Elevation: 3,156
Date: June 6, 2015
Location: Orange, NH
Distance: 5.7 miles
Time: 4:37 (48.36/mile)
Any time something becomes a regular event in your life, it becomes
easy to take it for granted. Whatever it is, you may be very clear that you
love or hate it. But, people often adapt to any change, so you adjust to it and
it becomes your “new normal”. This may be a new approach to nutrition, new
exercise program, new job, new kid, new divorce, new place to live… the list
goes on and on.
When I went through some big upheaval in my life a few years back,
multiple types of activities in the woods across all seasons became ways to
work things out in my mind, connect with those around me, and enjoy living. In
short, playing in the woods became my
new normal. After a while, I developed skills and knowledge to even become
pretty good at it all. I’ve now mountain biked black diamond trails, skied
double-diamond trails, and hiked the whole Presidential Range of New Hampshire
in a single day. I also have read and written about outdoor adventures, and
some of the best moments of my life have taken place on mountains; not bad for
a guy who quit playing in the dirt for twenty years.
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| A quiet moment to appreciate living well. |
“Too many of us are not living our dreams because we’re living our
fears,” Les Brown once observed. Many times, if you want to make a change in
your life it is about making the mental commitment and persevering until that
change becomes your new normal: quit smoking, and after the first week, month,
and year it gets easier. Reduce your sugar enough and you’ll find that a big
slice of cheesecake now sits like lead in your stomach for a few hours.
Exercise several times each week and a few months later you’ll find you’ve
dropped weight. This is the way it’s always been for me, too. Only, sometimes
effort, commitment, and sacrifice are completely irrelevant.
Both my feet had a plantar fasciitis flare-up starting over a year ago.
Symptoms worsened over a few months, and I became increasingly limited. I only
hiked two easy mountains, biked very intermittently, and even skiing, one of
the few doctor-endorsed activities, caused several days of pain. Apparently,
I’m an outlier. Apparently, anyone who has a double limp also looks weird (feel
free to video yourself trying it if you don’t believe me).
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| Bonding with Sara on Mount Cardigan's Holt Trail |
A ridiculous amount of medical visits, treatment approaches, time,
money, and agony clearly established me as a statistical outlier. More painfully,
it cost me the chance to live life in the way I love. It cost me moments of calm,
accomplishment, pride, intimacy, amazement, and insights. I've rarely felt as peaceful as I have when sitting on a solitary, wind-swept summit. Nor have I typically felt as connected to Sara as when we've bounced across deep and light topics during a hike and settled into an evening in a plush hotel room bed, bundled up in a hut, or in front of a crackling fire. My job has its challenges and rewards, but will never leave me as pumped as when I finally crossed a narrow bridge over rocks that had previously left me with a broken hand. Lastly, sitting with my girls beside a mountain stream or on a chair lift offers a great chance to better understand their world, give them opportunities to develop, and to have experiences that lead to stories we'll relive years later.
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| Is this a sign of fun or stupidity? |
The injury, regardless of the healing time, will be temporary. The real
scare is because of what it points out: no matter your effort, at some point
everyone’s best days will be behind them and their bodies will fail them. I
can’t be in my sixties getting tossed over the handlebars deep in the woods. I
won’t want to sleep in a hard, cold lean-to. I won’t traverse the Presidential Range in a
single day when I’m in my eighties. It’s not an insult; it’s part of the
natural arc of life. Frankly, it’s the part that sucks. Perseverance can keep
that part at bay for a while, but not forever.
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| Immersed in the free climb section of the Holt Trail |
Hiking Mount Cardigan reminded me how much I’ve missed this sort of
activity: Sara and I were unplugged, our conversation meandered across topics,
and we bonded after contorting ourselves through and over a particularly nasty
section of rock. I liked the challenge that an oceanfront game of bocce can’t
provide, and the endless view of rolling mountains reminded me of rolling
waves, but yet was very different.
There may be no real lesson from this injury. Maybe it just stunk as it
became my yearlong new normal. But, since we often search for meaning in events,
maybe there is some value in it. Although I’ve loved how I’ve lived over the
last few years, and tried to squeeze every bit of living out of those moments,
maybe I still took it for granted, at least during this point in my life. This
injury has reinforced how temporary and fleeting things can be. Maybe this
helps me appreciate these times for however much longer they’ll last: more chances
to have long conversations, to watch a child study a bug or butterfly, to enjoy
the accomplishment of summiting a tough mountain, to coach my girls to push
themselves past their comfort zones, to feel the rush of a natural mountain
bike half-pipe among the trees, or to sit with my family on an open peak as we
take in the view. While I currently can’t imagine the day when I give them up,
maybe it also points out the benefit of being open to finding a way to continue
some version of this lifestyle, but in a modified way: loving and immersing
myself in the outdoors, but in a way I might not have thought of at this point
in my life.
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| Feet, don't fail me now! |
Today, I don’t need to figure out what my future outdoor lifestyle may
look like. Time and effort will figure out what becomes my new normal. My
desire for a meaningful life well lived means I’ll try to make the most of it.
For now, I need to celebrate being on the edge of returning to those activities
that offer a vibrant, connected life. In short, today I’m focusing on
celebrating my impending return to my old normal.
See you on the trails,
Jay, AKA Rockhopper
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