Me & Dad, having a momentMy dad was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor last July. The neurosurgeon told him it might take a little while or he could just slip away any day. (Trust me, my dad was totally banking on the latter.) The family closed ranks immediately. Cousins, uncles, a few of my dad's missionaries flew in to Billings for...(strangely enough) a party. Although it was devastating it was hard to mourn while he was alive and in such high spirits. Before Matt left to come back to Idaho my dad took him aside and gave him his hiking boots, Danners that were one of his prized possesions. It was a poignant moment because Matt and my dad had put a lot of miles on those old boots.
After a few weeks with all the clan, our little family had to come home. One Saturday morning we were sitting in the kitchen when we got a phone call from my dad. Matt, "Your dad want's us to send him his boots back, overnight mail." So I went to the post office and mailed them (I was actually chuckling, thinking what a cool blessing it was that I was mailing his boots back because he was with us for a while longer.) I think my dad found himself...bored and still very much alive. So he decided he would climb a mountain or two.
So...Mt. Borah is the highest peak in Idaho12,600 ft (straight up I might add). Jeff (dad's best friend) had been working on his goals of climbing the highest point in every state. So they came up with this plan to climb Mt. Borah. I was game, of course Matt was on board (he is part mountain goat). My mom contributed by watching the kids, Dad was soooooo exited. We had rooms at this tiny little hotel in Mackey the night before the hike. Dad and Jeff examined their gear, Jeff bought Dad a new backpack (a small one so Dad couldn't pack too much stuff.) They distributed the rope (Dad really wanted us to have enough rope in case he died up on the mountain. Seriously, he really wanted to die on a mountain. I think he pictured himself sitting with his back against a tree, his face towards the sun, just slipping away...) Sorry, I digress. So dad and Jeff were like little kids, checking out the hiking poles Jeff brought, the backpack, the food, etc... We started off early the next morning. I kept picking up the rocks that were on the right side of the trail because I was just sure one of those rocks was going to be THE rock that took Dad down. (He had lost the majority of the right sided peripheral vision in both eyes.) (The funny thing about me picking up the rocks is that about half way up, the whole trail IS rocks; shale, slippery rocks.) We hiked, rested, watered up, snacked, rested, hiked... Dad was so happy. We made it up pretty far before we had to turn around. Then it got tricky. Going down was harder than climbing up. Dad fell a few times (I made a lot of alarmed gasps until I had to walk in front of him because it was too painful for me to watch.) Then we got a system. The system was that Matt went directly in front of dad, who hooked his hands underneath the backpack straps. Two tugs meant go, one tug meant stop. That is how we made it down the mountain. It was very slow going but everytime I would turn around I would see Matt, a look of intense concentrationon his face, and my dad, his face exuding the happiness he felt to be on the mountain.
At Dad's funeral Wynn sang a song called "Joy in the Journey." Here are a few choice lyrics. "Every rock we stumble across can be a stepping stone, there are precious hidden treasures scattered all along the road. And there is joy in the journey, joy in the climb. Twisting and turning, reaching for the open sky. Carving out each footstep, in the struggling we find, there is hope, there is joy in the journey."
