The Mountain That Held Me

Early last summer, I had just been cut loose from the Space Center.

After decades of building an identity inside complex systems, precision work, and missions that once gave my life shape and meaning…

it ended abruptly.

Not ceremoniously.

Not gently.

Just — gone.

I remember carrying that loss in my body more than in my thoughts.

A heaviness behind the eyes.

A constant low-grade ache in the chest.

That strange disorientation when the life you built no longer exists, but the next one hasn’t arrived yet.

I was encouraged to take a trip to see my sister in New Hampshire, hoping the mountains might reset something.

They didn’t.

The grief came with me.

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We weren’t there for healing, technically.

We were there to vend.

My sister had the idea for us to set up side-by-side canopies — her beautiful crocheted goods on one side, and me offering astrology charts and conversations on the other.

I showed up.

Set up my banner.

Smiled when people approached.

Inside, I was anything but okay.

I sold a few charts — maybe four — but what I remember most were the conversations.

Slow ones.

Honest ones.

The kind where people weren’t asking for answers, just permission to feel.

In hindsight, I realize something quietly important:

Even while broken, I was still serving.

Even while grieving, the medicine was still moving through me.

I just didn’t recognize it yet.

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At some point, my sister suggested we ride the cog railway up Mount Washington.

Normally, I would hike.

That’s who I am.

But that season… my body and nervous system weren’t up for climbing anything.

So I rode.

And that choice, small as it seems now, may have been the most compassionate thing I did for myself all year

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Somewhere on the ascent, we passed a sign:

Jacob’s Ladder — Elevation 4,725 ft.

I laughed and sent a photo to my brother, Jacob.

He replied immediately:

“My ladder is on my truck.”

Classic Leo. Practical. Unimpressed by mysticism.

But the sign stayed with me.

Because in spiritual language, Jacob’s Ladder is the bridge between earth and heaven.

The passage between who you were… and who you are becoming.

And there I was.

Not climbing it.

Not striving.

Not earning.

Just being carried upward.

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At the summit, the wind was fierce.

The clouds moved fast.

People took photos and hurried back inside.

I stood there quietly.

Not healed.

Not inspired.

Not transformed.

Just… steadied.

The mountain didn’t fix me.

But it did something far more subtle.

It held me without asking me to perform.

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Later that day, I remembered my sister and her friends kept gently telling me to “feel better.”

They meant well.

But grief doesn’t obey encouragement.

Still — I smiled.

I listened.

I kept showing up.

And now, months later, I can see something I couldn’t then:

That weekend wasn’t an escape.

It was a threshold.

A moment when my old identity had ended…

but my new life hadn’t yet announced itself.

And the medicine arrived anyway.

Through wildflowers.

Through strangers.

Through a slow train to the clouds.

Through conversations I didn’t realize were healing me too.

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I share this now because many people I work with are standing in similar places.

After layoffs.

After divorces.

After injuries.

After spiritual awakenings that dismantled more than they built.

If that’s you, I want you to hear this:

You do not always have to climb.

Sometimes the bravest thing you can do…

is let yourself be carried for a while.

The mountain will still meet you there.