Reporting date and letting go
Notes from The Blur
Now that I had met some of my new teammates and spent a couple nights in the dorm, I felt even more excited to go to CMC for the fall semester. Also, after having the chance for more exploration inside the buildings on campus, I seemed to like the college even more.
I particularly liked that there was a big room in the residence hall called the Multipurpose Room, or MPR, where students could hang out to socialize, and participate in several fun activities such as playing ping-pong, foosball and pool. There was a big-screen TV for watching movies, and a piano. There was also a kitchen, so students could cook food during their free time.
The other thing I liked about the campus was the dining hall. I liked the salad bar and the way the food was laid out for students to choose.
I felt like things could only get better. Although, one challenge was that I was going to be away from home for the first time on my own, and also going to classes with professors I didn’t know. These things made me feel excited, nervous, and unsure how it was going to turn out for me. Nevertheless, the reporting date for the CMC Team was August 11. I was looking forward to meeting the rest of my new teammates then.
The last weeks of summer wound down, and the reporting date for the cross-country team was fast-approaching. The Sunday prior I ran the Leadville Boom Days Pack-Burro Race for my 43rd consecutive time. After the race we stopped by the CMC campus for Mary to look around. There were very few vehicles in the parking lot. The campus was strangely quiet and empty, but this was soon to change.
Back home, a pile of goods began to form in the living room. A memory-foam mattress topper, pillows and bedding, a five-cup Black and Decker coffeemaker, coffee cups, a small refrigerator, office supplies, lamps, a large rug, various clothes. That Thursday we loaded up our truck and Mary’s SUV and headed for Leadville. It was important to Harrison that he drive himself to college. He had a learner’s permit so I rode shotgun in the truck as we navigated the heavy summer traffic on the mountain roads to Leadville. The plan was for me to stay with Harrison until Saturday then head home.
We’d driven this route dozens of times but none of these trips were like this one. For years we had traveled to Leadville for the annual burro race. There was an old hay barn a few miles south of town, west of the highway near Box Creek. For many years we had noted it standing with its sagging and broken roofline. Then one year it had collapsed entirely, probably under the weight of winter snows.
Over the years if I found myself feeling hypoxic or otherwise badly after running the burro race I would load up and head out as quickly as possible to get to lower elevation. I would often begin to feel better in this general area of the collapsed barn, about 1,000 feet lower than Leadville. I don’t know if it was an altitudinal or psychic line of demarcation, but it had happened enough times to not be coincidence. I thought about this as we arrived in the upper Arkansas Valley, and at last to CMC’s Timberline Campus. In a flurry of excitement teammates with the help of some parents fetched belongings into the dorm. We unloaded and hauled all Harrison’s belongings to Room 111. The resident assistants had posted a hand-drawn name tag and a decoration indicating he was a member of the cross-country team on his door, with “Swoop” the Eagle, the college’s mascot.
Then everyone met outside. Coach Darren led the group through some introduction games, and Mary and I participated along with the other parents who were on-hand. In addition to Ben and the other Harrison, there was Nate, who we already knew, plus Paulo Aponte from The Netherlands, Kenneth Obregon from the Denver area, and Korben Long from Summit County. The women’s team included Brooklyn German from Michigan, Zoe Plummer from Indiana, Ana Garcia from Denver, Abby Hagen from Salida, Alexis Ricks from Fountain, and Anne Mawhinney from Kansas. My intuition was I could not myself have picked a nicer bunch of young people to be Harrison’s teammates.
The team’s first activity was to set up another campground for entrants in the Leadville Trail 100 MTB, which was that Saturday. The team also would help staff the Columbine Mine aid station about halfway out and back on the 100-mile mountain bike course. Once the campground was set, it was time for the first official team run of the 2022 season on the CMC trails.
The next morning we drove out to Hagerman Pass near Turquoise Lake for another training run. Hagerman is a dirt road starting at 10,200 feet altitude and gradually climbing into the 11,000-foot range. The men took off on a medium-length tempo run. Since the women were going shorter I stayed back with them and Darren and let Harrison go on with his new running mates. After the run we stopped back near the dam at Turquoise Lake and took a dip in the icy water to help with muscle recovery. It felt like the cold lake plunge was more a team-bonding activity than physical therapy.
The days and evenings were busy with setting up camp, reading the rules to the campers, guiding them to their campsites, and getting to know each other while sitting around in folding chairs in the cool Leadville evenings. We learned, for example, that Darren favored “Death Metal” music. Darren asked me and Harrison to go out and check the campground before bedtime. One night we went out to walk through the campground and were strolling back on the fire access road. There was a full moon out. Harrison out of the dark said, “I don’t why, but I like it here.”
The Saturday of the mountain bike race Harrison accompanied the team out to the aid station with Darren driving the van. I stayed back getting some things finalized in Harrison’s room before heading out on my own to the checkpoint southwest of town. The entire area was abuzz with race support vehicles, activity from crews and race officials. The trail was lined with tents from various sponsors. It was a madhouse of cheering, clapping, cowbells ringing and a dust storm of hundreds of cyclists. I found the aid station where the team was working amid the chaos and Darren quickly handed me a volunteer shirt.
For the next couple hours I watched Harrison hand energy gels to mountain bikers as they rode past. He had a huge smile on his face and seemed in his element. I stood back and helped out whenever I could. Darren had the men’s and women’s team take separate breaks and go for a run during all this, and so I took the time to go for a jog myself. When I got back from this run the realization that it was time for me to go home started to sink in. I had the urge to just stay another hour, or another week. Yet I knew everything had been pointing to this moment.
I had pictured some meaningful father-son good-bye but this was not the time or place for such. Harrison was working on the far side of the trail through the aid station and mountain bikers were speeding through, some of them drafting wheel-to-wheel, on this bumpy road back to the finish line. So I carefully picked a time to get across the trail. I gave Harrison a hug and told him I was heading out. I told him I was proud of him and knew he would do well. He was anxious to get back to work with the aid station. I crossed the trail back to where Darren was standing and told him I was heading out. I looked back across at Harrison happily handing gel packets to cyclists. He still had a big smile on his face.
Perhaps Darren could see or feel my hesitation. “We’ll take care of him,” he said in his matter-of-fact manner. We shook hands and I walked to my truck feeling more than sort of lost. The first few miles were a battle between turning back and tears.
For all my life I’d lived by the code, “Hang on tight, don’t let go.” It had served me through many wild rides both literal and figurative. Now I was learning a new one: “Hanging on is easy. Letting go is hard.” I passed the spot by the old collapsed barn at the south end of the valley with a confused sense of determination, mixed trepidation and relief, and drove on home.
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