The Burden

The lingering impact on those left behind

- Nathan Smith

Five minutes later the nausea returned. Stronger this time. I started dry heaving, wave after wave, my breathing blocked as my body struggled to hurl my insides out. Nothing came up but pain.

I hid this from the others and forged on, only to buckle again. And again. I glanced around. Bright silver moonlight revealed a stunning beauty rewarded only to those willing to forgo sleep. A mile in the distance the mountain burned. But I couldn’t answer its call. I longed to get up high, to greet the sun as it returned color to the mountain—pinks and dark blue turning to golden orange and azure—painting the steep slopes, snow, ice and rock with its ever changing brush.

Kick-step-swing, kick-step-swing, kick-step-swing, over and over, my mind focused on the task at hand. Nothing existed beyond here and now. We reached the glacier.

I turned to Brian and the others and said, “Sorry, but I’m out.”

'Brian raised an eyebrow, then nodded tellingly and said, “OK.” There were still enough climbers to continue without me.

I stopped in the talus and sat on a flat, car-sized boulder, listening to the trekking poles cracking on the rock, the crunch of boots on snow, and the creak of heavy packs. Their headlamps faded as my friends moved off, dots of light on the mountain.

I’d come here to get away, to grieve in the peace and solitude of the mountains, with friends who were closer than family. It felt strange to seek solace there, after losing two close friends to the mountains, but returning to rugged, unforgiving places is the only way I knew to heal.

Kyle and Scott are gone. The cold snuffed out their warm spirits, wrapped them in an icy embrace, their bodies entwined with snow,  rock and ice. The mountain they sought to climb made them part of itself.

YOU CAN DIE CLIMBING!