#tbt #alaska Somewhere deep in the Ruth. 20 years ago this month. This trip was a formative experience. We did get to the top of this tiny little mountain (compared to several of its neighbors) and I can't speak for Todd but I was not the same kid when I got back to base camp. The things I learned about myself here have powered me through some challenging times since. Photo by @tfisherak
#tbt
Look at that fuckin kid. He don’t know shit. Well, Todd knows something. He’d already been to war. But the tall kid, he doesn't know shit. And he doesn’t even know that he doesn’t know.
20 years ago this month. 1996. A formative year. Not that every year since hasn’t been. I can’t remember a year that just floated by. Waisted. I guess If I can claim anything its that I’ve pushed every year. But that year was a change in course. In direction of the whole life. Things weren’t working and I made a hard change. It was the right change.
This was the first of three consecutive springs in the Alaska Range. I remember the sunsets that first trip. I remember walking through base camp and hearing about 6 different languages. Floating over the hiss of gas stoves. I remember feeling impossibly small.
I remember the exact moment when I felt the mountain tell us to leave. I heard it loud and clear. You don’t belong here. Not now. We listened. Later that season some guys died near the same spot we turned around.
I miss that place. I miss the innocence, as much of a waste of time as that may be. I do. I miss it. Maybe ignorance is bliss.
She turns 14 this week. And I look in the mirror and see the lines and the grey creeping down my beard and I feel a thousand years old. And I worry about this world she has to look forward to. Or what is left of it. I worry about that a lot. I can remember the first time I held her and she looked up, right into my eyes. Right into me. Who are you? What is this place? She looked all around the room, calm as can be. Not crying. Sometimes I can still see that look in her eyes and in those moments I worry less.
There was no moon last night. I’ve got an old railroad lantern, it’s at least a hundred years old and last night I filled it with kerosene from the garage and we drove out beyond the city lights and parked and hiked up some little track in the dark and watched the stars and the planes and the satellites pass overhead. We counted a couple falling stars.
After a while a truck passed below us, pausing where we had parked. I’m scared dad. Why? What are they doing out here? Probably goofing off like us.
Are there coyotes out here? yeah. Can they see in the dark? I bet they can see pretty good.
After a while she started yawning so we went home. She turns 14 this week and you could say that December 17th is my favorite day of the year.
