Adirondacks Journal: 2005 - Climbing Blue Mountain

In 2002, when I was 60 years old, I said I’d never climb Blue Mountain again. I was in a group that included some young boys, their fathers, my 26 year old son and his fiancée, Jessica. Toward the top, 4,000 feet above sea level, where it becomes a long, steep climb up sheer rock, I began to feel faint and nauseous. “I’m too old for this,” I muttered to myself. “I’m probably having a heart attack.” It was a relief to come upon strong, young Jessica sitting on a rock, her head in her hands.

“I’m never going to do this again,” she moaned. "I feel like I'm going to throw up."

“I agree,” I was panting. “What’s the point of all this suffering?” I took off my baseball hat and whooshed away the flies and mosquitoes. “My hatband is soaked.”

When we reached the top, we sprawled on the flat rocks.

The men were lounging, drinking water, enjoying the view of the lakes below, and the boys were racing up the observation tower. “It must be a mental thing," Jessica said, "or maybe a macho thing. Look at them. They look like they’re actually having fun.”

“Maybe. I’m never doing it again,” I repeated.

Twelve years before that, I had decided that romance, too, was nauseating and painful, and not worth the pain and frustration, and I had withdrawn from romantic life. Then, in 2003, I started dating again. It turned out to be interesting, challenging, fun, but there was a lot of pain, and the closer I got to the right sort of relationship for me, the more painful and disappointing it became when it didn’t work out.

In 2006, I met Donald, who felt like the right guy for me. He was getting divorced, and seemed amazed that he had found me. He told me he loved me a thousand times. Then his wife wanted him back and kaboom, he was gone. Men going back to their wives is never a surprise, but it was still a shock. “So much for love,” I told him as he mouthed an, “I’m sorry.”

Donald was a mountain climber. He was 73 years old and in much better shape than I was. He was 5’9”, 140 pounds, not an ounce of fat on him. His legs were iron, his stomach the same. For exercise he went up and down stairs three at a time, and ran 5 miles every morning. He spent “about 20 minutes a year going 50 miles an hour down a ski slope.” Donald and I climbed cliffs and hills and mountains together, and I got stronger and stronger. There was something wonderful not about the climb, but about disproving my own hypothesis that I was too old to climb mountains. I told him that this year I was going to climb Blue Mountain again. “You’ll have to pace yourself,” he advised. “You can make it.”

Climbing Frankenstein’s Cliff in New Hampshire I felt a little nauseous, so we rested a little, and I was better. “I’m just going to put my head down and climb,” I announced. At the top we had milk and turtle candies and I felt fine again.

As we assembled at the bottom of Blue Mountain I was psyched. I had upped my daily swim from 30 to 40 laps, and took two turns around the nearby nature preserve, instead of one. I would go up Blue Mountain, and maybe other mountains later, opening up to new adventures.

The younger members of the climbing party, scooted up the mountain together, getting lost from sight. I tried to remember what it was like to have a body made of air – a mere nothing to carry up the mountain at full speed. They never tired.

The grown-ups tired. We made pretty good time, but by the time we got to the steep part at the top, we had to stop every hundred yards or so and collect ourselves.

As I looked up at the steep stretch I thought of my statement on Frankenstein’s Cliff, “I’m going to just put my head down and do it.” That’s what you have to do if you want to climb tall mountains. That’s what you have to do if you want to do anything difficult. If you want to have a happy relationship, a happy marriage, that’s what you have to do. If you want to discover what you love to do in life professionally, and make a living at it, you have to just put your head down and do it.

I didn't want to say I was too old, to retire from life, to do easy things. I still wanted to climb the tall mountains. I'll put my head down and do it.