later, May 2022. I stood at this viewpoint watching the sun rise, its heat warming me. I was waiting for a hiker, a biker, anyone to appear on that trail below and give scale to the hills above it. There are over a million visitors to the Boise foothills each year but no one came this morning

I remembered the news from 1992 and felt grateful there weren’t little boxes of homes stacked in the valley or marching up the slope before me. Just the hills, the way they’ve always been.