an epic life

Reflections: My Mother-Son Rite of Passage Expedition with Son Hayden

August 7th, 2016

(Note: My son, Hayden, read this and approved of my sharing)

Hayden, 14, is our second of three sons. He gets his name from Ferdinand Hayden, the geologist that led the Hayden Geological Survey of 1871, which explored and documented features in the region that would one year later become Yellowstone National Park, the world’s first national park. Since he was old enough to walk, Hayden has been drawn to rocks, and has always loved climbing and scrambling over rocks so perhaps it’s no wonder he gets his name from a geologist.

It was last year that I had this idea of leading my sons on a mother-son rite of passage expedition the summer before they start high school. A mother of three sons, I will get to have this meaningful experience three times. Last year, I took our first son, Wolf, on the adventure, and still consider the mother-son rite of passage idea one of my best ideas ever. (Our youngest son, Fin, is 9, so it will be 5 years before we get to do his.)

It was Hayden’s turn for the adventure this year, and after a lot of anticipation, we were excited to get the party started. First thing’s first, so we stopped at Lander Bake Shop at 6:30am and I bought Hayden a giant brownie plus a mocha, and we started our 2-hour drive to the trailhead.

On our way out of town, I played a Hidden Brain podcast called “Silver and Gold.” Hayden is super athletic and loves sports, so I figured this would be a good pick. I should mention that my son Hayden is funny, and really smart. He is way more intelligent than me, and in fact, one of the things we love about Hayden is the random bits of trivia he shares with us that are always fascinating tidbits that teach us things we did not previously know. The podcast started out with Shankar Vedantam explaining that David Matsumoto, a professor of psychology at San Francisco State University, and a former Olympic Judo coach, has analyzed the behavior of Olympic medal winners. Among other things, Matsumoto found that people who won bronze medals appeared happier than people who won silver medals. Before he could explain, Hayden quipped, “Duh. The bronze winner is just happy he made the podium. The silver medalist is not happy because he could have gotten a gold, but he did not, and that silver just drives that point home.”

LOL. I couldn’t argue with him, and in fact agreed, so we turned off the podcast, and instead agreed to listen to the start of an audiobook, Jim Gaffigan’s Dad is Fat. As a family we all laughed out loud while watching Gaffigan’s stand-up show, Beyond The Pale, on Netflix, and so we had a feeling this book would be good for some laughs on this day’s early start. And boy were we right. It wasn’t long, and Hayden and I were both laughing out loud. We especially enjoyed the first chapter. We loved it so much that I predicted “Dinga Dinga Dong…” might become a useful tagline, at times, during our adventure.

Once we turned off the highway and onto the long dirt road, we switched to music. We listened to Jet Fly, Ride, Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Bonfire Heart, Lose Yourself, Lost!, Let the Rhythm Just, Born in the U.S.A., I Took A Pill In Ibiza, All At Once, 7 Years, Called Out In The Dark, and many other songs, before arriving at the trailhead.

As per usual, ours would not be a lightweight adventure. As we parked at the trailhead and reached for our backpacks, we had to be intentional so as not to get injured. Good thing Hayden grew 5 inches in the last 12 months, I thought to myself. His pack was more than half his height! (By the way, I’m not necessarily proud to admit this, but these growing boys of ours are young and fit and strong, so they can carry more weight than they used to carry. Read: More weight than their mom carries. I train to be strong and fit and capable, but still, my 48-year-old joints are not of the same quality as those of my 14-year-old son. Even so, both of our backpacks were tall and unseemly – and seam-popping.

Did I mention Hayden is an Eater? Yes, the capital E is intentional. We packed an abundance of delicious foods – and also a football and a packraft and a kite. These things take up space. (This sort of reminds me of a time when Wolf was one-and-a-half years old and I was six months pregnant with Hayden. We rented llamas and camped at Stough Creek Basin. Because llamas carried our loads, we packed in an exersaucer, swing, and a huge condominium of a tent. Hayden’s and my backpacking adventure was sorta similar to this except for there were no llamas.)

We started hiking down the trail, and I instructed him to take small steps rather than large, bounding, lunging steps. I told him it would be better for us to try and stay under these monster packs rather than be stretched out from under them.

At first we didn’t say much. I listened as our trekking poles clicked on the rocky trail and I watched and followed in Hayden’s steps. This is common in all of the trips I lead and take. The first bit is all about getting into a groove and developing a sense of how it’s going to feel to move and travel in this way, loaded down with everything that will sustain us for 4 days. It’s also a time for re-orienting to a new – and wild – place.

“Only that day dawns to which we are awake.” These are the words of Henry David Thoreau, found near the end of his wonderful book, Walden. I reminded myself of this quote as Hayden and I started up the trail in the silence, and in our own thoughts. I had been on this very trail just days before leading my Epic Women expedition. I was home just long enough to get cleaned up, unpacked, and repacked, and my mind had been a little scattered in preparation for this adventure. I really wanted to be here with Hayden, 100%, and to savor our time together, and to not be too tired, or distracted by my unfinished, growing pile of work that was on my desk at home.

One of the reasons I love spending so much time in the wilderness is it’s the easiest place for me to be present, and to be in the moment. Otherwise, in all other places, I tend to be future-oriented, always preoccupied with future and upcoming events, and new ideas and possibilities. As we walked our first mile, I felt that familiar sense of belonging and presence – and a relief came over me that I would indeed have no problem being here with Hayden, and only here.

I love hiking with my sons. At least in my experience, if we’re wandering down some trail, I don’t have to work to prompt the boys into conversation. Walking somehow inspires them to talk, and to share openly about what’s on their mind.

Hayden started talking to me about basketball, and citing statistics about Michael Jordan. A few months back I had bought him Michael Jordan: The Life, by Roland Lazenby, and he recently finished reading it. He commented that the book is fantastic, and that he especially loved what was said on the book’s final page.

I listened as he talked excitedly about some of Jordan’s statistics, and several other NBA players. While I don’t want to compare, I must stay Hayden is very much like I was when I was his age. Basketball was my passion. I spent all of my free time developing my three point shot and other skills at elementary school playgrounds in the summer. I even received a Division I basketball scholarship to the University of Montana in 1986. And even though it didn’t work out as planned, and ended up being what I call one of my most spectacular failures, hearing Hayden talk about basketball, and watching him invest so much time shooting and doing drills at local playgrounds this summer is a little like flashing back to my own 14-year-old self.

After a while it started sprinkling so we took out our rain jackets and had a quick snack and some water. When we started hiking again, I asked him if he had any goals for our adventure. “I want to have fun with you and to do awesome.” I told him I had the same goals.

 

It wasn’t long, and we reached Big Sandy Lake, where we removed our packs and ate some lunch. I pointed out all of the mountains around us: Schiestler Peak, Temple Peak, East Temple and Steeple peaks, Haystack, and Big Sandy. Mitchell Peak, the mountain Hayden would climb on his own the next day, was just out of sight. As we ate our lunch, we listened as a marmot whistled/chirped from the pile of granite boulders above the lake. Hayden used to do a fantastic marmot call, and I tried to get him to do it now, but he refused. When did he grow up? I thought to myself. It seems like it was just yesterday that we were bribing the boys up the trail by planting “trail fairy” snacks for them. Now, we can hardly keep up with them. Hayden was loaded down, with a much-heavier pack than I, and still, it took effort to stay on his heels. I have created a monster, I thought to myself, as I tried to catch up with him after putting our packs back on.

Soon we started up the “grunt” part of the day – the beginning of Jackass Pass, so named because not even a mule (ie. jackass) can hike up it. As we moved slowly up the switchbacks, I remarked that we were moving like ants carrying great loads. “Actually, if we were ants, our loads would be much heavier because ants can carry 10 times their bodyweight on their backs.” We then discussed how grateful we were that our loads were not 1,150 pounds and 1,350 pounds respectively, and talking about this (almost) made our loads feel not as heavy. Hayden suggested how cool it would be if we had some ants around to carry our loads. We figured if we wanted a 70-pound load carried in for each of us, all it would require would be two 7-pound ants. We spent a couple of switchbacks distracting ourselves from exertion by imagining these giant ants, and what it would be like to hire ants to carry in our loads.

Soon, we arrived at what I consider to be a magical, best kept secret site for a camp.

We set up the tent and unloaded the foods and other kitchen stuff and moved them to the scenic kitchen area, where we were blessed by epic views. Across from us was Mitchell Peak, and in the distance was Haystack, Steeple, East Temple and Temple peaks. Hayden would climb Mitchell Peak early the next morning, and we’d day hike over to the Deep Lake area on Day 3. I love this camp because from it, you can see all of the country we’d be exploring.

Hayden then sprawled out on a granite slab and took a nap. While he was napping, I remembered him as an almost 2-year-old. One time we were camping in our camper at Flaming Gorge, and Hayden, then about 18 months old, was up all night screaming in pain from an ear infection. “Sing Amazing Grace!” he yelled at me as I tried to console him on my chest. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was so cute how demanding and specific his request was. As he lay there napping, I brainstormed words to describe my Hayden with using the letters of his name. H is for honorable (Hayden has always been principled, and inspired by men and women of honor), Amazing (he probably prefers the word awesome, but given the song, Amazing Grace, has such a place in his early life and our relationship, I am going with Amazing), Y for youthful (he’s great at getting down and playing with younger kids, including his 9-year-old brother, Fin, and Whacky Fish Campers last summer), D is for Determined (once Hayden sets his mind to something, he pursues it with a dogged determination), Eater (no explanation, but suffice it to say that he’s hungry pretty much ALL of the time), and finally, N is for Night owl (poor Hayden, he’s the only night owl in our family of early risers.)

 

After writing all of this down in my journal, I opened my copy of Kahlil Gibran’s prophet, and read my favorite essay in the entire book, “On Children.” Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts… I tell myself that I must remember all this, especially the last part.

One of the thing that inspires me about Hayden is how he marches to the beat of his own drum. Even at his relatively young age, he’s his own man. He may seek advice, and be inspired and influenced, but ultimately, he chooses what to believe, and how to be. I know it’s early on, he’s only 14, but it is something I’ve noticed about Hayden for some time now. I was probably 40 years old before I felt like I marched to the beat of my own drum.

This rite of passage trip is as much a rite of passage for mom as it is for son. I have a very clear idea about the kind of mother I want to be. Still, being that person is difficult. I struggle constantly with it. As my Hayden grows into a man, I want to do my best to be the mother I want to be. That mother is not a hovering mother, but rather a supportive mother who guides and loves and cares for her son, but also stays out of his way so that he can blossom and emerge and soar. By the time this expedition ends, my hope is that we make simple promises to one another that will help facilitate my being the way I want to be in order for him to be his best, and that we may love each other even more as a result.

Hayden wakes up as I make a bunch of racket getting pans, food and the stove out. I mention that nap will do him good since his mountain climb will come early tomorrow. We plan to wake at 4am, and for him to start up at around 5am. I show him Mitchell Peak, and most of what his route will be. I ask him if he’s nervous. “Not really,” he says. “I’m excited, though.” This is pure Hayden. If he gets nervous, he doesn’t show it. I, on the other hand, am feeling nervous. This is my idea – for him to climb Mitchell Peak by himself – and yet, as his mother, I wonder if I’m being reckless, and if he’ll get his leg pinned between two boulders tomorrow, or get too close to the edge when standing on the summit. I chase these thoughts away with conversation about food. Hayden decides we should save the most epic meal – cheesy quesadillas – for after the mountain climb, and so we settle on cheesy, buttery noodles for tonight. He eats almost three bowls.

Next, we play catch with the football he packed in. I used to beg him to throw the ball 50 times with me. Now, he begs me. I’m not a hard sell. I love playing catch (fetch) with Hayden. We both try to catch the football with just one hand. He’s better than me at it. Of course. But for a minute, I feel young, like a 14-year-old girl, and I’m having a lot of fun.

Then, we play some gin rummy with cards we bought in Switzerland. We wonder aloud, and laugh, at why we would have purchased the German version. Each card has a unique illustration and paragraph of information that we imagine is pretty interesting if only one of us knew German. We play three games; he wins two, and I win one. We’ll keep track and continue the contest over the next few days.

We decide to go to bed early since the alarm will sound in a matter of hours. We get into my 2-person tent, and he remarks, “this is very cocoon-like.” We say good night, but I can tell he’s not sleeping. He’s tossing and turning and his breathing isn’t restful. I ask him if he’s okay and he says he feels claustrophobic. I suggest we sleep outside under the stars so he doesn’t feel so closed in. He says he’ll be okay, and after a while more of tossing and turning, I can sense he’s fast asleep. For my part, I didn’t sleep. This isn’t unusual – I’m not a great wilderness sleeper. Mostly, I didn’t sleep due to nerves regarding Hayden’s mountain climb. I remind myself that last year I was the same way, and Wolf did just fine. This helps me a little.

The alarm goes off, and we’re up. I make coffee for me and hot chocolate for him. We have some chunky peanut butter and honey bagels, and we’re off with headlamps. We stop at the outlet of North Lake to refill our water bottles and treat the water. I lead him along the trail, and over the boulders along North Lake’s north shore before arriving to the start of the Mitchell Peak ascent. I start up with him for a bit to make sure he’s on the right course, and then agree where we’ll meet up to descend part of the mountain together, and we part ways. There is alpenglow on Warbonnet and I snap a photo of him with it in the background before hugging him and wishing him a great climb.

I climb in a different direction toward Dog Tooth, and find a rock on which to sit. And wait. And worry. While sitting here, butterflies were everywhere. This reminded me of when Hayden was a toddler and I’d carry him in a backpack. I loved those times. I have such fond memories. He’d be mostly in my right ear, over my right shoulder and he’d exclaim, “Buttflies! Buttflies!” whenever he spied a butterfly, which was often. I don’t remember Wolf or Fin ever getting excited over butterflies. Now, I see butterflies everywhere, especially on the yellow flowers that nature arranges like bouquets up high in this alpine tundra. It’s hard to not feel God’s presence and my blessings, as I recall Hayden’s love of butterflies and now see them all around me. I get a little teared up and emotional. I wait and every now and again, spy through my binoculars. Hayden is wearing a red shirt, which is helpful. I spot him making his way toward the peak. I figure it will be another one-and-a-half or two hours so before he sits on the summit. One-and-a-half or two hours of me worrying, and feeling what I can only describe as “tender.”

I pull out my journal and look for the wise words of Seneca that I printed out before leaving: It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it… Life is long if you know how to use it.

As a person, I can be very hard on myself. As a mother, I’m even harder on myself. It’s the most important responsibility I have, and I constantly doubt my abilities. I read Seneca’s words three times, as if to rehearse their truth. This right here, being with my Hayden – just he and I for 4 days – is using my time. For a minute, I allow myself to be proud of myself. I would not want to be anywhere with anyone else right now. I snap some photos of the butterfly that is on the yellow flower in front of me.

Last year for about three months, Hayden, a straight A student, went through a period where he was not turning in assignments. He was doing the work but forgetting to turn it in. It was challenging, and I was freaking out about it. It was so out of character and I didn’t handle it well. I was not the mother I want to be. The principles I was arguing for wasn’t a problem, rather the way I was doing it. I remember being at wit’s end and yelling at Hayden at the top of my lungs before storming upstairs to sink and cry. After a while I came down, with puffy eyes, and sat down with Jerry and the boys for dinner. I looked at Hayden, in front of Jerry and Wolf and Fin, and I said, “I’m sorry. I do not want to be this way with you. While you have to turn things around and start turning your work in, this isn’t how I want to be. I’m sorry. And I hope you can forgive me.” Surprised to see his strong mother so broken down, he thanked me. I am so fallible…

I remember that Hayden’s climbing a mountain, and get my binoculars out. It’s not long and I spy him gaining the ridge to the summit. I have climbed Mitchell Peak 10 times, and every time I gain the ridge, I’m blown away by what I see. It’s as if seeing it for the first time – the Cirque of the Towers, and many granite peaks along the Continental Divide for as far as eye can see – take your breath away. I wonder if Hayden is having this same experience… I hear him on the Talkabout: “I’m over the ridge. It’s awesome,” he says. I tell him great job, and congratulate him. “That means a lot, Mom,” he says. This chokes me up, and I’m sorta a blubbering mess right now. Hayden isn’t very emotional, so this, to use the words of Hayden, “hits me where I live.”

I’m relieved that he’s almost to the top, where he’ll likely sit and enjoy the view and solitary experience for a while, which means I feel like I have at least a little time to relax and stop worrying.

I think of Hayden some more. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love ice cream. It’s right up there with bacon. For years, we’ve had a tradition of eating ice cream after school on Fridays. Since the two older boys are now much busier with sports, etc. after school, we still eat ice cream together at least once a week, just not at the same scheduled time and place. I think of this now because it was during my pregnancy with Hayden that I fell in love with ice cream. I craved it all of the time.

As I’m making this realization, I remember the time I just had to have some ice cream, and so I put Wolf in the carseat, and loaded my pregnant-with-Hayden self into my Subaru Outback and headed to Dairyland to get a large hot fudge and banana malt. During the 10 minutes I was out satisfying this ice cream craving, we had a hail storm. $3,000 worth of damage to my car because I had to have ice cream. Oops! I am laughing out loud right now as I realize all of this, and that my love of ice cream can be blamed on Hayden.

I think now of Hayden’s birth. Wolf was an early, emergency C-section. I wanted to try for a VBAC with Hayden, if I could. I was in labor, feeling the intense pains of labor, when all of a sudden, Hayden’s heart rate was erratic and in distress. The doctor announced we needed to have an emergency C-section. The nurse, Karen – who I will never forget – pushed me as Jerry held my hand and ran alongside me down the hallways of the hospital to get to the surgical unit. Karen asked if we could pray together. We all prayed, and tried not to imagine the worst… it was too unbearable to do so. We got into the surgical room and there was panic in the air. Nurses and the doctor rushed around. Jerry and I cried, and prayed, in desperation. Suddenly, Hayden’s heart rate returned to normal. He was my only baby that was of average size, and didn’t require extended hospitalization or care. He was beautiful, what with his bright blue eyes and his head of thick, white hair. I will never forget meeting him for the first time.

I’m crying again when I hear his voice on the radio. “I’m at the top,” he announces. He says it’s awesome and that he’ll enjoy the view and eat something and drink some water. He says it’s not windy there, and he’s doing great.

I hear a hummingbird zoom by me. This the second I’ve noticed this morning. I think of my mom. My wonderful mom. She LOVES hummingbirds so I always think of her when I hear or see one. This one lingers a little for me, just long enough for it to feel like a specific gift sent to me.

I remember I have a Snickers bar. I packed one for Hayden for his summiting, and one for me. Sometime I’ll try just eating a Snickers but today isn’t that day, so I snarf it, and it hits the spot.

I think because Hayden’s a second child, and I’m a second child, I relate to him in a special way. I worry that because he’s second in the order, that he might not get as much attention as the first or the last of our sons. I remember when I was a young girl and sitting on the sidewalk step with my Dad watching as my older sister, and all of her friends, raced bikes up and down the street. I asked my Dad if I could get a bike, and he said something to the effect of, when you’re your sister’s age. Nothing against my Dad — he has turned out to be one of my biggest champions! – but I remember thinking how much sense that response did not make. I think Hayden is similar in that he doesn’t have a lot of tolerance for arbitrary things.

Some more time passes, and I’m enjoying myself, and the view, and the warmth of the sun that is now over the mountain on my face. I think I’m going to be okay, I say to myself. Hayden’s voice comes on the radio announcing he’s going to start down. I tell him to be careful and remind him to look around and get everything he had with him up there. “And remember, the summit’s only the halfway point,” I say. “Yeah, I know, Mom,” he says. I love it when he says this. It’s reassuring, and I just like the way it sounds when he says it, and I make a mental note that I will tell him as much later.

I head toward a spot high on the mountain that connects Big Sandy Mountain with Mitchell, where we agreed to meet so we could descend together. I zoom my camera all the way in and snap a photo of Hayden, in his red shirt, descending Mitchell, with the Cirque of the Towers’ massive mountains looming behind him. He arrives, and we embrace. He tells me how awesome it was up there, and then we start down. I tell him about the butterflies I saw, and of my memories of him in a backpack and exclaiming over my shoulder and into my ear every time he’d see a butterfly (buttfly!)

I tell him that I saw some hummingbirds while he was on the mountain top. “Did you know that an NBA point guard, when dribbling the ball with both hands as low to the ground as possible, can dribble faster than the wingbeat of a hummingbird?” I tell him, no, I did not know that. This is Hayden. He’s always pulling out random bits of interesting information for us. I love it about him, and I tell him I hope he never quits doing that, and I encourage him to keep reading and being interested in a variety of things. I tell him they are great conversation pieces, and that they are wonderful contributions to the people he shares them with.

We find a huge, flat slab of granite and decide to chill out and “sun like marmots on the rock” for a while. It is nothing short of blissful. I love hanging out with Hayden. He’s fun, and he’s funny.

We return to camp and decide that a very early dinner of Epic quesadillas is in order. (But for accuracy’s sake, insert “Dang Quesadillas!” in the voice of Napoleon Dynamite’s Grandma in the movie, Napoleon Dynamite) While I make dinner, I tell him again how proud I am of his climbing Mitchell Peak today. I share this René Daumal quote with him: “You cannot stay on the summit forever; you have to come down again. So why bother in the first place? Just this: What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above. One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know.” He likes it.

Then, I ask if he remembered to choose a poem that resonates with him to bring on the adventure. He did. It’s called The Great Competitor, by Grantland Rice, and he read it to me, captured in the video clip below, with Mitchell Peak in the background. He said he likes it because it’s about how you play the game – “a ballgame, and also how you live your life.”

Hayden eats three Epic quesadillas before acknowledging there is no more available space for food in his tummy. He heads to the tent and takes a two hour nap. For a bit, I read Meditations, by Marcus Aurelius, a favorite of mine that I’m reading for the third time. I underline the following text: The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts. Then I fetch and treat some water, make some strong coffee, and journal a bit. Life is good. So good.

Hayden wakes up (finally), and we make epic s’mores. We’re lazy and concerned about fire danger so we cheat by using the camp stove. We eat s’mores, listen to some music and play some gin rummy. The score is now 8 games to 3, Hayden in favor. I ask Hayden, “What are five ways you want to be if you’re going to be your best self?”

He says he’ll think about it, and for a while he does. He offers, “KACAB: Knowledgeable, Adventurous, Comedic, Athletic and Brave.” I tell him those are perfect, and thank him for doing this exercise for me. I add, “You know to be brave, you have to do things that are daring and courageous.” He responds, “Yeah, I know, Mom.” “You need to take epic chances every now and then. Not be reckless, but rather courageous,” I add. “Yeah, I know, Mom,” he says. Again. And this reminds me that I was going to tell him how much I like the sound of it when he says “Yeah, I know, Mom.” He seems glad that I like it when he says that.

We head to the tent early and I tell him it will be a “leisure start”the next day, that there will be no alarm that goes off. A night owl, and epic sleeper-in’er if given the chance, Hayden cheers at this news. We snuggle into our tent, and listen to some of the Gaffigan audiobook before quickly falling to sleep. We both sleep better than we did the first night.

The next day after coffee, cocoa and oatmeal, we load the “toys” (football, packraft, fishing rod, and kite), into our packs and add some food and water, and head to Big Sandy Lake, then Clear Lake and eventually, Deep Lake.

 

At Deep Lake, Hayden inflates the raft and goes for a float on Deep Lake. Deep Lake is my favorite place in the Wind Rivers right now. It’s nestled under the dramatic granite peaks of Haystack, Steeple and East Temple Peak.

Deep Lake is like glass and these peaks are perfectly reflected in its waters as Hayden takes turns rowing and going places, and lounging. I can’t wait for my turn, and eventually it comes. There’s a group of women fishing on the shore of the lake under Haystack. Their entire conversation can be heard as a result of the echoing. Based on their conversation, they are a group of women I’d probably love to hang out with. This reminds me of my recent Epic Women expedition, and the fond memories I have of that time. I think of Nicole, Cindy, Laura, Monica, Cristy and Cheri, and smile. Again – and I’ve been doing this again and again and again all year long this year it seems – I realize the many blessings in my life. I watch as Hayden skips rocks from the slab on the shore where all of our toys are spread out.

I paddle in, and Hayden and I play catch with the football for some time, before we eat lunch. And here is my opportunity to have the “deep talk” at Deep Lake with Hayden – to talk about one of the things I’ve come for, a promise that we each make to each other. I explain to Hayden that this mother-son rite of passage expedition is not only an opportunity to share an inspiring and challenging adventure together, but to mark the mother-son rite of passage with a shared promise. I told him the promises we make can be simple – that for best results they should be simple – and I offer what I’m willing to promise him. “I promise I’ll trust you more, and give you more freedom if… and then you add what you’re willing to promise in return.” He thinks about this for some time, but not before quipping, “Dinga, Dinga Dong…”  I love this kid.

He mentions principles. I ask him, “What are your principles?” He thinks about this and then responds, “Family, Love, God, Faithfulness to others, Honesty, Humility, and Excellence.” We relate these principles to cairns – things that mark our trail so that we don’t get lost or wander aimlessly. We decide on this: Hayden promises to not stray from his principles if I promise to give him more freedom. It’s a wonderful moment, he and I, just sitting there after making this promise to one another. I add, “We’ll make mistakes. I won’t always be as trusting as I should be. I’m not perfect. And you’re not perfect. You’ll make mistakes and you’ll stray. But we’re promising to do our best with this promise to each other.” After that, we share a little more about things that are more personal.

 

At about 1:30pm, we pack up and wander in our Crocs down about a quarter-mile to the big slabs of granite that feature water running from Deep Lake up above to Clear Lake down below. We can see Mitchell Peak and the Cirque of the Towers and Clear Lake in one direction, and Deep Lake, and Haystack, Steeple, East Temple and Temple peaks in another. So much rock everywhere. This place astounds me, and I’m thrilled that Hayden is loving it.

We stop at a fresh pool of water between springs and watch as a large school of small trout swim, and rise to snatch insects. Hayden wades in the pool before sitting and whittling with the knife Jerry got for him for this trip. I try to fly the kite, but there’s not adequate wind. These are the Wind Rivers, I say to Hayden. Where is the wind? He’s not hiding that he’s a little thrilled there’s no wind for me to fly a kite. He is embarrassed at the prospects of his mom flying a kite out here. After not having any luck, I decide to lay down on my stomach and get some sun on the backs of my legs and arms, since sunning like a marmot the day before resulted in quite a lot of color on my face and the fronts of my arms and legs.

An hour of this perfect lazing passes before we pack up and start our 3-mile hike back to camp.

We return to camp with full bottles of water so we don’t have to do unnecessary work. Just cook Epic chicken fried rice, play some gin rummy, start a fire and roast marshmallows so we can have Epic bacon s’mores before closing in for our last night in the wilderness. During gin rummy, I ask Hayden if he can pick 4 things he wants in his life in order for it to be Epic. The words must start with E, P, I, and C. He needs time to ponder this and promises me he will. I share mine: Experience, Play, Inspiration and Curiosity.

After stuffing ourselves with our last dinner, we clean up the kitchen and move to the “lawn” portion of the best kept secret Epic campsite. There’s an established fire ring at the end of the lawn, sheltered nicely up against a gigantic boulder. Hayden starts a small fire and we make bacon s’mores. Epic yum, we both agree.

Then, for a couple hours we have a great conversation. We take turns asking each other questions. Some of the questions we asked, and each responded to include: Describe a perfect day. What is the hardest thing you’ve ever had to go through – one thing that was by choice, and another that was out of necessity. If you’re stranded on an island and you can have one single food item for the rest of your life there, what would it be? If you could have only one outfit, what would be the one outfit you would choose to wear? Who inspires you? Who do you trust the most? Who are your closest friends, and why? What do you get from your Mom, and what do you get from your Dad? What do you think people say behind your back? What do you wish they’d say? It was a fantastic conversation where we both shared a lot, while making a lot of discoveries about each other.

We ended the night finishing our gin rummy tournament. We agreed to stop when we got to 10 wins. After I won two in a row, Hayden won two games to be victorious, 10 games to 7. He was a gracious winner. He was The Great Competitor.

During our last night in the tent, we again returned to listening to Jim Gaffigan’s Dad is Fat audiobook. It is so funny, and we laughed out loud a lot before Hayden dozed off and I turned it off so I could listen to him sleep and hopefully find sleep myself. I didn’t sleep well. I was buzzing from the new memories Hayden and I had made together, and enjoying some star gazing by looking out of our tent’s door.

I forgot to mention in this blog post that Hayden is a sleep talker. At home, almost nightly he sits straight up and exclaims something that is loud enough for at least some of us to hear. He seldom remembers doing this. Right when I was about to fall asleep, he jutted up in the tent, looked at me and exclaimed, “Congratulations on your child!” And then collapsed back down. It was hilarious – and so Hayden. Of course when I told him about this as we were hiking out the next day, he couldn’t remember it.

We laughed, though, and wondered if his comment was the result of listening to Gaffigan’s audio book, which is all about having children, or if Hayden was congratulating me on having him as a child. Either way, it was a fitting end to our expedition, and for what it’s worth, I do feel as if I should be congratulated for this son of mine.

As we got to the car, Hayden announced he figured out his E, P, I and C: “Excitement, Principles, Intuition and Courage.”

• Categories: Adventure, Family, Fitness, Life and Leadership, Travel
• Tags: backpacking, epic adventure, mother son rite of passage, wind river range
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