Cold Mountain

Where I have failed as a Spartan, I have succeeded in my goals to a) get cold, and b) be adventurously miserable. I wasn't being simply dramatic when I said I was heading to the hills to sleep. I did. Actually, I understated it; they were full-fledged mountains and even had snow dusting the peaks.

I would love to say that I took off from Sparta on foot and hiked my way to the highest peak, where, balancing precariously on the tippy-top point, I slept soundly in the nude with naught but snow as a blanket. None of that happened I can happily report. I took the Flintstone mobile up the side of a mountain, winding back and forth on a rocky dirt road that was partially washed out in places. If I could get that hunk of junk up there, I might be able to summit Everest with a Humvee.

I made it about 3/4ths of the way, far enough to see the lights of Sparta and its environs spreading out like intricate, incandescent spider webs. Thus at the end of the path, I parked and laid out my sleeping bag on an incline in front of the car.

I've found that, for whatever reason, the bag doesn't get as warm if I'm clothed, so I stripped down to my skivvies in the shivering cold and then nestled my clothes and myself into the cocoon of the sleeping bag. My first thoughts were with the constellations I saw shimmering clearly overhead. Orion, Taurus, Cassiopeia, the Pleiades. There I was, staring at them in the land where they were given their names. I know their stories.

I was distracted a bit from the stars by the not so insignificant point that I didn't have a sleeping pad. Even in a sleeping bag, one is necessary. Not for the padding, which would have been nice considering the bed of rocky daggers I'd laid the bag on, but to retain heat, to keep the ground from stealing warmth. Ground doesn't warm up without sun. Mountain side doesn't do that. Fading in and out of sleep, I turned from one side to the other to thaw myself out.

Somewhere in there I had a dream of being attacked by wolves. When I woke up next to shift, I couldn't go back to sleep. I was terrified of wolves; I prayed for wolves. I got the knife ready. The wind blew, the leaves rustled, and my senses sharpened, waiting to hear the nearly imperceptible predators making their way towards me. Thunder off in the distance and I listened for howls.

I war-gamed it out. I would make Menelaus, Lycurgus, and Leonidas proud. A wolf would attack; I'd spring out of the bag, sacrifice my left forearm, shielding my neck as it lunged for me, taking the lacerations to my thighs that its paws made, all as I slammed the knife just below the sternum and thrust down, spilling its innards at my feet. The beast would yelp its last breath, and thus release my arm. Victorious, I would calmly flay my noble opponent, cutting strips for tournequets to stanch the flow from my wounds, which I would bear stoically. Forswearing the use of the car, I'd hike down to the hospital with naught but the pelt as a covering. Me, Hercules reborn!

Then I thought realistically. Wolves are pack animals. I don't need to war-game that. Every scenario above ONE wolf (and even one would do me in) ends with clumps of André fertilizing flowers at the pack's depositing grounds. Plus I remembered that it wasn't so simple as popping out of the bag battle-ready. "Um...Hold off on eating my exposed face while I un-velcro myself and struggle to find the zipper in the dark." Plus, I don't think Hercules ever wore white briefs that his mom sewed his childhood nickname into.

Still, resigned to...whatever, I tried to sleep, but when it began to drizzle (not rain, just drizzle), I used that as my excuse and, still in the bag, bunny-hopped over to the car, unlocked it, and hopped in. Though it was not the same as being exposed on a pointy, rock-faced mountain side, I truthfully can state that a Fiat is no pleasure to sleep in. On a positive note, the gear shift and I accidently became intimately acquainted for approximately one millisecond during the courst of one of my million repositionings for [dis]comfort.

I managed to wake up at dawn. Homer describes it as "rhododactylos eos", or "rosy-fingered dawn." Unlike his description of the "wine-dark sea," he is one hundred percent correct about daybreak. A sliver of saffron capped the opposite peaks as the violet above lost its hold. Below, in the valley, Sparta and its suburbs twinkled on with no idea of the spectacle playing out above. I gazed at it all through thoroughly bloodshot eyes and with a weary, unrested body; perhaps I am Tithonus reborn. I was almost upset that such a fantastic sight would dare interrupt my nearly exquisite miserable experience of the night.

The next morning I made my way towards Mt. Olympus, clear on the other end of the country. Along the 450 miles, I stopped to tour Mycenae, seat of Ancient Greek power and kingdom of Agamemnon, and paused briefly to admire the valiance of Leonidas' three hundred at Thermopylae.