I asked someone to take my photo on the top of Mt. Timp before I “hid” it in the crack where no one was and where no one would notice it, EXCEPT for my own brother!
Was it Pollyanna I had been searching for all those years, looking into the eyes of people passing by, looking for that someone. It certainly seemed that way, so, I stop searching.
But at the same time, I thought, “No! Not again.” I didn’t want this attraction to anyone anymore. I didn’t want the pain of being emotionally dependent on a woman again, to fall in love with another woman again. I knew how these things end, the obsession and the deep emotional pain and misery of longing for someone, someone I’ve searched for in the crowds for as long as I could remember. Where was she? Was this her?
I knew what happened every time I fell in love with someone, and, I didn’t like it anymore. It always brought sorrow. It always began with a giant crush, and it always ended in crushing me. One way or another, it always ended…
It was about this time that I hiked Mt. Timpanogos with three of my siblings, my oldest brother, David, my younger brother Matt and his girlfriend and my sister, Diane. I had decided to find a rock that represented Pollyanna and carry it to the top of the mountain. I would dump the rock off at the top leaving “her” and the pain and confusion behind, kinda “dumpit to Crumpit” like in The Grinch That Stole Christmas. I needed to end the relationship…NOW, before it began. It was a good plan.
On the way up the trail, I looked for the perfect rock. Up on a shelf, I turned over a piece of flat ivory colored limestone. Connected to the underside of the limestone was a round, smooth and beautiful maroon chert nodule, about as big as my two fists. I rubbed my hand over the smooth rounded rock. It was very cool, like Pollyanna. I picked “Pollyanna” up and put “her” in my pack to dump her off at the top. I was hopeful and excited!
I was the first of my group to the top, at least a half hour ahead of my siblings. I loved the hike! I was excited to eat my lunch and drop the rock on the top. I left the smooth chert nodule in the perfect spot a small crevice on a secluded spot on the summit. I turned it upside down, so the beautiful chert was hiding beneath the dimpled limestone. It fit snuggly and was perfectly level with the rock around it. I made sure that it looked natural, lay hidden and undetectable. I turned away to eat my lunch and wait for my siblings.
My siblings summited more than a half hour later, ate, took in the sights of the valley below, the very valley where Pollyanna was originally from. Then we all left to return to our cars at the trailhead.
Again, I was the first one down. When my brother, David, finally arrived, he said, “Look at this cool rock I found!” Then, he pulled MY ROCK out of his pack!!!
I stared at MY rock in my brother’s hand. I thought about the 16-mile trip, all those steps I had taken to get it to the top, the care I took to hide it, to leave that relationship with Pollyanna before it began, lost and forgotten. That rock now sat in my brother’s hand! Of the dozens of people prancing around on the summit, how could my own brother have found MY ROCK and brought it back?
How in the world…?
My thoughts whirled. It was dusk. I imagined hiking it back up there, then rolled my eyes at the thought. How could I return that rock where it belongs? I was confused and frustrated!
I yelled at him, in a high puzzled voice. “That’s my rock!”
I repeated, “That’s my rock! Give it back!” I demanded.
He refused, thinking it a fun game. He had found a treasure.
He told me, “No, I found it. It’s mine.”
He explained how he found it. He climbed up the last summit rocks. He stuck his head up over the last crest, and noticed a rock stuck in a crevice. He picked it up and turned it over, thought it was cool-looking and stuck it in his bag to take home and put in his rock garden with the other rocks which he had carried down from other mountains he had climbed.
Now that he had ruined plans one, I wanted him to give me MY rock, so I could execute plan two which was now to throw the rock off the Menan Snake River bridge as far as I could, to sink to the bottom, lost forever. But he refused. Even my little brother, Matt, David’s hiking buddy and neighbor, played along, ensuring I never found MY rock. Though I searched through those dozens of rocks they placed in their mountain rock garden, I never found it. (The rock has since been lost, David tells me.)
I took this odd experience as a sign from God that I was to continue my relationship with Pollyanna. I returned home to tell Pollyanna the story. She only laughed and didn’t seem to give it much thought. But I knew that it wasn’t just a coincidence. I knew deep, in my heart that God had a plan for us. At least, for now, I wouldn’t leave Pollyanna at the top of a mountain or throw her in the river. I was compelled to move forward with her as my companion and BFF. Now, I had my reason to stay.