If you're not from the prairie...

This is a book, Dave Bouchard, talks about our inability to understand the quintessential him because we don't know the prairie.  He describes things like a prairie cold, and if we have never experienced one, we don't know cold, we can't know cold.  His roots and experiences are so deep with the land that without understanding the prairie we do not and cannot understand him.  It is well written, and though I have never been to the prairie, I can identify with the sentiment.  As people, there are things at the very core of us that we cling to and without those experiences truly "knowing" someone is impossible.  This idea resonates because we desire to be known and understood and are utterly aware that even the people who know us best only see the topmost layers of the complexities beneath.  For me, if you have not shared uncontrollable laughter with children you don't know laughter, you can't know laughter.  If you have not broken bread with your dearest friends, you don't know friendship, you can't know friendship.  If you have not sat on a mountain peak in shear awe of creation, you don't know Peace, you can't know Peace.  These snapshots of beautiful life's moments remind me of the great things to KNOW and experience.  I am grateful to have a God who does truly know me, the number of hairs on my head, my inmost thoughts and the paths in which life will take me.  What is at the core of you?