In my early 20s, my younger brother and I learned backpacking and wilderness survival. We often went together, and sometimes we went alone.

One fine fall day in mid-September, I dropped my brother Andy off at a trailhead on the West side of the summit of Trailridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park. From there, the trail leads mostly North into the Never Summer Mountains and the headwaters of the mighty Colorado River—hardly impressive here, but home to cutthroat trout and a few brookies—on the Continental Divide at around 10,200 feet ASL. The trail now has a sign called the ‘Colorado River Trail.’

I also brought my backpack, and we started off together, planning to hike for a couple of hours before stopping for lunch. After lunch, I turned back, agreeing to return for him five days later at the trailhead.

This is the kind of trout stream that I Love. Ever seeking its destiny, confident in its servants’ vocation, forgiving and overcoming the obstacles that the stones and fallen trees create, the clear, wind chime water persistently—as Theresa of Avila noticed—chooses the lowest place like our Rabbi Jesus taught us.

A humble stream, singing lovingly to itself, and a great path, a narrow way, following closely—and the strength to walk—my idea of heaven.

The plan was to pick him up at the trailhead, ten-ish. As it was coming on 11 and it was beginning to snow, I was getting my fully provisioned backpack out of the back. We had agreed I would head in after him if he were an hour late. Was I worried? Solo in the wilderness can be unpredictable. A large sign above the Rocky Mountain National Park registration desk near Estes Park reads in large letters, “THESE MOUNTAINS ARE NOT YOUR FRIEND.”

A quarter of a mile in, I wished I had brought my snowshoes. There was no wind, but the flakes were large, and those who bumped into one another as they fell hung on to one another. Communities of flakes were falling, with visibility reduced to a hundred yards. I could no longer discern between the earth and the sky. White, with graphite pencil drawing trees over snow-white watercolor paper.

We found each other when I was in about two hours. A fine, mature Spruce tree uphill from the stream (aka Colorado River) was the perfect bushwhacker emergency shelter. Their lower branches reach far and droop toward the ground, shedding water away from their center. They will be perfectly dry at the trunk with a bed of needles. Comfy. Backpacks under the tree and drying. Coffee in tin cups next…and then stories.

The small portion of bacon he saved for his last breakfast sizzling in the small fry pan was so obviously and completely irresistible to that Juvenile highwayman Black Bear that Andy could hardly blame him. Having reached a mutually beneficial understanding—Andy threw his whole breakfast as far as he could into the pines—it still took him some time to pack up. I guess that cute little brown bear was unconvinced that Randy wasn’t holding out on him.

Backs to the trunk of the Spruce, sitting on a soft bed of needles. Water heated in my ‘Jet Boil’ for some hot coffee courtesy of the ‘Aero-Press’, then both hands warmed around the tin cups resting on our laps. When sipping, it’s with two hands. We decide on Cliff Bars for lunch since we are both interested in wading our way back to the truck before very long. The snow is building, and it’s a wet one.

• • •

Passerby, I expect few are privileged to experience the connection to the sacred we experienced at that moment. Few get to feel—to be impregnated with—Holy silence. Most lives are lived with the pervasive background hum of technology; if we are honest, we prefer it. Absolute anything is complicated to process. Infinite silence, especially for the first time, can be discomfiting, even scary. It dispels life’s boundaries, carefully erected to keep us safe. Without boundaries, we are open to infinite possibilities, including junctures insisting on choices we have carefully avoided until now.

Silence is also deeply nourishing. She waits for us there. We listen to many voices—way too many voices. She declines to compete with them for your attention. Still—or muzzle as the case may be—the other voices and Love Herself is right there. Like Jacob declared, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.”

In the Tibetan monastery, the soft bell tone signals the end of meditation time. In the Never Summer Mountains, Bull Elk’s challenge to any other male listening is that this is his mountain, and the rut is on. He is somewhere behind us. His threat is first a high, piercing whistle followed by squealing and screaming, finishing down the scale, a series of grunts. It makes the hair on your arms stand up. Wow…what an Amen!

It is not long, and the gauntlet is picked up. In front of us, presumably across the creek, which is doing its best to resist the temptation to freeze and become invisible as the snow piles up. Another bull we cannot see has taken exception to the claim of this mountain and its fertile females. He has signaled his willingness to ‘take it outside,’ as it were.

We might have stayed, but the snow just kept gettin’ deeper. Having slogged our way to the trailhead (Note to Self, boy…snowshoes sure would have made our lives easier), we were met by a Park Service Ranger sitting in his idling truck awaiting our return. “Good to see you, boys. I was about to gear up, go in after you, and call for rescue. We closed Trail Ridge after you crossed over. Berthoud Pass, Hwy 40 through Granby, is also closed. If you need to return today, your remaining way will be to Rifle and I-70.” Many hours away.