JOURNEY - on Mastering Ukemi (24 page)

“
Is there anything I can do?” he asked.

“
Think you can carry me?” I chuckled.

“
No,” he said. “I would if I could.” Then he looked off across the valley to the rushing river thousands of feet below. “Jesus...”

“
What’s the matter, son?”

He put his head down. Then in a moment he looked at me and said. ”But you’d carry me, wouldn’t you? I mean if something happened. You would just ignore whatever pain you felt and you’d pick me up and carry me the hell out of here. Wouldn’t you!” he challenged. Then I saw tears come into his eyes. “You would. I know you would.” He closed his eyes and his head sagged.

I reached out and tiredly patted his shoulder. “You are starting to feel a long way from home, Christian. You are also starting to understand true ukemi. And don’t worry that you’re getting a little emotional, that’s just the altitude. It messes up your hormones. Pretty soon you’ll be crying like a little girl. Just keep attacking.”

He slowly looked up at me.

“
I didn’t say you were mastering ukemi, son. But seeing it and recognizing it for what it is... well, that’s more than most ever do.” I patted him on the shoulder, again. “Yeah, I’d pick you up and carry you until I got you where you needed to be or until it killed me.” I turned and headed up the trail and Christian followed.

It’s easy to sound like a hero to a young boy, real easy. He could never understand that dying would be easier than looking his mother and father in the eye and telling them I had failed him and that their boy wasn’t coming home. Dying would be a cinch compared to that.

I climbed steadily for an hour. When I stopped again he waited by my side, but I saw he was depressed. I looked at him and said, “Christian, you have to decide what kind of man you want to be.”

He gave me a half smile and asked “What are my options? How many kinds are there?”

“
There are two kinds, essentially,” I said. “There is the kind of man who decides who he is, decides what he wants, and lives his life to those ends. And there is the other kind of man.”

“
What is the other kind,” he asked.

“
The other kind is more concerned about what other people think of him than what he thinks. He does what he does because he believes other people will be impressed, and then want to be his friend. He changes his politics, his religion, his core beliefs if he thinks a woman will accept or reject him.”

“
I’m still not sure I understand.”

I almost shouted, “The first kind of man decides he wants to go into outer space. He graduates with a degree in electrical engineering and then applies to the Navy for a commission. After he spends a few years landing F-16s on the pitching deck of an aircraft carrier he applies to NASA. Twenty years later and he’s commanded three Shuttle missions. That’s the first type.” I looked at him. “He sacrifices all to live his dream.

“
Think of it like this; Hemingway wrote a book that shook the world. He’s the first type. Dozens of critics wrote volumes about his book. They are the second type. They don’t create, they don’t produce, they don’t enhance, they don’t build… they get all their juice by criticism. The get together with others of their ilk and talk, talk, talk about what this person does or that person… but in the meantime, Hemingway is off writing another book!”

“
So you’re saying that the first type doesn’t need other people?”

“
No! Do you think Bill Gates or Steve Jobs would have gotten where they are without an entire phalanx of software engineers, writers, and designers? Do you think the old guys, DuPont, Edison, or Ford could have built empires without support from backers and family? Without the hard work and sweat from thousands of employees they gave good paying jobs to and supported for a lifetime? Of course not. But they are the ones who had the drive and the vision. Men like that attract others to them. Women come in droves, and friends and supporters are theirs for the choosing because they are the driving force on this planet.” I paused. “People who get together and decide how to take all that away from these men are the other kind.”

“
Do you know anybody who is the first kind?” he asked.

I grinned at him and pointed up the trail. “Chris, Curtis, Bim, Nawang, and back in Namche Bazaar there’s Pemba, and Buz Donahoo, and before them there were people like Tensing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary.” I smiled broadly.

“
Who are they?”

“
Sir Edmund Hillary was the first man to summit Mt. Everest. He would not have made it except for the second man to summit Mt. Everest, Tensing Norgay, his guide. Even Sir Hillary needed people. We all do. But Christian, needing help and looking for answers don’t make you the second type of man, they just mean that you are human and open to the world and all that life has to offer to you. You must be steadfast and never falter if you want to live the type of life I know you have in front of you; to be the kind of man I know you can be. I’m proud of you.”

I turned, sucked it up, and started climbing.

***

We kept going and it was now one step at a time. At least for me, it was. One step, a breath or two, another step, another couple breaths, over and over. Going had become very slow and when we finally crested the final pass and looked down on the tiny village of Machermo, I felt huge relief and elation. Machermo is one of the highest continuously occupied villages in the world, perhaps the highest. It is over 14,000 feet in altitude and is situated in an immense rock and stubble plain that is an important summer pasture for traveling yaks and supply trains coming from Tibet and going back over the high passes. Somehow, it has a very comfortable lodge with individual rooms for trekkers and travelers and a nice kitchen and guest lounge. It has comfortable dining facilities and even a supply of both beer and the locally made Khukuri rum.

After getting settled into my private lodge room and changing into my camp shoes I went into the lodge. Chris had already found the bar; so to speak. It is mostly a large room with a window at one end where one could buy drinks and snacks, and I went over and quietly warned him to take it easy. We were now in a completely different altitude zone and alcohol doesn’t react in the body the way it does down below. He nodded and took a long drink, but put the cap back on the bottle. He would be all right. Chris has all the bravado and macho swagger of a pro wrestler, but I also know he is one of the most brilliant people in his profession. And that is saying a lot.

I walked around outside a bit, but found my breathing was labored and decided to come in out of the misting rain and light fog. Soon Curtis came in.

“
Sensei, have you seen Christian?”

“
No.” I looked over at Chris sitting with his feet close to the iron stove. “Chris, who are you bunking with?”

“
Me,” he said. “I have the ultimate luxury. A private room. If I could breathe, it would be like being in a Motel 6 in Orlando.”

I looked back at Curtis. “Are you bunking alone?” He nodded. “Wow, very cool. Since we will all be practically living in each other’s pockets over the next four or five days, that’s pretty nice for a change. I guess you could go knock on doors or maybe find Bim and ask him where Christian’s room is.”

He left. In a half hour he was back and this time he had that weird little line between his eyebrows.

“
Did you find Christian?”

“
No. And his bag was completely unpacked and his down parka is gone along with his gloves and hat. I think he went for a walk!”

I sighed and got up. Dizziness made me lean against the table for a moment. “Curtis, you’re a sandan, a rocket scientist and 2
^nd
in command. You worry about it. I need to lie down for a while.

***

I awoke to an urgent knock on the door. “Sensei, the sirdar wants to know if you are a doctor. I told him no, but he is begging you to come.” Christian looked very frightened. I got my down coat. The air coming into my unheated room had turned icy and I could see that snow now fell in the courtyard.

I walked out and Christian led me to a group of Nepali men standing and squatting in a circle in the falling snow. As I approached I saw another man laying on a rough blanket and rolling back and forth in obvious pain. Nawang came up to me and whispered that the man had been gored by a yak and could I please look at it for them and help him?

“
I am not a doctor.”

“
But you are a westerner, and you all know something of medicine. Please?”

I looked at Christian and said, “I have taken several first aid courses and one was pretty extensive. Go back to my room and look for the first aid kit in my duffle.”

I knelt next to the man and slowly extended my hand to his shoulder. At my touch he stiffened, but he looked at me and then relaxed. Christian came back and I looked into the kit and found the small pack of Tylenol with codeine I had brought. I broke out one, then thought better and added two more and handed them to the injured man. Before I could ask for water he had taken them and swallowed them dry, then let his head loll back. I looked at Nawang and said we had to get him inside where it was warmer and where I had light.

He shook his head no. That could not be done. But he did say something to several men and they disappeared and then came back with a canvas tarp that was tied into a shelter from the falling snow. I needed light and told Christian to go get Chris and Curtis and all their flashlights. The day was dying and with it the meager light that accompanied the end of a Himalayan day.

When all was ready and we had light from three sides I pulled on the man’s jacket, gently opening it so I could see how bad the injury was. He was well into the codeine and allowed me to uncover the wound. I was hoping for a puncture I could put a dressing on and that would hold until they got him to the Hillary hospital in Khunde, a two day walk from here. What I found made me want to cry. Blood was pumping freely from a terrible gash in his side and I took a flash light, bent over, and looked closely into the wound and saw the jagged tear of a ripped intestine. Whatever artery had been ruptured was not slowing and I knew I could not help this man. The tear across his abdomen was so large that I did not have a bandage large enough to cover it.

“
I have one clean t-shirt in my bag,” said Chris. It’s brand new.”

I nodded to him and he ran. I opened my small, carefully packed, carefully planned, completely useless first aid kit and saw how pitiful it was in the face of real tragedy and once again fought tears from helplessness. Suddenly Chris was there gently handing me the folded shirt. I didn’t have anything to disinfect the wound. I had nothing to close it but some small sutures that would be like trying to stop the Dudh Kosi with a soup spoon.

I placed the shirt across the opening in his body and gently laid my hand on him willing with all my being that whatever God had done this would take him quickly. I looked at Nawang and shook my head no and then stood up. Slowly the men moved around him and finally completely encircled him offering him at least a tiny bit of privacy from the gawkers who had come to see what life in the Himalaya had wrought. When he was surrounded and I could no longer see him I turned away and went inside the lounge. My hands were drenched in blood. Nawang came to me and thanked me and said that they would take care of him now. This was not the first yak drover to die at the hands of his charges. I went out behind the kitchen and found Cook kneeling over some pots. I asked him if he had any warm water I could wash with and he gave me a basin of warm water. He was very deferential. I washed as well as I could in the dim light and went back inside. Chris had gotten the rum out again and this time I had a glass with him.

Several Germans came over and wanted to hear about what had happened, but Curtis told them to go away. Curtis can be a formidable man. He was not polite and despite their Teutonic sense of entitlement they left us alone. We drank quietly and waited for Cook to bring out dinner. When he once again produced the potatoes I’d liked so much the night before I did start to cry. Tears ran down my face, but I did not make a sound. I willed them to stop, but I couldn’t. As I grow older my tears are much closer to the surface. I find myself weeping over songs, poems, and sometimes an unusual act of heroism, kindness, or bravery. I often wish I wasn’t so weak. I wish I was stronger, more callous, like the man I had been when I was young. Still, my tears were not for the fallen drover, exactly. Nor was it for life in all its unfairness and sudden death. It was just for all the sorrow in the world that I had not shed a tear for, ever before. Or, perhaps it was just the altitude. Probably, just the altitude.

The tears fell softly and I did not acknowledge them and neither did anyone else. Eventually I ate, because life does go on.

***

I woke up in the night. I was cold and could not make myself any warmer. I don’t know what time it was, probably 1:00 or 2:00 AM and I was also having trouble breathing. I would drift back near sleep and then find myself gasping for breath with my heart trying to pound its way out of my chest. It was very distressing and I pretty much resigned myself to being up all night. I tried to read by flashlight and tried lighting a candle for a little warmth; a candle can do miracles in a small space, but it also consumes oxygen. Eventually the darkness behind the window gave way to a steady gray and I finally managed to go back to sleep for a couple hours.