Mine Mountain

                               Mine Mountain

    I first met the old man; I reckon it’s been close to thirteen years ago. I can remember spending the better part of my afternoons and weekends with him during the school year. During vacations we were almost inseparable. Hours and hours we would spend in a silence that was only broken by the sounds of the birds and various other forms of wildlife that was native to the area. Oh, occasionally we’d have our pleasurable silence interrupted by the sounds of a nearby pickup or car going down the road a half-mile or more away. For the most part though, it was just a nice quiet retreat for me to get away from a world that was constantly rushing around.
 
  The old man had wrinkles all over him that had been made deep with time. His face had seen the effects of the extreme heat of summer in the Sonoran Desert, the sudden flash floods of monsoon season, and the bone chilling cold of a winter’s night in the desert. I spent many an hour studying those cracks and wrinkles. You never heard a sound or complaint from the old man, he just sat there and let things come and go around him with the passage of time and the advancements of society. Some folks knew the old man as Saginaw Hill; others probably never even gave him that much thought, except maybe as a backdrop for another beautiful Arizona sunset. To me though he would always be known as “Mine Mountain”.

    Years ago, he had been a copper mine or so I had been told. On the East side of his face, there was a narrow crack about seven feet wide. Occasionally a friend of mine would go with me and we just started referring to this as the front entrance. You walked in from there about twenty yards, the floor then developed a rather nasty forty-five degree angle. Due to all of the debris that littered the floor, you had to carry a decent flashlight, although we generally chose to use torches. I guess that we preferred them out a sense of adventure or maybe just a youthful romanticism with the stories we had read. Either way, you had to watch your step or you’d sprain an ankle or worse.
   
    Hell, we must have covered every square inch of that mountain at least twice. We walked, ran, and sat just about everywhere you possibly could. I knew all of the old man’s secrets, secrets that made the heart soar when each one was discovered. I saw and took into my soul everything he had to show me. I really shouldn’t say secrets though, because anyone who took the time to get to know him would have learned all of the old man’s features too. I guess most people just kind of take an old man like that for granted. You know “oh that mountain will still be there the same tomorrow as it is today, it will never change.” Only things do change, sometimes a lot sooner than you think.

    I hadn’t been to see him for a few years. I guess you could say the hustle and bustle caught up to me as it does with everyone else. I’ve got a family now and all of the joys and responsibility that goes with it. For some reason, I just got an urge to go see him again. I guess I wanted to find out the effects of ten years on him, me, and our relationship. I also wanted to see if I would even recognize him anymore. So early in the morning, I kissed my wife, climbed into my truck, and drove to the foot of the old man.
   
    The first thing I noticed as I walked up the old dirt, rock-covered road was just how much I had changed. In my youth, I’d run up and down this hill all day long without tiring. Now as I slowly made my way to the top, I found myself winded and the muscles in my legs burning. Was it too much of the good life or too little taking better care of myself? More like the latter by a long shot, anyway, as I go around the West face, I feel a pain in my heart. Not a physical one, mind you, but an emotional one that hurts just as bad.
   
    You see, a few years ago, the county went and built a new school less than a mile to the East of Saginaw Hill. In order to protect any wandering kids from getting up there and getting hurt, they went and blew up the old front entrance. I remember seeing it on the news, but I guess I never realized the dramatic change it had made. I stood there looking at what I remembered as a grand and ominous part of my past, now seeing nothing but a hill slope with an abundance of rock everywhere. The shock was overwhelming, I just never thought how much it would change him and affect me at the same time. I felt a sudden loss, a part of me and my childhood memories gone forever, only to be relived in my mind.
   
    I continued to the top and couldn’t escape an odd feeling of being out of place. Sure, certain things were still the same, but time had had such a hand in changing us both physically that I didn’t seem to know him as well as I did before. I could still find my way around to the once almost sacred spots of meditation and seclusion, but something was different.

    I can’t shake the feeling and it grows to the point that I am compelled to say good-bye to my old friend. I proceed to make my way back to my truck and stop along the way to contemplate, has he changed that much or is it me? Is my memory sweetened with the nectar of youth and innocence? Is the feeling of loss so intense, that I can’t even recognize my old friend any longer?
   
    As I get closer to my awaiting vehicle, I stop and look back at the only thing aside from my family that was such an integral part of my youth. I have to laugh, because there on the North side of his face are the same spots of vegetation I remembered from so long ago. It was as if to say, I will be here waiting for your next visit, no matter how much each of us change.

    So long, old man and thanks for being there.