Every time I exhale, the mountains go dim and blurry for a second. I breathe in and out, watching the phenomenon. This, I decide, must be what people mean when they say they can “see their breath.”
My friends are impressed by the view. I can tell because, well, they all shut up and just stand there for a while in the cold, no sarcastic statements or quips. And I’ll admit, it is pretty cool. But to me, all views are pretty cool. To me, seeing mountains in every direction is no more and no less interesting than the circular brown hay bales that dot the endless farmlands of Kansas or the skyscraping glass towers of downtown Denver or the glowing dials of a Volvo’s dashboard. But I know Cecily would appreciate this view. She’d want to see what a sunset looks like at this altitude, with this landscape.
We eventually return to I-70 and continue west. We pass three ski resorts—Copper Mountain, Vail, and Beaver Creek. From the car, the trails look like crisscrossing white lines cutting through the dark green alpine forests.
Night has fallen by the time we stop at a hotel in Grand Junction, Colorado, near the Utah border, and when I wake up in the morning, I look outside to find that I can no longer see the mountains. Have I gone nearsighted? Is this the first sign that I’m reverting to blindness?
“It’s a blizzard out there,” says Nick, joining me at the window. “A complete whiteout.”
I hope he doesn’t notice my sigh of relief.
I put on my coat and go out to stand in the thick of it, feeling the snow land on my hair, face, and outstretched hands. I hold a flake up to my eye and watch it turn to an icy-cold drop of water.
One of the main sensory cues I’ve always relied on is the volume of a sound. Generally speaking, the louder something is, the more significant it is. Snow is counterintuitive. It’s pouring down around me so heavily that I can see no more than a few footsteps away. The snow is presumably piling up on the ground, bringing delight to skiers and despair to motorists. Berthoud Pass is probably closed. But the falling snow emits not a single note. It falls silently, it lands silently, it melts silently on my tongue.
Whitford refuses to drive while it’s snowing, and we waste precious hours watching TV in the hotel until noon. Then we cross the border into Utah and head south. The terrain is different here. Gone are the mountains and foothills lined with green pine trees. The horizon is flat again, but with clusters of orange rectangles standing at right angles.
“Are those skyscrapers, too?” I ask, gesturing out the window.
“No,” says Nick. “Rock formations. Most of this on our left is part of Arches National Park, actually.”
It’s dark outside by the time we reach Grand Canyon Village. We get two rooms at Bright Angel Lodge, and in the morning, the four of us set out for the viewing deck at the south rim of the canyon.
I still walk with my cane, but I rely on it less than I used to. I’m now able to see the ground moving beneath my feet and time it with the rhythm of my steps.
“Guys, I have a confession to make,” says Nick. “I’m kind of afraid of heights.”
“Awwww, poor Nick,” teases Ion. “You need me to hold your hand?”
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen,” says Whitford.
We reach the deck, and we have to drag Nick to the edge to get him to look.
“Will’s probably not afraid of heights. Are you, Will?” asks Ion.
“I don’t really know. I’ve never looked over anything tall and steep before.”
“Well, you’ve got a mile drop in front of you right now. Are you afraid?”
I peer over the edge, leaning on the rail.
“Can’t say I feel any fear, no,” I say. “It looks awesome—and I mean that in the literal sense—but I don’t… the depth doesn’t really register for me.”
I gaze down at the canyon and out across the panorama of reds and browns. It’s a feast for the eyes; that much I can understand and appreciate.
The Grand Canyon, I decide, is kind of the opposite of the Colorado Rockies. Whereas the mountains jutted above the horizon, carving triangle-shaped peaks against the blue sky, the horizon here is basically flat, with all the terrain having been chiseled out below it.
Even though she still hasn’t answered my texts, I think about how I wish Cecily were with me to see this. I pull out my phone to take photos—it’s a feature that I’ve never actually used before. My hope is that after we find her, I can show her the things we saw.
We return to the road. Our path will take us near Las Vegas, and Nick insists that we get off the interstate so I can see the Vegas strip lit up at night.
“How long will it take?” I ask. We are only hours away from Los Angeles, and the closer we get, the more eager I am to be there already.