A long canoe trip, across difficult rivers and unfamiliar trails, discovering plants, animals, and country vistas we had long dreamt of seeing, anticipating congenial conversation around the nightly campfire before contemplating the starry sky. Canoe-camping— a way of life among many of the Amerindian peoples—along with hill-walking and mountaineering, is one of those sports which most deeply satisfy the need for belonging. What is real is fully present there, in all its forms: the earth, the sky, people; so too are the three kingdoms: the mineral, the vegetable, and the animal. And, above all, time, the very core and soul of space is there as well. There, I was pushing myself beyond my limits out of a longing for beauty. There, comparison took its gentle form—emulation, and not its aggressive form—competition. There, at the end of the day, I was inspired by the living environment, not motivated by the will to break a record nor by “the will to dominate the podium.”