Climbing Cho Oyu

I was 25 years old, standing atop the Nangpa La, straddling an epic gleaming swath of glacier, one foot ostensibly in Nepal, the other in Tibet. My soon-to-be-husband (and later to be ex-husband) had just proposed, standing on the roof of the world. We laughed and kissed and tried to catch our breath in the oxygen-deprived atmosphere, and attempted to force down just enough Snickers bar for the climb down to 17,000ft and temporary respite. Our Sherpa friend Sonam snapped a picture, his gold tooth glinting fiercely in the sun. To our backs, the massive hulking bulk of Cho Oyo reigned over, an immense and grand dame, queen of the Himalaya, standing witness. For days I had been fascinated by her broad flanks, the lenticular clouds draping her summit, and the thundering crumbling of seracs serenading our lower trek. I took a moment to myself in those precious minutes before starting the descent, and stared up at her with a certainty that was unfamiliar to me in my twenties, when I couldn't even imagine what my life would look like in a year. I'd be back. I'd meet her again, carefully and cautiously, determined, and I would at least attempt to stand on her summit. This much I knew to be true, as true as anything I'd ever visioned. I'd climb Cho Oyu, the 8th highest mountain in the world, by the age of 40.

In roughly 120 days, I will be 40. I have not climbed Cho Oyu. I can tell you that although nothing is certain, I will not return to climb her. I have climbed the equivalent of her height many times over clambering up one flight of stairs to tuck my kids in, and equally down to the basement with endless, overflowing loads of laundry. Most of the time when I eke out moments to write, I am able to conjure some small moment of grace in the mundane, some epiphany that feels warm and whole. There's a part of me that's completely terrified by the visceral, sticky reality of what this feels like, this looking at 40.
I have promised, perhaps as honoring this right of passage, but mostly as a pledge to myself, to honor the creative voice as I take this journey. I'm not sure how it's possible that nothing is as I imagined it, and yet everything is whole and alive in the matrix of growth. What is it about 40 that holds our collective conscience (especially if you're female) so hostage?

So here I am. A lot less tan, just a tiny bit more wrinkled, and definitely more warm. Somewhere in the landscape of another country I consider a "soul" home, sits my beautiful, massive mountain. There's a beauty in just knowing she's out there, and so much gratitude in having stood at her flanks, and appreciation for the clarity and dream she gave me at a time when I couldn't envision beyond my next airplane flight. Climbing a mountain was easy, even glorious in it's simplicity.  Now, there is no massive span of glacial ice, no tattered prayer flag to carry my devotions, no 20,000ft shockingly clear blue sky.The real courage now comes from the sneaking suspicion that the climb right in front of me-- of family, self, job, home-- this is where we must dig deep to find the fortitude to keep ascending. In the mundane, in the quiet sublime of this everyday life, lay the challenges and the beauty of growing older.

I'm sitting in my wonderful local public library, alternating between trying to write, watching the incredible, visionary groundbreaking work of Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson as they top out of the Dawn Wall in Yosemite, and appreciation the screams of delight from the toddler set hearing "If You Give a Moose a Muffin" for the first time.

There are times to write, and then there are times to sit at the table, feel the precious January sunlight stream across the honey wood table and splash on your face, and just marvel at a what a wonderful thing it is to be alive. To find joy and glee in the ordinary, and to be inspired and awed by feats of daring and endurance, all in the same millisecond.

A friend shared these with me today. As firefighters and medics, we don't talk much about the incredible emotional burden some of our calls take, or the PTSD that haunts some of our brothers and sisters. This photographer/ artist so beautifully captures a moment in time, albeit some very difficult ones. This brought me tears. Purging, cathartic, healthy tears.

Warning: Some of these are very graphic and may be disturbing.

http://www.dansunphotos.com/Emergency-Response-Portraits/i-SwxxJdc