A Shared Joy

Tom & Atticus: a shared joy.

Black Cap is our fall back mountain. It’s the place we go when we don’t have time for a longer hike but want to experience a summit and soak in spectacular views.  It’s also the mountain we seek out when we are returning to the trails after a physical ailment. 

A couple of summers ago I nearly died of septic shock and was in North Conway’s Memorial Hospital for eleven days after my gall bladder blew up.  My doctors, in turn, nearly died when they discovered four weeks to the day of cutting me open Atticus and I had climbed Black Cap, even though I still had tubes sticking out of my torso and a large drainage bag.  But hey, sometimes you just need to go where you get your strength. 

Last Sunday Atticus and I returned to Black Cap, this time it was because he’s been suffering as of late.  A month ago he was detected with a tick-borne disease and was put on a serious dose of medication that appeared to take as much out of him as it did the disease.  Our vet described it in simple terms so that I could relate, “It’s like we would feel if we had mono.” 

But over the past week he’s been regaining his energy with his health and I know my friend well enough to understand he missed sitting on top of a mountain and it would be good for his health and his spirit…just as it was for mine in the summer of 2010.    

At 2,356 feet, Black Cap has a substantial height without being overpowering.  And because most of the elevation is gained in the drive in our car along Hurricane Mountain Road, it’s a perfect mountain for rehabbing on.  The trail is easy enough and the elevation gain is only about 500 feet in just over three miles, round trip.  But for the ease of the hike, the bang for the buck is incredible when you see the views.

On the way up, Atticus did what he’s been doing for the past month – and is so out of character for him – he got behind me and let me lead.  But as we reached the familiar fork in the trail and went off the right to avoid any potential crowds, at least for a little bit, the slightest bounce returned to his legs.  We kept curling around the back side of the mountain, slowly gaining elevation on this, the more gentle route to the top, and when we were within a quarter of a mile of the top he sensed it and picked up the pace even more. 

There have been times on an unfamiliar peak when we are close to the summit where I’ll say, “Do you want to go say hello to the summit?”  His response is a quicker pace, occasionally even a bouncy trot with ears happily flopping around as he runs forward with enthusiasm I haven’t seen known since I was a child.  But he’s been to Black Cap enough to know when he’s close and he took the lead and led us up over the stone ledges to the top.

And there, once we poked out of the trees as it always is, was that spectacular visage waiting for us.  North stands Kearsage looking noble and massive.  Off of Kearsage’s right shoulder stands Evans Notch and several of the Maine mountains.  Off of its left shoulder and in the background is Washington, and the rest of the Presidential Range looking stately.

When I picked up and sat him on my shoulder he was quite at home as we looked to the west towards the Moats, Cathedral and White Horse ledges, and the Pemigewasset Wilderness beyond.  And to the southwest, almost looking like a faded painting from one of the White Mountain artists of the 1800s, stood the rocky ridge of Chocorua.  Behind it was much of the Sandwich Range from Passaconaway through Whiteface, the Sleepers, and the Tripyramids.  We know all these peaks.  We’ve climbed them more than once and they are like looking into the faces of old friends for us. 

Atticus sat on my shoulder and together we gazed out at the view until I heard him sigh and felt that comforting moment when he released his weight and completely relaxed into me.  After drinking our fill of the views we turned to the camera and this is the sight you see here.  It wasn’t until we got home and I saw the photo that I noticed that great, giddy grin of his. 

Atticus is now ten years of age.  Any person who has ever lived with a dog will tell you how such a simple sentence will snake its way deep into your heart and touch a place of sadness.  And when I look at that photo I drink it in now as we drank in those views this past weekend: with hunger, appreciation, and gratitude.

When A. A. Milne penned Winnie the Pooh I cannot imagine he ever completely understood how much wisdom would last for generations from the pages of his little children’s book.  Just consider this single bittersweet sentence: “I used to believe in forever, but forever’s too good to be true.” 

Love a dog and you find yourself connected perpetually with childhood.  You feel the happiness, the carefree nature, the innocence of it – all through a link with a four-legged friend who can’t speak English.  It’s such a gift. 

Here I sit now, writing this, knowing that we are on the backside of the mountain we started climbing so many years ago, and even if Atticus lives for another nine or ten years it will simply not be enough for me.  Just as it’s not long enough for anyone who has ever known such friendship. 

When Atticus first arrived in my life I had no idea where that little puppy and I would go together.  Not even my imagination could give me the slightest hint of the endless mountains we’d climb, or that we would end up living in them, embracing a simple but joyous existence.  But this photo says so much.  It’s the love we share and the love of the mountains we both share. 

It’s for this reason that I love this photo.  The connection between us is evident; the smiles are just as connected as our bodies are.  We are two unique souls who found our way to one another.

Yes, I am haunted by the thought that "forever's too good to be true," but I’m also old enough to understand that all we really have is today…and the wagonloads of memories we’ve collected together.

Thank goodness for all those experiences. . . . and for photographs like this one.