Before moving onto Asia, I thought I'd elaborate a bit on Kili summit day from my perspective-- Zach was entirely too generous only noting my 'fatigued legs'. :) So here it goes, and warning, it might get a little emo.
The evening we were to sleep before our midnight wake up, I clumsily maneuvered myself and all my layers of clothing into my sleeping bag feeling a bit nervous but more so excited and prepared...a sort of, lets just do this thing, I got it, sort of sentiment. Shortly after, a girl in a tent near ours started sobbing uncontrollably, and my temperament of calm momentarily slipped away from me. I didn't know what was wrong with her-cold, sick, terrified or combination of all- but I realized two things from her pre-summit night breakdown: First, that I was incredibly lucky to have come this far as smoothly and painlessly as we had. And secondly, that I would have to maintain control mentally no matter how miserable, tired or hopeless I felt if I hoped to make it to the top. Whatever that girl was going through, I felt for her-most girls (and secretly some guys ;)) reading this can sympathize with that overwhelming desire to let the tears fly when you've exhausted every last bit of mental and physical energy you ever once clung to. Sometimes the temptation to succumb to the crying seems irresistible.
But I knew that it simply wasn't an option for me tomorrow. With that realization, I shut out the cries and shifted the tone of my thoughts. How incredibly special this experience was. How if my mom were here she would make us all feel how cold her nose was. How my brother would be in his absolute element on the climb. How my dad would be proud that his little girl had been so tough. And finally to a dear missed friend who had conquered the peak (and countless other remarkable feats) years before I would try to. With that, I was sound asleep.
We were woken as promised at 11:30 pm by Rasta (suspiciously donning his sunglasses...what had he just been doing?:)), and gobbled our snack of chocolate creme wafers. I knew I'd need all the energy I could get, but I never needed an excuse to finish an entire plate of cookies in front of me. Shortly after, we started out of camp, and despite my two pairs of summit socks and two pairs of gloves, I already had lost all feeling my toes and fingers. I had a moment of panicked self pity (why were MY fingers and toes already frozen?!) then realized Rasta did not have gloves at all, rather marched into the dark with his hands plunged into his pockets. That put an immediate end to my pity party-frozen toes and fingers would have to do for the next seven hours.
We then passed the sick and hysterical girl Zach mentioned in his post, and I experienced a quick tightening of nerves like the night before. Luckily by this point, we were still moving at a respectable pace and her cries faded behind us in the darkness along with the camp and comforts that came with it. I focused on matters at hand: breathe, follow Rasta and drink water. So I inhaled what morsels of oxygen the mountain would give me, pole-pole'd after Rasta, but when I sucked the tube on my CamelBak I had wrapped in tape and a wool sock, water would not give. Luckily the ice yielded after some large in-expendable breaths and massaging with my clumsy blocks of hands, and water was back in business.
With a couple of power moves around large groups that involved quickly following Rasta off the path into rocky darknesses that felt just a little too close to cliff sides, we settled into a steadier pace and the trek became less eventful. Unfortunately, the slow pace became too fast, as did the slower pace after that. While familiar with fatigued legs from past athletic ventures, this was different. In my marathon, my legs were shot, completely shot, the last seven miles, but I was able to focus on and embrace my breathing which was comfortable and strong at that long distance pace. On Kili, I could not divert my attention to an alternative spot in my body for solace. I was cold, beyond cold, and my breathing, while slow and calm, yielded little sustenance in return and I was beginning to feel nauseous. In climbing 14-ers, I would take in the remarkable Colorado views of endless blue skies, white tipped peaks, and the occasional moose or mountain goat I always had my eye out for to help me forget my legs were on fire. On Kili, the darkness was limiting on visual distractions. Looking above at the trail of endless headlamps ahead of us was no longer beautiful, but devastatingly disheartening. The stars were absolutely brilliant, but gazing up or sideways at this stage disoriented, exhausted and frustrated me- why was I already so so tired and uncoordinated? I think I audibly unleashed this frustration on Zach when he excitedly exclaimed for what seemed like the hundredth time that he'd seen a shooting star (we both love them, and always have friendly contests to spot them), and I released a grumpy grunt. He got the hint that I was really beginning to struggle, and I accepted that watching the backs of Rasta's boots would be my visual distraction.
With my preferred go-to distraction tricks off the table, I was left with manipulating my mind with quotes from and ideas to provide some sort of drive to continue. There are a ton of these mantras that athletes will claim as their secret to continue the push to success when you're spent, done, over it. One that I have tried again and again to embrace is from a runner highlighted in Born to Run who attributed her success in ultra-long distance to the idea that you become 'best friends with the pain'. I want this one to work for me, and I understand why as a woman killing 100-mile races in the Rocky Mountains would need to befriend agony, but that has always just made me focus more on my misery. So, on Kili, as I have done on many a trailrun, I briefly entertained her mantra, and moved onto others in my oxygen depleted mental archive.
I quickly pulled Muhammad Ali's "Don't quit. Suffer now and live forever like a champion." While I would never equate any of my physical challenges as deserving Ali's 'champion' status, the idea of temporary suffering in the name of that permanent, lasting sentiment of achievement is powerful and gave me something to dwell on in my exhaustion. I alternated thinking of the exhilarating feelings of finishing past races with fantasizing how great it would feel to crawl back into my sleeping bag later that day. And then, finally, we reached Stella Point.
I turned around to celebrate with Zach and could tell by looking at him that he was pretty out of it. I asked if he was ok, and he replied something like "I feel really weird. Not good." Both coping with personal struggles, we started stumbling to what would be our final hour of ascent.
During this time, Rasta whispered to Zach to push ahead as he thought it would make me go faster. I'm not sure if it did or not. I definitely didn't go slower, but I'm not sure slower was possible at that point. So Zach pushed on and Rasta mosied with me, all the while singing songs in Swahili and asking "you ok, dada?" We returned to the ongoing joke that we were going to the disco club called Uhuru Peak. He brought the music singing his songs, so I danced as promised, although I could barely move at all by this point, so it wasn't my most impressive showing.
And then finally I was at the top, Zach there waiting for me. As he gave me a hug, I finally let just a few tears slip down my frozen cheeks. Tears of joy and exhaustion. Tears of continued pain and nausea. Tears in awe of the massive, creaking glaciers, the sweeping, endless skies of muted blue and the feeling of being so very small amid the enormous presence of nature. And finally, some tears for Syd.
We didn't spend long at the top. Snapped some pictures where I don a smile more awkward than usual due to frozen face muscles. Then we stumbled down the steep climb, with noodles for legs and numb bricks for feet, and immediately went to our tent for the best, most deserved nap I may ever have.
Now as I write this in Vietnam it seems a world away that we were frozen on top of Kili just less than a month ago. Until we do it again, because we will do it again, I have my toes which are STILL numb to remind me of the beauty and grace, the ruthlessness and fury of Mount Kilimanjaro.
