So, every year, Dad and Caleb plan a weeklong trip for our families together. I must have inherited Dad’s love for the peaks, because I find myself longing for the mountain air almost every other day of the year. We live in small-town Wisconsin, and we live a very blessed life. But something about the mountains is invigorating, and we dream of the annual trip all year. We’ve gone to several places in Colorado, Washington once, and Montana twice. This year we’re back in Colorado, where Dad and Caleb joke that they grew up, even though they were both raised in the Midwest.
Three months ago, when Dad announced to us that we were bound for Colorado again, my sisters and I enthusiastically began researching the area. We had briefly read an article about avalanche survival, but who knew we would actually need to know about it.
Right after we read the avalanche survival information, I remember teasing Ellie that Sawyer had probably grown up quite a bit since last year. “What if he’s super handsome this summer?” I taunted her.
“That’ll be the day,” she muttered. “Even if his appearance has, um, matured, he’s probably the same old annoying Sawyer.” She and Sawyer usually spent most of the week together quarrelling about trivial stuff, like whose pack was heavier, who had a better GPA that school year, and even whose hiking boots smelled the least offensive at the end of a day.
I often teased Ellie about Sawyer, mainly because they are only six months apart in age, but also because I really think they would be compatible if they could just decide not to annoy each other. It’s like my mom always says, “People will live up or down to the expectations set for them.” If Ellie expects Sawyer to be a nuisance, he will seem like a bur in a sock. “Mind over matter,” I told her, but she rolled her eyes at me, warning me to drop the discussion. Seriously though, if she expected him to be helpful and intelligent, I really think she would see his positive attributes. To be fair though, Sawyer teases her endlessly, making fun of her perfectionism and the attention she pays to her all-too-beautiful hair. So I can kind of see why she dislikes him. But nothing pushed Ellie over the edge like the day Sawyer called her Smelly.
It was the first summer we went to Montana, and we girls and our moms had a hard time keeping up with Dad and Caleb’s fast pace. As we finally approached the campsite, Sawyer and Marshall slowed their pace to hike in with the “estrogen herd” as Sawyer called us. Out of nowhere, a blond-haired grizzly bear sauntered across the trail ahead of us, stopped to look at us, then turned and ran away. The sighting was phenomenal, and I hope to remember it for as long as I live. That bear’s muscles rippled under his coat, and he must have weighed 600 pounds. The expression in his eyes was terrifying and humbling and empowering all at once. When he turned to look at us, all seven of us came to a sudden halt and our breaths were caught mid-air. The grizzly stared at us for about four seconds, spun, and ran out of sight.
“Aww, Smelly, you scared him off!” Sawyer joked. Lydie and I couldn’t help but chuckle. Okay, laugh! Mom and Julia even smiled and rolled their eyes when Marshall claimed that he had read that bears are deterred by stinky girls.
Sawyer looked proud of the timing of his joke, at least until Ellie marched up to him and slyly said, “You think you know what smelly is?” She shocked us all when she shoved the bandana that had ridden on her hairline for two full days in his face before jogging ahead to pitch our tent. I thought she was going along with his joke, but she later confided in me that Sawyer’s taunt had hurt her feelings. It turns out she had been worried about BO, and when not only her first name, but also her hygiene were made fun of, it gouged her like a knife into warm butter. The rest of the evening, she wouldn’t come out of the tent, much less acknowledge Sawyer. Mom and Lydie had a difficult time convincing her to come out to eat. Of course, being in bear country, eating in the tent was not an option since the scent would linger and could attract bears to our tent.
When she finally agreed to come to the cooking site to eat her supper, she held her head down the whole time. Then she insisted on using her deodorant once more before Dad and Caleb hung the bear bag full of “smellables.” Sawyer attempted to apologize, but she physically pushed him away. Marshall snickered.
Sometimes I wondered what happened to her beloved lime-green bandana. Well, it started as lime-green, but after three treks and Ellie’s three summers at camp, followed by one summer of working as a counselor, the sun had faded the top side to a whitish green.
Even though Ellie and Sawyer have never seen eye to eye, I think of him as the big brother I always dreamed of having. Once, several years ago, I wandered away from camp after supper, and found myself taking a picture of two bear cubs. The cubs were pretty young, I guessed, and Teddy-bear cute. Before I realized there was danger, Sawyer grabbed me by my shoulders and slowly backed me out of the situation. In just a minute, I saw the mother bear and my heart dropped. “Where there are baby bears, you can count on there being a mama bear. And near a mama bear and her cubs is a place you never want to be,” Sawyer gently warned. Ever since then, I have used much better bear safety practices, and to be honest, the occurrence also earned Sawyer a ton of trust in my mind.
When Sawyer first suggested the idea of a moonlit summit when we arrived two days ago, I pictured a peaceful, lovely hike, mostly lit by the full moon. The five of us kids casually walked away from the camp to discuss our plan, out of earshot of our parents.
“Full moons come once a month, and this combined-family backpacking trip happens once a year,” Sawyer explained. “My plan is for us to make it to the peak by two, maybe three a.m., and then be back to camp well before our parents wake up. They’ll never even notice we were gone.” He glanced at each of our faces to gauge our reactions. My mind began spinning, imagining the cautionary information Dad and Caleb would have for this idea.
Hiking at night? Attempting a peak in the dark? It was early June, so the ridges and peaks were still mostly snow-covered. During the day, with Dad and Caleb’s expertise, our careful moms close by, and the extensive gear that our dads had, I would not be so hesitant. But sneaking away in the night, just us kids? I almost spoke up, but then Sawyer continued, “I heard Dad and Mr. Forrest talk about it once.” Forrest Stanley is my dad, affectionately called Mr. Forrest by the Miles boys. Sawyer continued, “They did a moonlit summit, and Dad said it was one of his greatest memories. We could have a story like that, too,” he pressed. I too had heard the story of their midnight hike. But they told the guys they were with what they were doing, and besides, they were professional backpacking guides at the time.
In my family, we pray to God. A lot. We pray before meals and trips, and at the start and end of every day. Instinctively, I began praying silently, either for safety or for Sawyer to forget this whole idea. I’ll admit, it sounded cool – make that awesome. Summiting one of Colorado’s fourteeners, a peak over 14,000 feet tall, in the middle of the night during a full moon! What could be better than that? This would be a tough decision. Sawyer was almost eighteen now, with a respectable amount of backpacking experience considering his age. He was enrolled to attend the Professional Outdoor Guides School at the end of summer. So we practically had a pro leading us. Well, not quite a pro, but I knew he was good for his age.
And I already knew how knowledgeable he was with bears. I’d seen him hike every summer for as long as I could remember, and I could not deny that he was a natural. With him as our guide, the chances of our succeeding were fairly high – I hoped.
And I could see his reasoning for not telling our parents. I mean, what kind of parents would agree to let their children attempt such a hike? Certainly not ours. Yet, even in our youth, the five of us were probably more prepared for a midnight hike than the average American adult. As long as we didn’t ask our parents, we would not be disobeying, right? Careless perhaps, but not disobedient. At least, I hoped not.
“No way,” voiced Ellie. Normally I would have given her opinion equal consideration, but since she was talking to Sawyer, I dismissed her negative response as simply wanting to disagree with Sawyer.
Sawyer shot her a challenging look and without missing a beat, roughly asked, “Why? Ellie, what about this is a bad idea?”
Ellie’s eyes grew huge and her face had an expression that said, “Are you out of your mind?”
“One,” Ellie held up a finger, “it’s night. Hiking where you can’t see is 100 percent dangerous. Maybe if we were familiar with the trail, but we’re not. Two,” she popped up her second finger, “we’re not going to tell anyone our plan? Hello, Sawyer Miles, did you totally forget the first cardinal rule of mountaineering? Three,” up shot her third finger, “you would be insane to drag little Lydie into the wilderness. She is eleven, for crying out loud!” (As if Lydie wasn’t already in the wilderness, but whatever.)
I had to agree with two of Ellie’s points, and from Sawyer’s face, he was either hurt by Ellie’s speech or he was considering her points, probably already planning his counter. Before anyone had a chance to say anything though, Lydie argued, “Little Lydie? Come on, Sis, I always get left out. I’m sick of being excluded from all the fun stuff. When you were eleven, you got to go on that rock climbing trip with the church kids, and when Marlee was eleven, she went to camp for a week in California with the Gundersons. Come on, Ellie! We’ll be with Sawyer and Marshall, and we’ll only be out for onenight.” Lydie wore a confident, slightly proud expression as she looked at Ellie, and realized she too had made a good point. Or was that two points? My mind was spinning.
Sawyer gloated, but rather than keeping quiet, he shot up one finger just inches from Ellie’s eyes and said, “One, we’ll have our headlamps. And the full moon. And spare batteries for our headlamps. Two,” up went another finger, “we’ll bring Dad’s satellite GPS messenger along. Three,” his third finger nearly hit Ellie’s nose as she glared at him, “Lydie is strong for her size and conditioned for hiking.” With that, Sawyer focused a daring stare into Ellie’s eyes. My teasing Ellie about the possibility of Sawyer having grown up this last year was not in vain. Seeing him stare down at my older sister, I estimated him to be at least six feet tall, several inches taller than at last year’s trip. His shoulders were broader too, and he looked like he probably worked out hard and often, probably to maintain good condition for these very hiking trips.
I half expected Ellie to retort back, or to shove Sawyer and storm off, but with a somewhat defeated countenance, she glanced at Marshall, “Marsh, what are your thoughts?”
Marshall lit up, “I’m going with my bro, whether or not you girls decide to join us,” he confidently stated.
That did it. We were in. I cast an inquisitive look at Marshall, wondering if he had planned his last statement, knowing that a challenge like referring to us as “you girls” would influence Ellie to agree. Marshall was fifteen, like me, but he was usually quiet enough that I couldn’t describe his personality very well. Honestly, I don’t know Marshall as well as I know Sawyer, which is why I wasn’t sure if he purposely worded his decision as a challenge to convince us to come. Not that Lydie needed any convincing. Or that I needed much convincing. And while Ellie did put up a valiant stand against Sawyer, I think she secretly was intrigued by the thought of the moonlit hike. I was positive that the only reason she fought the idea was because Sawyer was the one who suggested it. Well, that and the risks involved.
Ellie isn’t always disagreeable. In fact, she is usually very amiable. Granted, maybe due to her being firstborn, she is strong-willed and tends to strive for perfection. My mom constantly tells her that only God can be perfect, and we should be content with doing our personal best, but that is not good enough for Ellie. She will push herself as close to perfection as is humanly possible. Once, her county fair project on floral arrangements earned a second place ribbon, and she argued with the judges and even went so far as to research why her arrangement should earn a blue ribbon, if not a purple-champion ribbon. The judges finally gave her a blue ribbon, but I always wondered if it was because they were sick and tired of her explanations rather than that they agreed with Ellie. She was smug that day, but this was different. I could see she felt defeated that Sawyer had won the debate.
And so, the five of us quietly prepared for our trek. Lydie was so eager that her hands were literally shaking and her smile was mischievous and wide. Marshall looked just as excited, which says a lot. He’s usually reserved and hard to read. Looking at Lydie, I was beginning to feel the thrill, though my heart raced with questions and prayers pleading for safety. When I glanced to observe Ellie’s face, I noticed that her eyes were fixed on Sawyer’s face. At first I thought she was glaring at him, but her face didn’t look angry. It seemed like she looked at him with a look of admiration, if that was possible – almost as if she did trust him and sincerely wanted to go on this midnight hike after all. Maybe she was just a bit apprehensive, like me. But when I turned my focus back to Sawyer as he rattled off our itinerary, I noticed that he was focused on Ellie’s face. And for once, he didn’t appear to be exasperating her. Maybe my teasing wasn’t far-fetched, I mused with a sudden smile. Sawyer and Ellie…
“What?” asked Sawyer, turning to me.
Startled, I repeated his, “What?”
“Why are you smiling like that? It looks like you’re planning something evil,” he suspiciously said.
“And you’re not?” My retort was all I could think of in the moment.
He sheepishly smiled, and I again saw Ellie look at him warmly. Weird!
“Back to business! Here are your individual packing lists,” Sawyer said as Marshall began passing out small sheets of paper. “Lydie takes the smallest load of course. I’ll take the biggest.”
“You made us individual packing lists?” Ellie asked with complete disgust in her voice. The warm look I thought she had given Sawyer had been replaced with absolute irritation, as if he were a skunk who had just sprayed. “I mean,” her voice softened, realizing the brashness in her response, “it’s good that you planned ahead, but, I mean, seriously, you think we need you to tell us what to pack for a peak?”
Yikes, that one hurt! I could tell immediately from Sawyer’s dejected look that Ellie had hurt his ego. While I didn’t think it necessary to tell us what to pack, I certainly wasn’t offended that our self-appointed guide had taken the time to consider the appropriate gear and how best to distribute it. Honestly, I thought it was a good indicator that we had a trustworthy guide. Obviously, Sawyer hadn’t dreamt this up on a whim. And, since he’d be attending POGS this fall, he was obviously pursuing a mountaineering profession like his father had. Likely he viewed this as the perfect opportunity to practice for his future career. I thought about speaking up to say that I trusted Sawyer or to thank him for the packing list, but decided against it as I didn’t want to create any fissures between Ellie and me.
“Wow, thanks Sawyer!” Leave it to Lydie to break the tension. “I can’t wait! I’ll go pack right now!” And with that, she gave Sawyer the kind of hug that a kid would give her uncle, then raced back to our tent. Sawyer appeared to appreciate Lydie’s kindness, but I noticed that he would not even glance at Ellie. Ellie, however, was either being stubborn or was completely unaware that her words had stung. After a moment of studying her list, she marched back to our tent.
Skimming my packing list, I saw a problem. Crampons were on my list, except I didn’t have my own pair yet. Dad said I wasn’t experienced enough for crampons, and with my level of skill, crampons would serve more as a danger than an aid. Crampons strap onto the bottom of hiking boots and they help mountaineers gain traction in snow and ice. Made of metal, their sharp blades can cause serious injury to an inexperienced user, or even to an experienced climber in a fall.
“Hey, Sawyer,” he looked my way and from the corner of my eye, I saw Marshall look at me too, and I was afraid they expected me to act rudely like my older sister. “Um, I see I should pack crampons. I’ve been asking Dad for two years now, but he keeps saying I’m not ready for a pair. So, um,” I looked down, thinking that Marshall had probably had a pair of crampons for two or three seasons, “I don’t have any,” I muttered, feeling embarrassed.
He thought for a moment, and then said, “Tell you what, if we get to a spot where we need crampons, we’ll rope up. If your dad isn’t comfortable giving you crampons yet, I certainly shouldn’t overrule that. But if we’re all roped up, and Marshall, Ellie and I have crampons, we should be good.” I was impressed with his problem solving and his respect for my dad and politeness to me in this embarrassing situation, and it further increased my trust in his plan. Smiling, I thanked him and then apologized for Ellie’s impolite treatment. When I mentioned her name, he looked in the direction of our tent and seemed to grow uncomfortable.
