Courage

Throughout life we are all met with many paths to take.  Most of these paths involve taking a risk, and that risk can either be large or small.  We are courageous when we take the path with high risk; the difficult path; the one that is not often traveled by.  That path is often one of the most rewarding but comes with its inherent difficulty, fear, and risk.  Everybody enjoys the rewards of courage: the wonderful feeling of accomplishment, the knowledge gained, and the happiness found.

It was early April of sixth grade when I found my chance at being courageous.  My father and his friend Bruce were going to hike and ski Tuckerman Ravine, a steep ravine on Mount Washington.  This involved carrying a heavy pack up a steep trail to the base of the ravine and then physically climbing the insanely steep wall where you ski down.  There is often a very high avalanche danger especially after recent snow.  Avalanches are dangerous with crevasses being almost equally as bad.  There has been 137 deaths from 1849 to 2008 on Washington making this a very dangerous place to be; but I opted to come despite my fears and the risks, and I am glad I did.

We headed up right after a snow storm in late April, and the avalanche danger moved from low to high.  This was nerve-racking especially because we would be tired by the time we got to the ravine carrying our skis and boots on our packs.  The trail was snow covered and it took about 4 hours to reach the ravine.  once there we observed the conditions and realized how huge it was.  standing at the base of the ravine looking at the surrounding mountains such as wildcat you are extremely high.  we decided to take a steep route up the ravine.  We put our ski boots on; dropped our pack and began to climb.  It became nerve racking.  The only thing holding you up is the holes you make with your boots kicking and your skis horizontally placed across from you.  If we made one mistake you were at the bottom of the ravine.


Your heart begins to beat rapidly as you climb filling with nerves.  You are heading to spot high up on the wall.  One slip and all of that effort is wasted and you could end up severely hurt or even dead on the way down.  We faced our fears and continued on.  All of a sudden my father lost his footing and slides down a large portion of the ravine.  This scares the crap out of you thinking that you are next; and making you second guess your decision.  The thing keeping you going is your determination and your courage; knowing how awesome it will be to ski down, and say you skied down.  That is pushing you onward with your decision.  You have the will or courage to fight on and make it to your goal.  This is what we did.

We reached our goal and put our skis on (not an easy feat on such a steep incline).  We enjoyed the view; it was the most stunning and beautiful view I have ever seen.  We looked and saw that we were above just about everything that surrounded us.  The surrounding mountains which are fairly large looked flat.  Most of all the slope we were going to ski down looked terrifying.

Once you commit and start to move there is no turning back; no stopping.  You need to go and flow with the mountain.  It is that first turn; pointing your skis down the slope that you must muster an enormous amount of courage to complete.  As you are about to go down you know that if you fall you are not stopping or getting up until you reach the base of the ravine.  It is honestly terrifying to look down that slope; and it takes a lot of courage to overcome this fear; but we did.  We unleashed the mountain and let it take us flying down the slope until we ended up at the base.  It was exhilarating and awesome.  It was well worth the fear.

We then proceeded to ski out of the ravine towards the parking lot down a trail called the "Sherbie" it is a relatively easy mogul trail that was open until halfway down.  once we got to the end of it we had to put our dreaded packs back on our backs and hike down.  I was 12 years old and exhausted.  I just wanted to sleep but I pushed on and made it all the way down.  I practically fell asleep in the car back to the hotel; but was so glad I did it.

This showed me that anything is possible and without risk there is now reward.  Without trying to accomplish something you cant.  You have to push through the pain and agony to achieve things.  These lessons have been very important and have helped me greatly as a runner.  As a distance runner I know what its like to be tired and wanting to quit, just like how I felt during this trip but I know that if I push through, stay in the race, and do my best every single day I will reach my goals and do well.

This adventure taught me that we are defined by what we do, not what we don't do.  This means that we need to accomplish things to become who we are.  We can't be afraid to take risks; if we are then we will just end up sitting around all day afraid of everything.  You need to go out there and be courageous.  You must go through hardship to realize how good you have it, you need to push yourself to achieve.  With time, sweat, and tears, anything is possible if you put your heart into it.