Finding Jim (34 page)

My routine becomes my tradition: wake up, meditate, write in journal, do yoga, walk Habby, breakfast, work at organizing my sixth Kilimanjaro trip.

My friends call to touch base, and it strikes me how much I learn from them. From Terri I learn compassion and understanding. From Susan I learn resilience and hard work. From Marla I learn that honesty and consistency allow clear communication and strong relationships. From Andrea I learn that self-confidence allows you to reach your potential. From Rose I learn not to take life and myself too seriously. From Jenny I learn the power of intellect to become self-aware. From Heather I learn how self-love allows you to love, understand and encourage others. From Karen I learn that to have a friend you must reach out and be a friend.

Learning is one of my survival tactics, as is having purposeful activity, not just busyness.

Relax and romance will flourish.

—
MY CHINESE FORTUNE COOKIE

The teaching term begins after the Kilimanjaro trip, and I settle into a routine and try to ignore my loneliness. A friend sets me up on a blind date. I sit in my car for 15 minutes before I gather the courage to go into the restaurant. The man never met Jim and is not from the mountaineering community. My body waits like a loaded gun for the moment when I tell him about Jim, my true love. Each word describing my dead husband builds a wall between my heart and the unknown man sitting opposite me. After our evening together, he does not call or e-mail, and I do not expect him to.

I cry at home, alone. I regard myself from a distance and wonder Who is this crippled mess of fear and pity? Enough of mountain guides. I am going to find myself a businessman. I laugh at the absurdity of my quest. But I am tired of being stuck and am ready to commit to change. I date a few more men and decide that if I have not met the right person within a year, I will have a baby on my own. I am 38 years old.

Six months later, I join a group of friends and strangers for a backcountry ski week at a cabin near Nelson, in the interior of British Columbia. We meet at a restaurant before flying in by helicopter. My friend introduces me to Joe, who grasps my hand firmly and nods his head once. He seems a bit stern and short. Joe confides to me later that he thought I might be gay.

Twelve of us settle into the cabin and take turns cooking meals. I set the alarm for six o'clock to make breakfast the next morning for the group, but there is no need. At 5:30 the tap runs and dishes clink. Who the heck would be up at this hour? I stomp downstairs, growling, and there is Joe, sitting at the table. “Would you like some coffee?” He raises his mug and smiles.

“No, thanks, I don't drink coffee.” Thoughtful guy. Nice. I smile back. But he gets up too early.

For the next few days, we ski fluffy powder under blue skies. Joe drags his out-of-shape body up the slopes and drives his telemark skis down, undeterred by several face plants. Strong. He's got chutzpah. I like that.

At après-ski, Joe produces copious amounts of alcohol and shares it with the group, laughing easily. Generous. And funny.

On the third day, we ski a deliciously puffy steep slope. I partner up with my girlfriend for safety, and we giggle with each turn as our skis kick powder up into our faces. Joe arrives just behind us at the bottom. He beams and plows through the deep snow toward us.

“Wasn't that great?”

“Wow.”

“We're going to go up again. Want to come with us?” Joe looks eager but then sees his sister on a high line heading back to the hut. They wave to one another and Joe turns to us.

“I'd love to but it looks like my sis and her hubby are going back. They've been good to me, sticking with me. I'll head back with them.” And he's gone. Loyal. I watch him go for a minute and turn to see where he is a few times as we ascend the slope.

That evening, we have a party and dance until late. As I drink more, I gravitate to Joe's spot on the dance floor and we bump against each other in rhythm to the music. We step outside in sock feet onto the snowy deck to cool off.

“Here, you can step on my feet if you want.” Joe offers. I giggle as I balance on his toes, hands braced on his chest. He catches me around the waist. We look at each other for a second and then laugh and start to tell jokes. After everyone has gone to bed, Joe and I sit on the couch and talk.

“So, where did you grow up?” I tuck one leg under me and turn to face him.

“Minneapolis. Well, just outside of Minneapolis, in a place called Anoka, on the Mississippi River.”

“What's it like there?”

“They say it's the closest thing to Canada in the States. Moderate politics, friendly people. The winters can be harsh. Some companies take their employees up in a chartered airplane just to get above the clouds to see the sun. There's a whole system of covered walkways for people to get from store to store when it's too cold to be outside. I grew up on the river, fishing, swimming and exploring.”

“What do you do?”

“I started out in law and practised for five years but then went into small business start-ups. What about you? Where are you from and what do you do?”

I wonder for a second what that means, small business start-ups. “I grew up in Vancouver, taught French and German for six years, got my backpacking guide certification and do some guiding, and I teach outdoor education now to high-school students.”

Joe perks up when I mention guiding. “What sort of guiding do you do?”

“I've done some ski-tour guiding and heli-ski guiding, and now I do an annual trip to Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa.”

“Wow. Ski guiding. Africa. You're hard core.”

I chuckle and deny it but know he is impressed, so I don't tell him that my ski guiding was only as an assistant and that I was just a tail guide for heli-skiing.

“What does that mean, ‘small business start-ups'?” I divert the attention back to him. He answers in a lingo I am not familiar with, but I nod my head to keep him talking. He made a lot of money in the dot-com boom, millions, and then lost most of it when the market crashed.

“Are you married?” He doesn't wear a ring but I ask anyway.

“Divorced. Five years ago now. We married young, when I was 24.”

He is two years older than me, lives in San Diego and has three kids. His ex-wife remarried and moved to Maryland with the kids. Joe stayed in San Diego. When I ask him if he misses his kids, his eyes tear up.

We play one another songs on the guitar. Joe picks the classical “Bourrée” by Bach. I choose a folk song by Ferron. We discover that we both love the book
A Winter's Tale
. And the movie
A Princess Bride
is one of our favourites. That night, I lie awake picturing his handsome, strong-boned face, his bright, steel-blue eyes and his smile.

Over the next few days, we sneak off to the sauna together, hang back in the ski line to kiss and persuade our roommates to give us some privacy. At the end of a week of ski touring together, Joe drives west with me to Vancouver, to my parents' house, instead of heading south to San Diego. My parents raise their eyebrows slightly when the bed in Joe's room is not slept in the next morning.

Every other weekend, Joe flies up from San Diego and we snowshoe, ski, hike, rock climb and camp in Whistler. We go out for long dinners, drink lots of wine and spend hours in bed. Each time I pick him up from the airport, my heart does a little flip.

Exactly 60 days after we first met, we canoe on Alta Lake behind my house. Joe has packed a picnic of soft cheeses and wine. I steer in the stern, Habby sits in the middle and Joe powers in the bow. At one end, the lake meanders into a reedy marsh before forming the River of Golden Dreams. Grasses reach way above our heads, and the canoe turtles along through lily pads. Joe relaxes on the floor of the canoe, his legs draped over the seat and his paddle barely dipping into the water. “It's a good thing you've got that mondo rescue knife on your life jacket. The River of Golden Dreams could be pretty dangerous.” He smirks and raises one eyebrow. He's so cute.

“I imagine for a strong Minnesota River Man such as yourself, this river will be nothing.”

We nudge to a standstill against the grassy banks. The slight jolt jars Joe upright, and he stops laughing. He looks around at the snaking quiet water. We are alone. He swivels onto his knees, slides a hand into his pocket, leans over Habby and reaches out a little open box with something very sparkly inside. Habby licks Joe's face just before he says, “Will you marry me, Sue?”

I take a deep breath, look Joe in the eye and say, “Yes.”

The next day at school, I tell my class of students about Joe's proposal. The girls echo a soft, “Oh.”

There is a silence and then one of the boys says, “That would have been a really uncomfortable paddle back if you'd said no.”

It may be that some little root of the sacred tree still lives.
Nourish it then
That it may leaf
And bloom
And fill with singing birds!

—
BLACK ELK, EARTH PRAYER

No memory of the past touched him for his mind was full of a present joy.

–
JAMES JOYCE,
DUBLINERS

My parents host a “Meet Joe” party. I scurry through the kitchen and overhear a good friend of mine who has Joe pinned in the corner say, “So, do you do your own laundry?” Joe laughs and answers yes. My friend nods her approval. Joe goes from conversation to conversation, meeting people, getting to know my friends and family. Dad examines the unorthodox label of a wine bottle and hesitates to pour a glass. Joe interrupts the conversation he is having just long enough to say to Dad, “That one is fine.” Dad nods at me and is impressed.

At the end of the evening, one friend leans in and says, “I'm glad Joe shows his affection for you. Jim was so affectionate with you, and I know how much you loved that.” When everyone has left, Joe goes downstairs to get ready for bed. My parents and I sit around the table.

“Joe sure is bright,” Dad says.

“And he's witty, too. He's savvier than Jim was, don't you think?' Glenda says.

“Yes,” I agree reluctantly. I'm happy that they like Joe and that they approve, but any comparison to Jim triggers my guilt. In my heart I pledged to love Jim forever, not just until death do us part, and now I am going to marry someone else.

Within four months, Joe quits his job in San Diego and moves to Whistler. Within one year, we exchange vows at a quiet ceremony in our Whistler home in front of our families. We host a larger reception at a local restaurant with 50 friends and family members. Jim's parents, brothers and best friends are there. There are speeches and crying. One of Jim's brothers says he was skeptical when Joe first arrived on the scene, but having spent time with him, knows he is a good guy. Jim's best friend says Jim would be happy seeing me with Joe. Jim's name comes up several times. I wonder if it bothers Joe, but he keeps a poker face. After all, they are honouring Joe, too.

People hug me with such unbridled happiness that I realize my wedding to Joe allows them to say one last goodbye to Jim. Jim and Sue are no longer. It is now Joe and Sue. And I sense relief in their tears. They have watched over me for almost six years, on Jim's behalf, and now they can pass the torch. I'm okay now.

I feel strong when I go to the front of the room to address my friends and family. But I begin to cry as soon as I open my mouth:

People are defined not so much by the job they do but by how they dust themselves off and pick themselves up after a big fall. I feel I took a big fall. And as I've been picking myself up, loving hands, and one big paw, have reached out to me all along the way. I am defined by how my heart connects to all of you, my loved ones. Thank you. And now I have Joe. I would like to read a fable I've read to my students called “The Perfect Heart.” The author is unknown:

In a faraway land, there lived a people who carried their hearts in their hands. One young man began to achieve some fame. “I have the most perfect heart,” he proclaimed. Truly it was a sight to see – magnificently shaped, hard, smooth and flawless. His heart became the standard of perfection and people travelled from far away to view this wonder. And they would steal a glance at their own hearts, each now clearly aware of its flaws, embarrassed to let anyone else see them.

One day, an old man stepped up to the young man and said in a voice for everyone to hear, “I have a more perfect heart than yours.”

A murmur ran through the throng, then a hushed silence. Every head craned forward. Every eye watched intently as the old man brought forth his heart. The young man looked at the old man, bent and wrinkled with the passage of many years. Then he looked at the heart tenderly cradled in gnarled fingers and burst out with laughter. “Senile old fool. This is your perfect heart?” he sneered. For sitting on the palm of the old man's hands was a heart as bruised, tattered, misshapen, scarred and ugly as anyone could ever recall.