I hiked a mountain a few weekends ago.  I am no stranger to this mountain; it was my Dad's mountain.  He climbed nearly every weekend for some twenty years well past his 80th birthday which he celebrated there among some of his family and hiking buddies on a cold and wintry November day.  His name appears in a book about this mountain, and his picture hangs on a wall in one of the park entrances.  That picture helped reignite memories for him we thought sure he could never lose. 

Now, recently following a stroke at 91, I cajole him into scooting down the hallway in his wheelchair at the nursing home to help regain his strength, and when he complains he is tired, I remind him of these feats.

He stares out of still vibrant blue eyes,  his aged and defiant body, hands bent from arthritis, back bent from years of honest  hard work, wondering aloud when he'll go home. I never thought, given all those years of climbing, that age would forsake him.  And I always thought that when his time came, he'd want to be scattered on that mountain, but he doesn't.  He  wants to be alongside his beloved.  He loved that mountain, but he loved my mother more.