Over the next few weeks I will be focusing on a word of the day drawn from a list created at the beginning of January. Each word was chosen to serve as a guide to inspire and inform my steps through 2020. If you are just joining me now and want to look in on earlier posts on this topic, you will find links to each at the end.

RESILIENT

Standing on the top of Mt. Adams, the 12,283 ft. high volcano we see out our window every day, the sense of accomplishment of having made it to the top was diminished by the overwhelming sense of how small I am in the bigger scheme of things. I am a tiny blip on the radar screen of the very long arc of time. I do however like to think that I’m a resilient blip.

We had arrived at the summit late in the afternoon, several hours after we should have been making our decent to pack up our tent and gear before continuing on down to our car at the trailhead. It was quickly obvious that we wouldn’t make it, and would have to spend another night on the mountain. Not the worst thing in the world to spend another night in our tent that we had left at our basecamp the night before.

When climbing up a mountain, it’s hard to lose your way as all trails converge at the top It’s a little trickier on the way back down. It is easy to get on the wrong ridge and miss your intended trail down. We obviously hadn’t paid close enough attention to our route on the way up, and as night fell it was clear that we were lost. The only option was to find a wind break and hunker down for the night. Choosing a flat spot ringed with a low stone wall erected by former climbers, we put on every piece of clothing we had, rested our heads on our packs, and pulled the space blanket (think tin foil) over us. Imagine trying to sleep in your driveway on a cold night and you get a pretty good idea of our predicament.

It was a long night.

For 7 hours I turned from one side to the other, only able to last about 10 minutes on a side before the ache in that shoulder and hip needed a rest. As cold and miserable as it was on the one hand, it was breathtakingly wondrous on the other. A chance to watch the Milky Way rotate in the sky, the fireworks of the Perseid meteor shower, and eventually the miracle of the sun touching the top of the mountain.

At first light we were up and out to find our way down. (We didn’t find our tent and gear, but that’s a whole other miraculous story to be explored another day.) By 4pm we were back home. After 36 hours with no sleep, a shower and a strong cup of coffee to go we were on our way to my brother’s 70th birthday celebration.

It’s no small thing to summit and survive an unexpected night on a mountain, just like it is no small thing to reach seventy years of age, having survived all the unexpected things that have happened along the way. Both call upon us to be resilient. To recover from difficult conditions and challenges. To spring back into shape after being bent by life’s storms. It is those same challenges, difficulties, and storms that create resilient souls. A willingness to get up and go at it, whatever it is, again, and again, and again.

Yes, we’d summited a mountain.

No, we hadn’t gotten any sleep.

Yes, we were tired.

And no, we weren’t about to miss that party.

To be resilient is both a practice and a choice. We were able to make our way to the top of the mountain because of the endurance and strength we’d trained so hard to develop. We weathered a night of aches and shivers by focusing on the miracles unfolding in the night sky above. We made it to the party because after making it back home, the option to crash for the night couldn’t compare to the chance to celebrate the life of someone we loved.

To be resilient is to remember what has brought us thus far. It is to call upon the best in ourselves in the face of the unexpected challenges, losses, and heartaches that life can throw at us. Which it has, and does, and will.

Onward.