When I Found Myself On The Mountaintop
When I was 16, I found myself on a mountaintop. And it remains one of the most glorious moments of my life.
I’ve always been more of an introverted person. I was content by myself, closed off from the world. Or rather, that’s what I told myself. The truth was, I was lonely. That loneliness sprawled out inside of me, taking hold and fighting to allow its grip to sink down deeper inside of me, even now.
By the time I was 16, there was this desperation gnawing inside of me to shift and change, but I didn’t know how. I was afraid of what would happen if I clung to anything other than that loneliness that I had held onto for all of these years.
A summer camp I attended during those early years gave me one of the most life-changing experiences that I could hope for. Each summer, they accept two groups of teenagers for what was akin to an internship program. I applied on a whim, at the last minute, and was sure that my more outgoing friends would make it in before I did. But, to my surprise, I was accepted.
So there I was, 16 and scared for the first time in a long time. The program itself gave me a new understanding of this place that was so sacred and valuable to me. But there was a catch — each “intern” was required to complete an eight-day hike across the Catskill Mountains. We wouldn’t be alone, of course — we had been assigned intern groups of about 10, with a male and female counselor to act as supervisors to guide us along our process — but the thought of making this journey crippled me with a sense of dread I’d never known.
I tried to get out of the hike, I’ll admit. I blamed everything from my knock-knees to my scoliosis as a reason why I wouldn’t be a good fit for the journey. (My scoliosis actually did worry me a bit, but it wasn’t anything that backpack adjustments wouldn’t fix.) Still, that loneliness and self-doubt wrapped around my confidence like a viper; I’d never been hiking on anything more than a 30-minute trail and a few hills before. How would I do this?
The first day of the hike, in my brother’s old basketball shorts and hiking boots, I made my way with the rest of the group. The other interns were chatting, laughing at their bubbling excitement. But I was terrified. I cried up that first half of the hill. I wanted to fast-forward to the last day, to see that camp shuttle again, and lie across my bed and forget all about this hike.
One of my supervisors, noticing how upset I was, talked to me. And she rested her hand on my shoulder when I spilled out my uneasiness about the journey ahead. She posed a question that everyone was astounded to hear come out of her mouth.
“Why don’t you lead us tomorrow?”
No words came out of my mouth, and with everyone’s pressing eyes on me, I nodded.
The next morning, we rose bright and early. I strapped the pack onto my back and took my place at the front of the group. At first, it was all I could do to remind myself to place one foot in front of the other. But then I… I got comfortable. I was doing a good job. We made good time, and I picked up the pace a bit. My counselors smiled from the back of the line.
We passed by a lake around the third day, and even after my protests of not knowing how to swim, my groupmates urged me to get in the lake with them. I felt shy in the swimsuit that I’d packed last-minute, with the simple navy color and sturdy straps. But as my friend tried to teach me how to swim, clasping his hand on my belly so I wouldn’t fall, I felt safer than I had in a long time.
Around the sixth day, we set a goal of reaching a specific spot by noon so that we could have a day of rest. We set the last cell phone with power to wake us up with an alarm at 4:15 a.m. It was a space between moonlight and sunlight that shone down on us as we packed up our things to make the journey. We stopped for breakfast at sunrise, when we were atop a large hill. No one made a sound as we overlooked the breathtaking view.
There were pinks and purples and oranges that swirled in the sky, but more than that, I saw myself. I saw that it was something unexpected that had kept me from believing that I would make this journey: my lack of faith in myself. I remembered that sunset, and the way that it moved all of us to a wise silence that lasted until the sun had settled above the horizon to fully start the day.
Needless to say, I finished the hike with my group. Even now, there were so many memories that I hold back from this essay, not because they are unimportant, but because they reassure the purpose of why I made that journey when I did. That hike comforted me and made me realize that there was a chance for me to catch that bit of faith and hold it for myself before anyone else. That I, too, mattered. And that I had the power to recognize that for myself.
I’m not as close to the other interns or my counselors as I once was. But there are moments, when I feel most lowly settled into that gripping loneliness, that I remember what that sunset felt like, and I feel reassured. I remember what it felt like to find myself on that mountaintop.
