Yesterday right before I left hiking, the phone rang. It was my mother-in-law reminding me the second half of our property tax was due. I thanked her for the reminder, got off the phone, and walked away. I think I felt the edges of my soul wilt.
If you were wondering, my computer is still MIA. And there is no way to get everything done before we leave for Beach's next gymnastics meet, 10 hrs away in Colorado. Obviously, I'm not even trying. I have accepted that I can't win and I can't keep up. My only option is to keep going and hope it is enough.
But yesterday's mountain only worked yesterday.
In those stolen moments, walking paths carpeted with mud and caked with snow, above you is the sky filled with clouds waiting to clear the cradling peaks of the Wasatch in winter. They line up like overburdened ships entering a rough harbor.
Deep in the back, up a deer trail where the scrub oaks arch and touch overhead, one step was sheer ice, the next ankle-deep mud, and the next snow so slippery you could fall just standing on it. It took every last ounce of concentration to stay on my feet...
When I woke up this morning, I realized life in the valley is no different. Nowhere feels safe to step. I think I see stable ground, and then I find it's not.
On top, the mountain opens views of more mountains and of hidden other valleys with frozen ponds. Sights I had forgotten the feeling of. I thought I saw movement through the trees, but I couldn't be sure what it was or if it was at all.
It is the same with the words written late at night. I think I see something slowly creeping in, but I can't be sure what I see. And when I wake up in the morning, I laugh at myself, forever wondering at all that there could possibly be someone else out on the ledge with me...
This trail is the closest far-ness I can manage these days. It is not genuinely wild or dangerous. The city breaks into the background quite a bit. But it is steep and muddy and has a decent view into the Great Beyond...
