The Write Perspective

 Our family spent Christmas, 2023 in Phoenix had a fantastic time in general. In Phoenix there’s a mountain we always hike. It used to be called Squaw Peak but the city changed it because they realized the person that named it clearly held hate in their heart for squaws to name a hiking mountain after them. It now goes by Piestewa Peak.

We decided to climb this mountain one morning. I’ve never relished hiking myself, but knew if I didn’t go, Ladon would spend the rest of the trip ridiculing me. 

Christmas morning we woke up bright and early and headed to the mountain. Our group consisted of Dad, Brandon, Ladon, Mike, Eddie, Shana, and myself. We began the trek chatting, but soon fell silent to conserve energy.  

“Wow this actually isn’t as bad as I figured it was!” I thought cheerfully, “20 minutes in and I’m still keeping up with Shana!” 

“How long have we been hiking?” I asked her. 

 “Two minutes.” I glanced at everyone around me. The people in my group looked unbothered and more than that they seemed to be enjoying themselves! So did the others hikers striding up and down the mountain. An unsettled feeling overtook me. 

“So is this how it feels to be the visitor of an insane asylum?” I wondered, “People completely unconscious of their own mental illness?” I mean really, what kind of scary monsters wake up early in the morning to put themselves through physical exertion and torment, and on top of that, doing it with a smile on their face? “Maybe they do it for the view at the top!” You say. Trust me, the view is, at best, mediocre. 

 Not much later I fell behind the others. I tried not to think about the fact that I was laboring up this path only to come right back down a while later.  I’ve always had this idea that when hiking your mind zones out and you’ve covered a half a mile without even realizing it.  Not so, I was painfully aware of every single minute and every single step. I can’t tell you exactly what went through my mind the whole time which is probably for the best because the little I do recall wasn’t exactly edifying. 

I knew the peak was still hours away when shockingly, I saw it up ahead. 

“Wow! I’m going to make it!” I was ecstatic. Fifteen minutes later realized the peak was gone. “That can’t be, peaks don’t just appear and disappear to manipulate hikers,” the rational part of my brain told me, but deep down I held a thread of doubt about the Mountain’s integrity. 

No more than 1 hour later I saw the top. I trudged on then collapsed onto a rock beside the trail. When I lifted my head, the peak was once again gone, and all I could see was endless trails with perky, maniacal hikers jogging up and down. Sighing I continued the self imposed misery. 

“Hey!” someone yelled at me “Are you Amish?” 

“Uh, Mennonite.” I responded to the hiker who was on the way down the trail. 

He then launched into a story about how he used to live close to Amish and bought butter from them. Grateful for any break, I let him ramble uninterrupted.

“You don’t happen to sell butter around here do you?” 

 I gently broke the news to him that I would not be able to sell him butter as I didn’t live here, and that my butter business was located in Missouri. 

“That’s too bad, you guys make the best butter!”

 I thanked him for the compliment, and we continued on our way, him trotting serenely down the Mountain: me slumped over, dragging my way up. 

Three-hundred minutes later my phone rang and I saw it was from Ladon. I jumped to several conclusions as to why he’d be calling me. Maybe there was a massive volcano or a suicide bomber at the summit and the top of the mountain was blown off and he alone had survived and I couldn’t continue to the top. I’ve always been much too optimistic. 

 “Yeah” I gasped into the phone. 

Ladon cackled, “Your dad just beat you to the top of the mountain. How does that make you feel?”

I stifled a cutting retort. Actually, my heaving lungs stifled much of any talking, and I simply hung up on him. (Two weeks later I came up with the perfect response but by that time I had almost reached the summit and the moment had passed.)

I rounded a slight curve and heard yelling and hollering. I raised my head and saw what again appeared to be the peak, but this time the Mountain had employed jerks to stand on it and yell to fully convince you that this time the peak was there to stay. I blinked to give it time disappear but when I opened my eyes, it was still there. 

“This cannot be the actual top, Carole. Do not get your hopes up.” I blinked again and heard, “Hurry up loser!” from one of the jerks. The jerk laughed and I realized it was Ladon. I gestured back. 

Not long later I hauled myself up to The Actual Peak and was met by encouragement and congratulations from brothers-in-law and harassment from the brother. His first words, “Okay, it’s time to go.” I considered pushing him over the edge but decided against it when I realized it would require me moving from my prostrate position on the rocks. 

That night we went to an escape room and I had the wonderful experience of mentally out-performing Ladon. 

So if you need someone to and get you out of a locked room I’m here. Ladon’s your man if what you need is someone to endlessly jeer, heckle, and belittle. 

P.S. Ladon is a great person and in brother rankings scrapes into the top three.