The Last Magical Place

It's been awhile since I posted anything. I've been dealing with a rather nasty bout of depression that's finally starting to lift some. I'd thought it had started kicking in shortly after the 3-year anniversary of her death, back in February. Talking with some friends and family, they've said that it started earlier than that, maybe back around Thanksgiving. Regardless, it'd been making things harder and harder for quite some time. I finally had the sense to get help for it, and it seems like it's paying off. I'd wanted to write before, but this is the first time I've actually felt able to do so. Hopefully it'll be something I can get back to regularly, as I know it'd helped before.

This last weekend I went for a hike. I'd gone to the same area a week before, though not to exactly the same spots. I'd first gone there with me darlin' wife when we celebrated our 10-year anniversary. In addition to renewing our vows, we'd gone to an inn up in one of the local canyons. The dinner was fantastic, the room was nice, and breakfast kept up with dinner. That second day, we went for a hike up at the top of the canyon. We'd headed up to a place called Twin Lakes, and the trail leads to the eastern edge, where a dam holds that side of the lake in place. We then went on around the lake to the western edge, which is against the side of the mountain slope below a saddle between two peaks. It's a kind of isolated spot, and it'd felt magical when we'd been there. We hadn't planned on hiking that far, but it'd really made the day. I hadn't been back to that specific place.

Until this last Saturday, three days ago.

Even then, I hadn't planned to go back there. I'd planned to hike a loop that would take me to the eastern edge of Twin Lakes, to where the trail meets the dam and would take me back down. Due to a rather curious series of events, I ended up with more time than I'd thought I'd have, and it led to following....something. Something inside me wanted to take another trail, to see where it would go, and yet another that split off from it. The end result was coming to the saddle behind the western edge of Twin Lakes overlooking that spot. As I was hiking there, the thought had come up of stopping by that place. I'd felt anxious and uneasy about it, wondering why I'd go. Wondering what I'd find. Wondering if it'd be worse if I found...nothing. And I just didn't want to go.

And yet I ended up down there.

The trail I saw that looked like it led down from the saddle disappeared halfway down the slope. The clearest way down through the scree and undergrowth of plants would lead there. In retrospect, it was stupidly dangerous to go off-trail through that area. I'm lucky I didn't break something on the way down there. But I ended up back at that place. At the edge of the lake. Where it'd felt magical being with her.

And I found...memories. It was the first time in months, more than I can count off-hand, that I was able to remember her with warmth and affection. For months, I'd not wanted to think about her, not if I could help it. And when I did, it was often hung up on how she left or how rough things were for the last few years. How I'd stood by her and done so much to try to help, only to have her do....this. But in that place, I could remember her smile. The warmth I felt seeing it. How much she trusted me. How much she was willing to share of herself. How much she accepted me.

I don't think I stayed there all that long, maybe 20 minutes or so. And then I had to go. It was too much. It was overloading having all that come back all at once. But it hit me on the way out, that it was the last of the places that'd felt magical for us, the last one I hadn't been to yet. That there were no more places to go to, to try to find memories or some sense of her. There's nothing left to look for, to hope for.

To be afraid of.