Years of training went into this climb, I assured myself. You got this.

But I wasn’t so sure.

“One step at a time,” I said to myself. I wasn’t alone. I had a whole team with me! What could go wrong?

I was used to this: the cold, the wind, the blasting freezing air. But I was getting old. This would be my last climb. I wanted to make it a good one.

As we climbed past Green Boots, we saluted. Just one of the many lives lost here, conditions too dangerous to retrieve their bodies. His namesake boots sticking out of the snow, the rest of him lost to years of snow.

To the top. My lungs heaved from the thin air. I felt that I would crumble and suddenly I felt so tired.

“Hey,” a friend said. “You ready to go back down?”

“I’m ready,” I said.