I don’t want to climb this hill.

But the hill is what stands between me and the warmth and coziness of the cabin where I’m staying.

It juts up out of the forest, an abrupt swell of land, dropping steeply away to my left and sweeping gracefully into a deep bowl of trees and underbrush. The road here is well-traveled, deeply rutted by runoff and the tires of 4-wheel conveyances the hunters call “mules.” It’s not my language, the language of hunting and 4-wheel conveyances, so it might be a model, a make, a nickname for all I know. Right now, I’d be happy for a mule of any kind, for a shortcut to the top of this barrier to my comfort.

The hill is hard, unforgiving. Here and there, it lurches suddenly upward and makes me strain and stretch and gasp for breath. I have to pause several times as I climb it, sweat running over my body, the air whistling into my lungs. But there’s no avoiding the hill. I must climb it. It’s the only path home.

Beauty presses in on me from both sides of the road, distracting me from my climb. I let it fill the spaces  when I pause to catch my breath. Many of the leaves have fallen and turned to brown where they lay. The ones still clinging to their branches are molten gold in the afternoon light. I can see deep into the naked forest, finding rock outcroppings that punctuate the gentle undulations of earth out of which they burst. Shadows painted by the trunks of trees stripe the landscape. It would be easy to lose myself in the beauty, in the momentary respite of stopping.

But losing myself isn’t the point, is it?

I must climb this hill. I must return to the cabin and make dinner and wash out a few pairs of socks and do my reading and write — get on with my life. I know I can take this hill, know I can beat it, because I’ve traveled this road before, conquered this hill. I know, too well, the effort required and the rewards. So I push on.

—-

I don’t want to cry these tears.

But the tears are what stand between me and the warmth and wholeness of a healed heart…