Another Slice of Paradise…

All summer my dad has had me on a 14er crash course. The whole works—small local hikes, Red Rocks stairs, the evil stair master at the gym. I’d learned all the tricks and lingo- how to “suck air,” how to take breaks and many small steps, the importance of not looking up (and seeing how far there is to go) or looking down (and seeing how dejected and exhausted everyone is behind you). I had the look- layers of clothing, a stuffed bag, splashing water, a homebred Coloradan naiveté. Bulky shoes and a bulging heart. What I didn’t know I was in for was two days of the brutal and the beautiful. The daunting and the delightful. A “slice of paradise” indeed, as a hiker exclaimed walking by. If only it were delivered on a platter.

Day 1- Mt. Bierstadt Rainstorm 10:00

My first look of the mountain on the car ride up was stunning. My hands pressed eagerly against the window as though approaching a ship, anticipating my maiden voyage to an unknown land. The clouds were already gathering, but in my mind they unlocked a mystical kingdom, a majestic lifestyle. Bierstadt was as wondrous as its namesake’s paintings and more.  The bottom of that pass bred the most excitement I have ever felt around me. I was infected as my dad said “let’s go get us a mountain.”

We were met by the first hard stinging pellets of reality (round one) thirty minutes in. The trail hissed with hail. We turned back, were headed to the car when the mountain changed its mind. The sky was stretched with its blue lacy lashes to seduce us once more. We headed back up. It cleared, we hiked, ever more encouraged by our advances. But just when the summit was in sight, and we stood at the top of the first false peak, round two hit. Thunder shook our delightful naiveté away. A curious man, both dramatic and crazed in the eyes, frightened new hikers with stories of storms. “Redefining, redefining” he muttered, a fake ferret tied to his shoulder apt for stroking. Within minutes he had a woman whimpering and praying.

My voyage sunk. People scurried from the top looking like the special effects of Titanic. Sumo wrestler clouds flopped over mountains and towards us. Thunder sounded the cracking of the ship. The mountain was a theater…it brought out all the works. Wind, rain, hail. It was theater of the absurd. It was Rocky Horror, literally. At the bottom the battered audience stood shocked. 

The sun was out when we at last stumbled down, the mountain’s weak apology. We sprawled across my dad’s heated car for warmth, and we tied our clothing to the doors to dry. It was quite the camp. It was there, stationed like the homeless, that we decided to come back.

Day 2- Do we look like Michigan people?

Back again, less innocence, less ignorance, more hardened determination. It’s a developed Colorado trait when the world tries to change on you too much. Not a cloud dared to come out. My dad and I remembered our training, we took our small steps, we made our small talk and mentioned to awed faces that we were back the second day in a row to get our full of the mountain. My dad was wearing a hat with an “M”(for Mullen) lettering, and at one point a woman assumed it was for Michigan State. She remarked “You’re not doing bad for Michigan folk.” We promptly passed her and beat her to the summit.

It amazed me the way the mountains opened up. Like one of those unfolding pop up picture books. Floods of people gravitated upwards—babies carried in back packs, small children, large dogs, small poodles, a man that would propose to his girlfriend on the top. The summit was practically a city of hustling bustling people, a potluck of purpose. A group of teenage boys showed off, racing to complete push -ups on the boulders. A veteran of 14ers, a man who had climbed every one in Colorado, regarded the peaks as old friends. An art student captured the view, sharing her dream of painting from the top of many more.

2 names on the registry, 2 days, 1 mountain. 2 months of training, 2 sets of eyes, 1 good story. 1 summer of seeking Colorado beauty, finding it after many, many steps.