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An enormous chain of mountains had formed around the small town and they hardly noticed. They were a community of ground-watchers, meaning they rarely looked at what was around them, but were more concerned with the view of the pavement, the sparkles in the cement, the cracks caused by tree roots. These people looked down. The sky was no concern; most of them couldn’t even tell you that they sky was blue. They would have said that leaves are brown because the only ones they saw were the dead ones on the ground. They didn’t even recognize reflections in windows or other people’s hair color. I walked over the mountain peaks and down into the valley because I had heard of the strange occurrence of ground-watchers. I didn’t understand, but I wanted to. The mountain walls were steep and I slipped on the pebbles that littered the path. Inside the town I walked around, and it seemed that people recognized other people by their shoes. They didn’t recognize my shoes and they knew I was an outsider. But they didn’t look at my face, or even as high as my chest. I was Adidas black stripes to them. And they stomped on them. My toes were crushed and my heart was crushed as they pounded the ground around my feet. They didn’t like outsiders apparently. They didn’t need the sky, or the window reflections. They didn’t need anything above the knees. I asked someone if they knew what it felt like to stretch the neck and look up. The person kicked me in the shin. I have no need for that he said before stomping away. I see I said to his back, but he didn’t hear. It wasn’t a conversation. It was a lifestyle, and not one I was likely to break. After several weeks of trying to make sense of their reality I realized that I had started to look down. I noticed the sparkles in the pavement and I saw the grass grow each day, and noticed when it was cut the day it grew too tall. I saw the shine on everyone’s shoes; they took care of them. They polished and bought new laces when the old ones were ragged. They folded their cuffs neatly, knowing that hundreds of people would see and notice the fold, the crease. At first I wanted to reach out and lift their chins with my palms, making them see, even if only for a moment, the blue of the sky, the shape of the cloud that passed slowly overhead. They were missing out on so much. But I put my hands in my pockets and walked on. I didn’t scuff my heels along the sidewalk any longer. My neck developed new muscles. My eyes felt relaxed, shielded from the glare of the sun. The sunny days, the rainy days, it hardly mattered now. I never left. And my shoes always shone.