“This is as far as I go.”
So said my guide Dawa, who abruptly turned and headed back through the squalling storm towards base camp.
“Wait!” I called out to him. “Where do I go?”
Dawa adjusted his pack and shouted back in Nepali over his shoulder. My knowledge of the language is rudimentary at best, but I believe he uttered something that translated roughly as:
“Go up!”
The wind tore through me as I took one last look back at the sherpa, who rapidly disappeared in the snowfall as he made his descent. I was on my own from here on out, my quest for knowledge far outweighing my forty pounds of gear.
The peak was no more than two hundred feet away, but at this altitude the air was thin and the progress would be slow. I leaned into the wind and swung my pickaxe in a broad arc upward, ever upward.
-----
My journey started long ago. I had been a happy man, with a decent enough job, a loving wife and newborn son. Things could not have been better really.
Yet I could not help but wonder if there was supposed to be more out there for me. I became consumed with the question of whether there was a higher purpose. What did it all mean? Where do I stand?
After some time and a great deal of money, I now found myself in Nepal, shivering through my thermals as I approached an outcropping of rock near the mountain’s peak. I knew that just beyond the stone formation I would find the cave. Inside that cave was where the man who went by various names was supposed to hold counsel. Some called him sage, others guru. I knew not what to call him. I only knew he, and only he, could answer my burning question of the meaning of life.
I held thoughts of my wife and child near, using them to warm me. I remembered our wedding day, how nervous I had been. I pictured the first day I held young Casey in my hands, lifting his face to mine so that I could see his smile up close.
I no longer felt the cold.
-----
The cave itself was spartan, appropriately lacking worldly comforts. A lone man occupied the place, sweeping the floor and humming to himself.
“Hey, bro. How’s it hanging?”
That’s how he greeted me.
“Fine,” I replied stupidly. “I’m looking for…”
“The wise man,” he interrupted. “Everyone comes looking for the wise man.”
“Will he be back soon?”
“Soon enough.”
I waited for hours. All the while the man swept the floor. Finally a thought occurred to me.
“Are you the wise man?”
He laughed.
“Nope.”
“Then who…”
“I’m waiting just like you. I’ve been waiting and sweeping for seventeen years.”
I was stunned. “Why wait so long?”
He paused then said, “Where else would I go?”
I bundled up to return home to my family, and bid the man goodbye.