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Monday, August 18, 2008

The Rest of the Mount Marcy Story

This highpoint episode was very disappointing for me. This was like the culmination of several things recently which have pushed me to the inevitable—I’m getting older.

I have hiked many, many miles, climbed some pretty high mountains, and done some things that even shock me. Needless to say, I was devastated to have gotten so close and been too afraid to scramble over the rock to the top. Additionally, I was disappointed in my old feet. They are just not what they used to be.

Since noon Saturday, (the time when I realized I just couldn’t go up on that rock) my mind has struggled with the adjustment to another phase in my life. It hasn’t been pretty and Gene is to be commended for having lived through it so calmly.

My Uncle Carl actually got me started hiking. He considered it good therapy and, at a particularly difficult time in my life, he took me for my first hike. He made pimento cheese sandwiches for us and stuffed them into his day pack, we gathered up the dog and off we went. On the drive to the trail head the dog thought a nap was in order so he curled up on top of the pack to catch a few Zzzs before the hike. At lunch time, looking out over the wilderness from a rock high on a mountain, we laughed at the result of the dog’s pre-hike nap. The sandwiches looked like flat bread with yellow halos. It didn’t alter the taste; you just had to plan a strategy for getting bread and cheese in the same bite. My uncle has always been one for an adventure so when it came time to head down the mountain, he thought it would be fine to just leave the trail and go off down the hill side. I slipped after only a few steps and landed on my bottom. The dog thought that was a fine ride so he jumped in my lap. Down we went for about twenty yards before coming to rest somehow. My mother has always been one to be in the woods walking about, and a few years after this first hike, she persuaded me to join Tennessee Trails, our state hiking club.

So hiking has been my hobby for many years and I never gave a thought about the distance or difficulty of any trail. I think those days are over. A few years ago, while spending what seemed like days in the backcountry office at Rocky Mountain National Park trying to get permits to climb Long’s Peak, a seasonal ranger made a comment to the effect that he and his wife (both over 60) liked fixing a thermos of coffee, stopping by the bakery for Danish, and enjoying their goodies at one of the many waterfalls within 2 or 3 miles from the trailhead. At the time, I thought that was really hiking and we should do that more often. Perhaps now is the time.

I was encouraged by a couple things yesterday. We met a couple not too far from the summit as we were going down who seemed to be about our age. The gentleman commented that they were in the “hiking” rather than “climbing” phase of their life. I’m so there! I had email this morning from a long time hiking friend who, like me, never gave much thought to distance or difficulty. We have been on some pretty long hikes together including California’s Mt. Whitney. His email said that he and his wife had done a 14 mile hike and were pretty bushed the next day. Had to go shopping instead of hiking. Thank goodness I’m not the only one feeling my age here.

Still, aging is a difficult process and hard to get my mind around. It is one in which I will have to change my focus from long distance hiking (carrying everything on my back and sleeping on the ground) and climbing mountains to sipping coffee by a waterfall, bird watching, and taking long strolls in the park. This is actually starting to sound pretty good, after all.

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