Fierce Beauty Read Online Free

climbers to guide me. I measured the wind-ravaged chimney with my eyes. It looked as if there was an uninterrupted section of steep but climbable snow that led to the summit.
    I began my final ascent. With my ice ax firmly plunged into the frozen snow, I took two calculated strides, then checked the security of my crampons. Once assured, I removed my ax and plunged it into a higher position. I followed this purposeful progression until I had to relocate my ice ax with every increasingly perilous step. My anxiety climbed in mirrored unison.
    I repeated this incremental method until I could step no more … until I could
move
no more! My novice aspirations had driven me into a no man’s land. I was stuck. I was not on the pinnacle; I was hanging twenty feet below Shasta’s icy summit on a glistening sheet of near-vertical ice. Now the only thing rising was my fear. I’d driven myself into a predicament beyond my ability to escape.
    The slope was so steep that my left foot was placed nearly two feet above my right. I could clearly see that the slanted, two-inch ledge of ice that bore my left foot was fractured—it would
not
hold my full weight. I glanced over my right shoulder and saw nothing but blue. The ice was too steep to descend and too hard to ascend.
    Standing with all my weight on my downhill foot, I fought my soaring sense of dread. Taking a few deep, steadying breaths, I evaluated my situation.
    Blundering forward in selfish haste, I hadn’t noticed that previous northwest winds had blown the steam up against the slope long enough to freeze the excess moisture into a sheet of nearly translucent boilerplate. If I tried to put weight on my uphill foot, the fractured ice beneath my boot would splinter away; I would lose purchase and fall. Because I was already thirty feet up the narrow chute and on a frozen surface with this high degree of angle, I understood that I wouldn’t have enough time to self-arrest before I went into the sizzling cauldron of basalt. I would notfall on snow but rock. A clear picture materialized—if I fell, I would not survive.
    For long moments I hung suspended over the void. With both hands gripping the shaft of my ice ax, I wondered—
How did it come to this?
    I realized that, in my haste and arrogant stupidity, I’d simply seen what I wanted and driven myself to obtain it. Nearly obsessed with the prize, I’d pushed reason aside. In the process I exchanged wisdom for foolishness—the first of many steps that often lead to death in the wilderness. Because my focus was only on what I wanted, I ignored the hazards.
    I
knew
what I was doing was wrong. I simply chose to keep doing it anyway.
    My pride and my foolish desire had brought me to this place—my pride in my climbing skills and ability to handle myself without help from anyone, and my desire to reconnect to childhood innocence, my father, his passion for this mountain, and his love for me.
    I’d staked so much on obtaining these things. I’d allowed them to become my life’s purpose, my value, my god. My sense of self-worth had become intricately woven into the design of this new selfish masterpiece.
    It was clear I had chosen the wrong path. Hanging just below the summit, I had plenty of time to contemplate how I’d arrived at this perilous place. With a grip that made my knuckles ache, I held fast with both hands to the aluminum shaft of my ice ax. Slowly I realized this wind-tortured peak was
completely
still. There was not a breath of wind. The only sound was my own heartbeat thundering against my eardrums.
    As minutes crept by, the cold air seemed to target my fists. I could not only hear my heartbeat from within, but I could also feel it pound inside each knuckle. Yet as uncomfortable as I was, I knew I had no option. I could not let go. If I let go, I would fall. If I fell, I would die.
    I held on and waited.
    Then, in the stillness, the familiar voice of my Lord quietly rose within my heart.
Child, if you would