Out of the dark....

Two pairs of feet dangling in the thin air of the void. Two pairs of hands clasping wraps of salami and cheese. A sublime view, the best company. Alistair and I enjoyed lunch on a sundrenched aerie near the top of Mount Crocker on the divide between Pioneer Basin and McGee Creek. After a strenuous day and half, we had reached our own private Nirvana. For that fleeting half hour, all worries and concerns subsided;  the outside world cease to exist. All was light and happiness. But what is light and happiness without dark and misery?

It all started, really, with the decision at a wedding. For the first time since the birth of our two children, Alistair and I had enlisted grandparental babysitting services to attend the nuptials of a friend, one of the boys. I was 39 and it had been a rough decade. Simultaneous child-bearing and a long distance, protracted farewell to my mother had not been kind. I was overweight and out of shape. The wife of one of the other boys was off running every morning, through the rainforest by the wild beach. ‘If her, why not me?’ I asked myself. A year later and 60 pounds lighter, I launched myself into strenuous activity with the evangelistic fervor of the newly fit.  Climb harder, keep up with the boys, run those trails, outdo the young crowd at boot camp. I’d never thought of myself as athletic; with each success, the hubris grew, and how I defined myself, how I differentiated myself from all those other mothers, morphed until this pseudo hard-core persona was a huge part of my identity. But as we all know, pride cometh before fall.

The day before, we had started from Mosquito Flat, the highest trailhead in the Sierra  at 10,200ft and quickly shed the inevitable crowds by climbing towards Mono Pass. The snow across the 12,100 ft pass demanded attention but our micro spikes stayed in the pack. Likewise, the much discussed river crossing didn’t even require the removal of boots. After a steep descent into the Mono Valley, a final climb led us up into the Pioneer basin and to a lakeside campsite. The picturesque bowl of lakes surrounded by granite ramparts appeared deserted apart from Naked Swimming Man and the inevitable squadrons of mosquitoes. We gagged down a rather subpar melange of odd ingredients for dinner but relished the light play of the stormy sunset over the Mono recesses on the other side of the Mono Valley.

I blithely ignored the first ominous signs, a discomfort in the wrists, and kept obsessively doing push-ups and climbing harder and harder routes. When I finally bought my first real road bike, I charged up our local mountain giving no thought to the descent. Sitting like a sack of potatoes on my bike, I braked furiously down the precipitous hairpins. Perhaps it was the straw that broke the camels’ back. My forearms flared in pain. Ice, ibuprofen, splints, doctors, and finally a hand specialist’s advice: give up climbing. “I’d rather cut off my left leg”, I responded and continued despite the pain.

The Pioneer basin revealed itself shyly. The terrain was more convoluted than it had first appeared. We had decided to make for the ridge at the back of the basin, and possibly follow that along to Mount Crocker. It seemed a simple matter of following the chain of lakes upper valley and scrambling to the top of the ridge. Cliff bound lakeshores and hidden snowfields forced us to take an unpredictable route, a rather drunken stumble of the trail, that eventually led to the ridgeline and an astounding view into the McGee Creek drainage, surrounded by ancient red colored peaks, a striking change in geology from our granite perch. Easy walking and scrambling took us to our lunch rock. Alistair tackled the sturdier climb to Mt Crocker’s summit while I was content to rest and soak in the lofty magnificence.

Hidden meadows in Pioneer Basin

Al on the ridge between Pioneer Basin and McGee Creek, Mt Crocker at rear.
Note the change from granite to red volcanic rock across the divide.

‘Thoracic outlet syndrome is a bitch,a creeping, conniving, insidious bitch that takes away your life in a slow inexorable fashion’. My thoughts lingered there as nerve pain seared my arms, unassuaged by any over-the-counter medication. Opiates beckoned, but I resisted that slippery slope. Despite a near constant battle of every therapy or exercise people could think of, I was forced to drop activities that I enjoyed like so many precious packages off the back of a moving truck. Climbing, of course. The grieving took years. Then cycling, gardening, any kind of craft. Pieces of my identity, abandoned. Even mundane activities became a challenge - driving, cooking, shopping, housework, holding a book to read.  A TOI specialist pronounced my case a mild one when I told him that I was not bedridden. He shook his head on hearing my various exploits and adventures. “You are a classic case - this typically afflicts middle-aged A-type women”.

After returning to our camp for a quick restorative nap, we packed up and headed down into the Mono Valley. A fortuitously positioned campsite was available;  at 9887 feet, it just squeaked in below the 10,000 foot limit for campfires. We ate a terrifyingly greasy and salty meal of hashbrowns, eggs and bacon which was the most wonderful food on earth, and relaxed weary legs in front of the fire. Even the mosquitoes were at bay.  Life was good.

February 2017.  A fifth round of physical therapy seem to be helping, perhaps worth the expense and aggravation of the weekly battle up the 101. But after a trip to Yosemite involving snowshoeing with poles followed by driving home flared the TOS to even greater heights, black thoughts swirled. I had defined myself in large part by the activities I’d been forced to drop, but still had the promise of a backpacking adventure in the mountains to look forward to. But now that was even in doubt - if I couldn’t hold my trekking poles and I couldn’t drive, where would I go from there? What lay in the future? How much lower would I go? I just couldn’t see forward. Do life's lessons of humility need to be so harsh?

Intuition told me that a summer in the mountains would make things better, that mountains feed the soul and heal. Arriving in Mammoth Lakes in June, I resolved the battle again, to try harder.  I found a new physical therapist, worked feverishly on my exercises, walked as much as possible. Every day, the mountains beckoned and restored. Silicon Valley stress fell off my shoulders. The pain abated. I rode my bike, not far, but the freedom and the beauty of the rides lifted my spirits. I climbed - just one pitch at first, but finally three or four. Not an impressive amount by most standards, but I was beyond delighted. Finally, I was ready to tackle Mono Pass, hiking poles at the ready.

The return climb to Mono Pass seemed tough on a tired body. I moved slowly, one step at a time. Trudging forward, not backwards, climbing up and up. In that bleak, desolate pass, I could at last see forward. There was a future….. and it was here.

One of the Boys

Blurry eyed, early morning daze, hurried movement in the black before dawn.

Surreal drive up deserted road, winding snake-like past jagged peaks.

The car is full. Four warm bodies but only engine noise; a coffin hurtling upwards.

At the trailhead, strong joe and low grunts. Oatmeal stirred, spilled, shared.

Packs on, ropes coiled on to backs, sinuous and choking like rata vines, securing and binding.

World defined only by jumping pools of light on rocky trail, by ragged breath, by the dissonant clanging of gear penduluming from hips stride by stride, by sharp air redolent of pine and dust.

Doubt breeds, multiplies in those crystalline, jerky moments frozen in time for future retrieval.

The peak ahead, a dragon’s spine. Weather forecast ominous.

Doubt once more. The boys. Always the boys. Yet here I am, a substitute, only X chromosomes to offer. Can I keep up? Can I pull my weight? Can I be one of the boys? The sour taste of doubt.

Imperceptibly black turns deep blue that morphs, eventually, to the optimism of sunrise.

Later, we climb. Rock cold but warming to our fingers. Rough granite under Sierra blue.

Concentration, mind razor sharp, breathe deep the pool of thin air.

Kinesthetic pleasure of movement, moments of laughter, brief repose at belays.

The boys strung out along the knife edge like Christmas lights, bound by the thread of friendship, of shared mountain experience.

White cotton in the sky turns black, ominous rumbles encroach, playful puffs turn to malevolent gusts.

Rapid retreat, recalled only in sensations, brief glimpses. Chilled hands grasping wet ropes, fumbling, checking and rechecking. Deafening crashes, brilliant flashes.

Doubt. Banished by necessity. No choice now but calm in the wild frenzy. Unroped on slick rock. Do.Not.Fall.

Finally, safety, reunion, a pause to chew on sawdust sustenance, visions of hot culinary delights awaiting.

We trudge damply to the car, spirits high in companionship. The boys.

Alive, alive, alive.

****************************************************************************

Years of abuse and bad anatomical luck banish climbing with unexpected rapidity. Cruel injury, insidious, undiagnosable.

The mind’s darkness threatens.  Memory both fights and fuels the black.

Such vivid fragments remembered: of life on edge, of sounds, smells, taste, touch, of the boys.

These sustain me in the gloom, but also reawaken overwhelming visceral desire. The need to repeat, to capture new memories, to live so brightly in an instant.

How to find equaminity? I am still searching.