The Hike to the Y

A story from the trip. (I hurt my back yesterday and can’t get out of bed, so you might hear a lot from me.)

So. It was one of the planned activities to hike the Y on Sunday morning, meet at Aunt LeNae’s for brunch and go to church at 1:00 p.m. It would be a family event – anyone who wanted to would go! Multitudes of cousins were present at the reunion so the boys never were friendless at any of the events.

Now, for those of you unfamiliar with the term “hike to the Y”, it is a BYU thing. Almost a rite of passage. I thought it was a Utah thing, although after sitting around with Mark’s cousins after church I found that half of them had lived in UT for many years and never done it. Sad! Anyway, the new BYU freshmen are almost required to traipse up the side of the mountain. There is a HUGE “Y” up there, demarking the nickname for BYU. The Y is up there pretty high. It is kind of intimidating… and Sammy did NOT want to go.

We were kind of iffy anyway about whether we’d actually do it. Nobody else was going… one uncle had been sick throughout the night, wiping out a whole family of potential comrades… it had been raining, creating possibly unfavorable trail conditions. But we had NOTHING else to do. We had already walked around BYU twice, the kids were sick of the Bus, and we couldn’t show up unannounced at unsuspecting family’s doorsteps in all good conscience. We kicked around the idea of walking around one of the various LDS temples in the area, but Josh was being such a turkey and needed an outlet for his energy (as did Ben and even Jill), and I had just the night before bought shoes suitable for hiking, so we decided to just go.

As we wound through the streets in the Provo foothills (I never remember where the trailhead starts – we always walked up when I was a student – now there’s a parking lot!) Sam was teary eyed and adamant that he was sure this was a bad idea. I looked at Mark out of the corner of my eye and said, “Well, maybe we’ll only go up part way and come down.” He shot back, “No, let’s do the whole thing! We can DO this! What else are we going to do?” So I slunk into my seat for a minute and listened to the whimpering from the middle row. And popped some excedrin. I knew I was about to need it.

We found the trailhead – wow, they have improved it. Josh, Ben and Jill were off in a flash. Sammy didn’t even want to get out of the Bus. I put on my best encouraging voice and said we’d do it together. I handed him a water bottle and he got OUT. Half the battle.

I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say, I had to hold his hand and literally DRAG him up the mountain for parts. We linked arms and I dragged him. I distracted him from the arduous task at hand by regaling him with funny stories of my childhood. And every time he sat down I’d stop talking. He’d say, “What happens next?” And I’d say, “I can’t tell you until you start walking again.” I kept VERY CHEERFUL, I tell you. It was helpful that I have some great stories.

We made it to the top, took pictures, and Jill AND Sam were both afraid of being up so high. Then Jill was being a momma’s girl and wanted me to carry her down… then she fell asleep on me almost instantly. So I carried a sleeping three year old all the way down the mountain, and my calves are still feeling it. Mark got the job of coaxing Sam down the mountain. Mark sent Josh ahead to catch up to me with the Bus key so I could put her down when I got there. Josh was in remarkable spirits through the whole hike. Amazing. And Ben was incredible. A total little trooper.

He asked several times, as we were going up, “What is the point of this??” We told him, so you can say you did it. For bragging rights. Because some of your friends in KS have never even SEEN a mountain, much less climbed one, and you can now tell them YOU have CLIMBED a MOUNTAIN!!! He was unimpressed. I thought giving him a few days’ space would give him some perspective on things, and the sense of accomplishment would begin to sink in. But as we drove home, we had to pass the Y from a distance. I said, “Look guys – the Y! Doesn’t it look high? Amazing that we were sitting on that thing.” Sammy didn’t even bother to look up. I think he’s still holding a bit of a grudge.