"Climb Every Mountain"

The year was 1966. To a teenager, (read that, me) it was a normal summer. Nothing special. Sunshine, warm temperatures and no summer job. None of us teens seemed to be worried about the ever looming next school year. After all, we had just finished one. We were only interested in the here and now and looking forward to our two months off. We wanted our list of things to do to last the whole summer. No one wanted to be bored.
It would still be a couple of years before we recognized what carpe diem was. We were little concerned for “the day” or the future. I know what you are doing right now. Other then reading this. You are traveling back to your summer at sixteen. To many, we refer to this time of life as, coming-of-age. We remembered it as that one special summer. It always seems to come when we need it. It comes today when a child moves from playing hopscotch or twenty-one to being a real live person. Or so we thought.
As we think of those long past summer days, we smile. It was a summer of finding ourselves. We no longer concerned ourselves with kid things. After all, we were on our way. But only just. It was a stop over year between kid and rent payments.
That summer I found out who I was. It happened when I went away. No, nothing like the movie, Summer of 42 with Jennifer O’Neill. So don’t get concerned. I left my girlfriend behind and went away for six weeks to a cadet military camp in the mountains of Banff, Alberta.
Every morning when I opened my eyes, I saw Mount Rundle. Didn’t even have to move my head. Eyes open, there is was, every morning. Part of our training was for each company to take a one week trek up a mountain and back again. Unfortunately, I developed blisters the first day. They took me back to camp and I spent the rest of the week relaxing and ironing everyone else’s uniform. I missed out. Climbing a mountain was never on my to do list but it became important to me. I wanted to do it. I wanted to experience that feeling of accomplishment as you reach the summit and look out over all the earth below. It is experiencing that moment when you stand in the grandeur of God’s creation, feeling your breath taken away by the beauty and the pounding of your heart for the effort. God must have an amazing view.
I took many pictures that summer, including one of Mount Eisenhower. After I arrived home, I developed the pictures to show everyone. One was framed that fall and it has been on my dresser ever since. That summer I promised myself I would go back one day and climb Mount Eisenhower. Today it is still just a dusty picture on a dresser. But is it?
In my bible I read so many times about people climbing their mountains. We even read about the disciples walking up a mountain with Jesus and meeting Moses and Elijah. My bible tells me we climb mountains all the time. Mountains of achievement and mountains of pain. We may even replace our Eisenhower with something more important or more challenging. That picture stands as a testament to me when I realize I am at the base of another mountain. God calls us, not to walk around the base of our mountains but to climb over. To feel our lungs staining and our heart pounding. God knows we will not only be stronger for it but stronger because of it. It’s not too late to climb your mountain. Don’t just sit there. And while we look at that long ago picture in your mind, listen to the words of Oscar Hammerstein and dream.
Climb every mountain, search high and low
Follow every by way, every path you know
Climb every mountain, ford every stream
Follow every rainbow, till you find your dream

This is your summer, carpe diem. Rob