A Snowball's Chance on Mount Charleston

Snoring soundly in my bed in my most comfy sweats, I was awakened to the sound of an exasperated husband. "Get up and get dressed. We have to get this damned car to the foot of the mountain and park it. It won't make it in the driveway. You need to follow me in your Jeep and we will go park this thing at the foot of the mountain and ride back up together in the Jeep."

Well........ when one is awaked at 1am, one does not put on one's thinking cap and make clear or practical realizations that lead to sound decision making. I didn't stop to think, "Hey, if the Ford won't make it into the driveway, what on earth makes me think I should be drinking it back down the mountain?" I merely woke up like a drunk recovering from the night before's bar bashing, with a hurting head and achy body, and stumbled out the door. Richard's Ford would not make it up the hill to the right so we had to turn around and go left, down a very large incline road called "Alpine Road". Think about the name...it speaks for itself. My Jeep was teetering at the very top of it. Richard was following behind me in the Ford. I felt like I was on a rollercoaster. You know when you are on a rollercoaster, once you get to the top, there is that matter of a few seconds where it just teeters over the edge and people are peering over in awe and fear. Well, this morning, that was me....peering over the edge of a cliff in fear, on a huge sheet of ice. The car slid a few feet. I tapped the brakes, knowing that if I slammed on them I would be in a world of trouble. I gasped a little and let out a whimper. Trying again, I prayed to God while inching forward in the Jeep...oops here we go...it slid again, another two feet. Whimpering in fear, I put it in park, applied the parking brake, and got out of the car. I crawled on all fours to the side of the road and sat my pajama clad rear in the frozen snow, arms crossed. Richard gets out of the car, perplexed. "What's wrong?!?!" "If you want this car down this mountain, you are going to get in there and drive it yourself", I yelled through tears, still with my frozen caboose parked firmly in the snow. "Drive it down to the next intersection and turn right. Then I will try to drive it the rest of the way. Meet me at the bottom of the mountain where both of these roads intersect. Don't drive off. Wait on me!" Famous last words. Well he slid the car into the next intersection, managing not to plough it into any of the huge seven feet tall snow embankments on each side of the road. I got in it, and slowly inched down the next hill. The Jeep's wheels lost traction and slid about 7 feet foward. Ok, at least I made it down that one without a wreck. I slowly and carefully drove until I met the next hill, inching down it through tears and whimpering, sliding every few feet. I made it to the bottom. No Richard..no Ford Explorer. All of the worst possible scenarious flooded my frightened and traumatized brain. I imagined my poor husband, under the wheel of the huge Ford Explorer, crying in pain with no one around to help. (The town had evacuated for the most part. We were the only remaining idiots on the mountain). I imagined an avalance coming down with rocks and hard, frozen snow and ice, plummeting his car and covering it with him inside, freezing slowly. Ok, I had to be strong. Maybe he just simply did not follow my instructions and went ahead to the foot of the mountain without waiting on me. So I drove further down to the parking lot at the bottom...no husband was there. Fear began to set it deeper. I drove halfway up Alpine road, in hopes that even if he was wrecked, I could find him and save him from certain death. The Jeep would not make it up. I stopped about a third of the way up, got out, and walked about halfway up the incline. No husband..no Ford Explorer. I inched slowly down the hill back to my Jeep. Losing my footing, I fell directly on my back and slid about 5 feet down the hill. Oh look there's the Jeep, I noticed while sliding by out of control. Reaching out with one hand while sliding by the Jeep at 10 mph on my ass, I managed to reach out and grab a hold of the tire. Go me! I crawled back into the Jeep, and inched back down the hill, sliding half of the way on the frozen sheet of ice. I waited ten more minutes. No husband..no Ford Explorer. Damn it! If he IS alive, I will kill him by the time I find him, I proclaimed in my angered state of mind. I managed to make it back up the mountain to my driveway, inching into it slowly, attempting to avoid the 7 feet high snow banks on each side. "Bam!" Ok, so they were unavoidable. My Jeep slid right into one of them, tail end hanging out into the road. Putting the car in reverse, I attempted to back away from it.....to no avail.. It slid even deeper into the side of the drive. I am stuck...in my own driveway. I turned the engine off, crawled on all fours across the driveway, and made it back into the safety of my home. Mom is waiting inside. "What the hell happened to you?" "Where is Richard?" It was too long of an ordeal for me to repeat. I reached for a cup of coffee, turned on the gas fireplace, and parked my frozen and bruised caboose into the rocking chair. Half an hour passed. Fear set in. Another half an hour passed...no husband, no Ford Explorer. Picking up the phone, I dialed Metro at 311 and gulped down my tears while going over the escapade with the dispatcher. "I don't get it. Why did you split up? That was not smart", the dispatched chastized. "Well I was not thinking about it at that time, mam, I was just trying to get to the bottom in one piece. Please just send an officer out to find him. We have bad weather conditions, and he could be hurt or freezing to death." "Ok will do that mam", dispatched coldly replies, "but you really should not have gone out in these conditions". Her chastizing was the last thing I needed to hear. "Oh my gosh, Carol lives on Alpine!" Eureka! Picking up the phone, I hastily dialed in Carol's number, begging and pleading for her to answer. To my amazement, she was awake. "Eric has left me alone in this while he works. I can't sleep because I am too afraid of the avalanches." I felt her pain. "Carol could you walk outside right now and see if you see my husband, or his Ford Explorer, anywhere on your road? "Sure...let me get my shoes on." "Sorry Pam, but no one is out there." Bursting into tears, I poured out my heart and soul to Carol, who consoled me, as good friends do, and talked me back into some logical thinking. "I bet he is walking home, Pam. Go to your door, turn on the porch light, and call for him." Hmm...she was onto something. Hanging up, I ran to the sliding glass door, pried it open in nervous anxiety, and for some reason, I knew he was ok. I felt he was near. Like a mountain lion smelling the air, in hopes of sensing out some prey, I sat with the door open, listening. I thought I heard something in the distance. "Richard?", I said tentatively. "Is that you, hon?" The sound came closer. It sounded like someone walking in the snow. I could hear the snow and ice crashing beneath the weight of feet. Then I could hear heavy breathing....I recognized his shuffle, and the breathing. Trying as hard as I could to keep from running out into the snowy front yard in my bare feet, I waited. In less than five minutes, my husband came sloshing into the yard. "Are you ok?", he said in exhaustion. "I looked everywhere for you!" "I was searching ditches, even. I thought you had wrecked when I could not find out." We stopped, held each other in our soaking wet snowy clothes, and just kept on holding each other. "I was angry for a brief moment," he said. "But then I realized, "Hey the person I love is out there, and I can't find her. I could lose her." "And then the agitation went away and I was more afraid than I had ever been. Sorry I took so long. Had to look for you." Falling into our bed with exhaustion and love, we held each other tighter than we ever have before and fell into a deep relaxing sleep. Don't take love for granted. ..ever. Love is a gift.