I had just started ice climbing during the period the first series of reliquary tree sculptures were created. I lived in the same cabin I do now, at the end of the road near the top of a mountain. The cabin was bare bones. I slept on a (constantly deflating) inflated mattress on the floor of my cabin which hadn’t the luxury of plumbing for seven years. Luckily fellow climbers gifted me their old gear and allowed me to rope in with them to explore frozen waterfalls. The iridescent shard of glass seemed an extravagant purchase but it reminded me of the magic and allure of ice. Life is full of unexpected bits of light in the darkest places; often experienced most fully when we open ourselves to the unknown.