WHEN I WAS A BOY I spent every summer in the Adirondacks at a sleep-away camp on Lake George, not far from Ticoderoga, New York.  It was a welcome respite from Manhattan in the summer, and was a much-needed break from life at home.  One of the highlights of camp (and there were many) was a trip or two to the high peaks region of the Adirondacks.  There are, I believe, 46 peaks in all (hence the aptly-named 46ers – people who have ascended all of them).  But the camp trips were mainly to the high peaks around Mount Marcy – the highest point in New York State.   These trips were generally a week long and required a hike in with backpacks and 4 or 5 nights camping in tents or lean-to’s along the trails.  The scenery in the Adirondacks is incredibly beautiful and many of the vistas and places we saw on those trips stay with me still.

On one trip, I remember a campsite next to a perfectly still beaver pond.  At dusk, after a long day spent hiking, the boys were all quiet, spending the last hour of daylight cleaning up dinner or hanging out. I went down to the edge of the pond, looking up at the  spires of the fir trees gilded by the setting sun behind me.  The water was glass-smooth save for the v-shaped ripples spreading out behind a beaver – probably heading home to his lodge in the middle of the pond with its entrance through a tunnel under the surface.  At the edge of the pond dozens of little fish slid gracefully through the shallow water.  They looked like black mollies – aquarium fish I kept at home – but I knew they weren’t.  Accompanying this peaceful scene was the thin, drawn-out whistling song of white-throated sparrows, likely nesting in the firs and pines which surrounded the lake.  It’s a wonderful memory and one which I still remember 40 years later with startling detail.

Lovely campsites notwithstanding, the goal of these trips was to scale 3 or 4 high peaks.  Some mountains were easier to climb than others, but I remember most being uniformly difficult and a real challenge to get to the top.  We would start out usually through gently sloping deciduous forests in the morning and walk steadily until noon when we would break for sandwiches and a rest.  By early afternoon, we’d be well into the coniferous forests of higher altitudes, with pines and firs all around us, and mossy rocks underfoot.  I also remember mud – lots of mud.  We seemed always to be struggling up slippery wet rocks, covered with lichen and leaves on our way to the top.

The tree canopy was generally unbroken so it was difficult to see where we were in relation to the surrounding mountains – if the top and flanks of the mountain didn’t happen to be covered by low clouds.  It got colder and colder as we got higher, so that would sometimes be an indication of altitude, but it wasn’t always reliable.  We would trudge on, slipping on stones, sometimes scraping knees or shins and hoping to get there soon.  Once on top, we’d break out the canteens and somebody would pass around a bag of GORP (Good Old Raisins and Peanuts – with added M&Ms) and we’d each get a few palmfuls to munch on while we surveyed the view – or the inside of a cloud.

About mid-afternoon – usually at the point where you said to yourself, “I can’t take it anymore!” – there would be a distinct lightening of the sky above our heads as the trees thinned out.  The high peaks were almost all bald at the top (like me), populated only by the hardiest lichen, clinging to rocks and often in a shocking orange color.  So the lightening of the sky overhead was a good sign that we were getting close to the summit.  Unless of course we weren’t.

A mountain – much like an apartment building – has setbacks at it gets higher and these false summits would often raise our hopes and give us a surge of energy and an increased urgency to our steps as we prepared to “take the summit.”  But we were often disappointed to see that it was a false summit – an open patch of rock sort of like the shoulder of the mountain – but definitely not the summit.  We’d pause for a few minutes, tighten any loosened shoelaces, taking an extra swig from our canteens, and soldier on, generally back into the trees and continue to ascend – somewhat dejected at the disappointment of the false summit.  In some cases, I remember the counselors making the decision that it was too cold, or too late or too wet to continue and we would head back down before reaching the top.  We were usually relieved to be going with gravity instead of against it, but were also crestfallen to miss the summit.

If we did push on, we’d be rewarded not too much later by the ever decreasing stature of the trees around us.  The higher we got, the shorter they’d be – often twisted into bizarre contortions by the wind and weather. They were a sure sign that we were close and the trees were scattered few and far between, giving us a clearer picture of where we were.  Eventually, they’d disappear altogether and we knew that once we were above the tree line it was only a matter of minutes before we reached the top.

When we finally got there, the obligatory cairn of rocks reached towards the sky, next to the bronze marker pounded into the rock declaring the top of the mountain, its name, and the altitude above sea level. The views – if available – were always magnificent and we had only a few minutes at the top before hustling back the way we came to reach camp before dark.

Mary Elizabeth’s recovery from the stroke feels a lot like a journey – and sometimes like climbing a mountain.  It’s hard work – with some pleasantness along the way – but also a lot of hardship and discomfort.  We keep pressing on because we are compelled to reach the top and to see what the view is from up there.  And yes, we hit a lot of false summits along the way. Just when it seems like we’re there – our steps quickening and our loads lightening – we discover that we are in fact not there, and we have to plunge back into the darkness of the trees and keep climbing.

But while a false summit is disappointing – and can sometimes be the end of the journey – it also means that there’s something even higher ahead, with possibly better views.  Like anything, it takes hard work to get there.

We went to a party on Sunday night and saw people we hadn’t seen for quite some time, and we enjoyed hearing their impressions of Mary Elizabeth’s progress.  It’s a little hard to see the forest for the trees sometimes (to beat the forest/mountain metaphor into complete submission – sorry!) and it helps when other people can add their perspectives.

Finally, many thanks for your words of support – both on the blog and privately – in response to the last post about my depression.  It’s been a hard year or so coping with it, and the decision to talk publicly about it was difficult.  Your kindness and compassion help me think that it was a good idea.