An Introduction To Creator Eli Brown

The best thing about the mountains is that when you're in them, you feel awfully small.

From about the time I was able to walk, my mother took me hiking. I don't mean boardwalks and flat, wide trails. Instead she led me through the underbrush, up steep climbs, and over logs to scenery more beautiful than I could have even imagined. Wise beyond her years, my mother introduced me to a new mentor, parent even; she took me to the mountains.

When I was about nine, I heard my parents talking to another middle aged married couple about the struggles of parenting, and wistfully laughing about the security some sort of guidebook would provide. I remember wondering how one could possibly parent if the was no sort of established guide to follow. Obviously, this was before I understood that adulthood just marks the beginning of the age of pretend; instead of asking for help, you simply pretend you know what you're doing. Anyways, this puzzle rested heavily on the mind of a young, blossoming over-thinker and continued to do so for a very long time. The question shouldn't have had any effect on my life, yet it just stuck around and continued to bother a bored and quickly developing adolescent. Long story short, the lack of specific direction in the philosophy of my upbringing led to the development of an overwhelming sense of independence and a love of danger. Yet, my father, a perfectly capable parent of course, understood himself and the effect he would have on his children and shortly after my birth my parents moved to the forests above a small town. Lakeside, Montana is nestled in the hills above the largest lake west of the Mississippi, Flathead Lake in Northwest Montana, an area is also home to Glacier National Park, the heart of the Rocky Mountains. What I'm trying to say is the conditions were perfect, and paired with my rampant independence an explorer was born. I love and always will love to explore.

As I gained an appreciation for adventure, I began to spend more and more time meeting people from around the country. Sitting around a campfire in a mountain forest with strangers is a marvelous feeling, and I've always found it funny the way a campfire seems to coax out a guitar from a member of its audience. No matter how many times I sit at a campfire and play or listen to another member of our impromptu gang, the magic of the moment never seems to fade. It's equally curious as to why the birds seem to hold the tune of the night before and sing it back with their own interpretation to the restless sleepers in the morning. The music of waterfalls and animal calls and the rustling of the wind echoed in my head from a very young age and at once, this addictive personality found its champion. Music. From that point forth, music has been and will continue to be my passion.

If I were to say the second best thing about the mountains are the photographs and lengthy poetic descriptions, I'd only kind of be kidding. See, even when everything went wrong, the mountains always seemed to make life more meaningful and it didn't take long to realize meaning is the key to happiness. As I began to spend more and more time exploring the mossy forests, fast moving rivers, and awe-inspiring rock of my environment, I began to feel the need to share the beauty of the world around me with the people in my life.There's a lot of people who could use a just little bit of happiness. Yet, I quickly ran into trouble, because when you tell a sane human being that you want to wake up at 3:30 A.M. and drive into the park to watch sunrise at Logan Pass, the far too common answer is no. Yet, when you show someone a picture of the top of Reynolds Peak at 7:00 A.M., looming at 9,125 ft as the sun peeks above the rugged peaks in the distance or a poem written to capture the same effect, it's pretty easy to change minds. So, it was then that I began to write, as well as take pictures, and have loved it ever since.

Despite the four most influential aspects of my personality being directly derived from my inanimate godparents, I believe the most important thing the mountains have taught me is the insignificance of man. When standing on a rocky outcropping thousands of feet in the air, it becomes much harder to worry about the nuisances of modern life, and much easier to appreciate the beauty of life and the connection between the life around us. The mountains taught me to love not just man, but all living things and, in doing so, instructed the principles of the man I am today.

The best thing about the mountains is that when you're in them, you feel awfully small. And for me, a self proclaimed explorer, photographer, poet, and musician, small will always be the best feeling in the world