CLIMBING THE MOUNTAIN

By Himanee Gupta Saratoga Springs, NY

I begin climbing Bear Den Mountain in a drizzling rain, telling myself it is only rain and that this time I am better prepared. I had been in the High Peaks region of the Adirondack State Park for two weeks as part of a three-week writing residency at Craigardan, a creative collective breaking new ground in rocky soil. During my time here, I had decided to get my hiking legs back into shape in hopes of perhaps beginning to climb the famed 46 High Peaks.

Volunteers at a roadside 46er Club stand encourage me. They introduce me to the “Lake Placid 9,” a set of nine lower elevation peaks that are beautiful and fun. They do not know me. When I tell them I am a farmer and have done marathons and have hiked before, they tell me I’ll be a 46er in no time.

I decide to try. Baxter is first. I get soaked on the way up, but the sun breaks out at the summit. A good sign, until the rain pours again on the way down. It’s drier when I do Big Crow, and sunny when I swing myself up the boulders at Cobble Hill.

Now I am at Bear Den. It is like the other mountains but harder. Many memories come back to me as I climb:

- The bear on the Hoh River trail in the Olympic National Park.

- My ex-husband mocking me for not climbing, running, biking, cooking, cleaning, harvesting, setting up, taking down, driving fast enough.

- All the messages I’ve received in my life of what I can’t do.

I am on the trail alone in the rain, thinking that if I had started sooner, not had a slow wake-up time with coffee and morning pages, a farmers market jaunt where I had to stop by a dozen booths and chat with a whole bunch of farmers, and a shopping spree for warmer clothes, I would have been doing the hike in the sun, in the company of others. The water is soaking my hands and my jeans, the hoodie of the new sweatshirt I bought that I did need for the colder-turning temperatures here, but not for this hike. My glasses keep fogging. Every time I take a sip of water, I need to pee.

I remember Snowy, heroine of a series of novels set in rugged New Hampshire. She is climbing up to the Fire Tower to fight agoraphobia and to find Tom. As she climbs, she is just shy of age fifty. She is letting go the grief and shock over the suicide of her husband of twenty-one years. The climb leads her out of the world of fear and into the wilderness of strength. She is hiking toward the lover from high school she never forgot.

Her stamina is like mine. So are her legs: little legs – baby legs, Bambi legs – that the big people of the world don’t seem to know how to handle. The big people try to help me in ways I do not need help – often lifting me over boulders in ways that wrench at my armpits and hurt. They sometimes ignore me. They often belittle me. Very often they do not see me at all. That’s almost the response I like best. It’s not that I do not appreciate help. I just wish people would let me ask for help – and let me tell them what it is that I need.

This desire echoes a sentiment from Gloria Anzaldua’s essay, “La Consciencia de la Mestiza,” that I find particularly compelling. Do not try to help the colonized, Anzaldua says to the descendants of colonizers. Instead, take stock of your ancestors’ wrong-doings and then ask the colonized: What is it that you need from us to help you heal?

On Bear Den Mountain alone, I seek a sense of direction. The colored markers affixed to trees are sometimes quite clearly spaced; at other times they are nowhere in sight and I am not sure if I have stayed on the path or meandered off. On the Hoh River Trail in the Olympic National Forest in 2000, I somehow meandered off. That was how I managed to land in the clearing face-to-face with an almost magical-looking black bear. A thousand cues for how to confront a bear flashed through my brain as I stared dumbly right at it: be aggressive, fight, shout, throw rocks, and then I thought: bear bell.

My friend Kat had hinted at picking one up on my way to the trail, a night or two earlier in Honolulu, where we both were living. We were sitting together at our favorite hangout, the Hau Tree Lanai at the New Otoni Kaimana Beach Hotel. A few days later at an outdoor gear shop in Port Angeles, I saw one for sale. I tossed it into my cart. I tied it to the top of my backpack. It tinkled throughout the hike, annoying me.

The tinkle was supposed to repel bears. Clearly that did not work because I was now face-to-face with a gorgeous one who could swipe me down with one brush of a powerful paw. But bears do not like shrill sounds. I reached up and rang the bear bell hard. The bear got up, took another look at me, and ambled off. In a fast hot surge of adrenalin, all of my negative self-talk wore off.

Now, here at Bear Den, I am seeing that as I ask Nature to guide me, Nature obliges. I get lost and then spot a marker. The marker either reassures me that I am on track or shows me how to get back on track. I stop, sip, pee, and make my way upwards.

My confidence wavers as the going gets rougher. I remember my ex-husband and his bestie – a female friend and 46er and her dog. We are hiking a trail around Moreau Lake near my home outside Saratoga. It is an easy hike, supposedly. But when I hike it with them it is not easy at all. I cannot climb fast or match my pace with the dog’s need to pee. I am frustrated that I cannot get the workout I want. My performance confirms to me what they had told me – that I could not be a 46er without a great deal of training and effort, that even if I had hiked in the Cascades, the Olympics, the Canadian Rockies, and the Himalayas, the Adirondacks were not meant for weenie-teenies like me.

I let the negativity settle over me like the mist filling the skies. I catch myself. “What is this selftalk all about? Isn’t it just making the path harder?” I force myself to laugh and take some deep breaths. I keep going.

And then I am at the summit. The darkness of the trees and the mud break open. It is so beautiful that I nearly start to cry. Not because I’d made it but because of what I see.

What I see. Nothing. Nature had obscured the stunning scenery I was supposed to see with fog. Through the mist are outlines of mountains and ridgelines. I must go inside and use my imagination to paint in the rest. It is one of the most beautiful sights I have ever witnessed.

I think of how many people might have opted out of the hike, thinking that without a good view and a photo-op, why make the hike?

Why not make the hike?

Not for the view but for the silent communion and the opportunity to see from the inside.

I will remember the vivid greens and browns of the forest, the bright yellow markers on trees that guided me up and back down and how much I realized I was relying on them when they disappeared, the grays of the water-soaked boulders. I will remember the mud and the moss, the fears and the tears, and the joys and the tears.

Bear Den was for me a farmers’ hike, something that can – maybe must – happen rain or shine. Going up in the rain is like farming’s 24/7 confrontation with the power and challenges of Nature. It is the most cleansing experience possible.

Himanee was a 2022 writer-in-residence at Craigardan.