19/09/24: An Odyssey - The End…or The Start.
Today, the curtain falls on what has probably been one of the biggest adventures of my life.
I'm in the airport of the departures lounge at Skardu airport. The clock ticks down to boarding, and I find myself wanting it to slow down. Autumn is descending on Skardu, it's a beautiful chilly morning, the kind you enjoy without any jackets — because the wind bites, enough to make you want a hot cup of chai — but not to go back inside. The clouds are rolling over the mountains, and the first snow has already happened at high altitude.
Top of my mind now is the battle for survival at Taleemabad. In many ways, this is the same challenge — perhaps greater than when I left it. What has changed is my belief in going out and playing my best innings. I'm optimistic, and I'm more confident in my own capabilities. That's what trekking to the remotest corner of the planet does to you, I suppose. You begin to believe in possibilities.
It's a privilege to be alive, and a privilege to have the freedom to do what I believe in.
I also realize what a balm vacations are, and how necessary it is to plug out. Life begins to look like a tunnel if you don't.
Simultaneously, plugging back in after something like K2 is so hard. How do you match that? What is the follow up act to such magic?
I know one thing for sure. This is my world. This crazed, maniacal pursuit of going to the ends of the earth, of doing things that seem pointless but in fact are the only worthwhile things to do. I'm drawn to risk, to spaces and places where the outcome is a toss-up, where it is very much possible to live or not, and where your heart, mind, lungs, legs and your entire body scream to survive.
Where life and living is a luxury, and where danger and risk are journeymen.
And if that means that life is shorter, or more uncomfortable, then so be it.
