Diseased Mountains

Flying from Kunming to Shangri La I sat in a window seat. I am beginning to rely like flying. Airports I hate, but flying, especially during the day, is something different. The view from plan during my flight was incredible. The sky was a brilliant blue, and the green sheet of the ground was wrinkled with mountains. It looked like some giant tractor had crossed over the land long ago, and the trees on the mountains were covering up the tread marks. It was incredible. But then as I admired the lay of the land I noticed that many of the mountains appeared to have a rash of some sort. Blotches of red and yellow... I was horrified. And it got worse. The tips of the mountains began to gray. Something was sucking the blood out of these magnificent hills. And what is that white stuff? They looked as if they were freezing... I had forgotten about winter. And oh, how nice it feels to be cold again. That may sound strange, but the smell of winter is comforting. I feel at home.
And Shangri La is beautiful. Its so high up that the sky seems to have a back light. I have never seen so much blue. Am I still flying?