Rocky Mountain High

We just returned late last night from a week's visit to Colorado with the five of us, my brother's family of five, our parents, and my MIL. Thirteen of us in total.

This is our third all-family vacation. We visited Great Smoky Mountain National Park in 2012, Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in 2016, and now Rocky Mountain National Park in 2018.

The day we were all supposed to fly out, my niece woke with a stomach bug, which delayed their family's arrival by a couple days, but they eventually made it and (so far) no one else has gotten ill.

Day 1--Golden, CO

In order to get acclimated to the altitude, we stayed in Golden, CO our first 24-hours before heading up into the higher altitudes. We visited Red Rocks Amphitheater and Park, as well as a little part of Dinosaur Ridge. We also made it into downtown Golden, where we checked out Clear Creek and ate at Bob's Atomic Burgers.

At Clear Creek, Golden

Dinosaur Ridge Visitors Center

Red Rocks Park

DAY 2: More Red Rocks and then heading to Granby, CO

On our way to Granby, we stopped and ate lunch in Winter Park, CO at a restaurant called Denos.

This is the house we stayed at in Granby.

Deer walked through the neighborhood every morning and evening, and we had a family of prairie dogs we could watch from a window. We arrived too early to check in, so we took a little hike on the Fraser to Granby Trail.

This deer under the window was just resting.

Granby is a very small town on the western side of the mountains. It is a short drive to Grand Lake, which is a slightly bigger town with more shops and restaurants. Grand Lake is also the "locals" entrance to RMNP. Estes Park is on the eastern side of the Rockies and where most tourists go.

DAY 3--Grand Lake, CO
We went into Grand Lake on Monday and hiked to Adams Falls, which is part of RMNP.

My brother's family arrived on Monday afternoon, which meant that we could carry on with our plans to go on a morning breakfast horseback ride at Snow Mountain Ranch on Tuesday. The kids LOVED this!

DAY 4--Snow Mountain Ranch and Colorado River

This was my handsome horse, known as PoopChute.

The kids met a real-life cowboy named Tim. 

He has broken nearly every bone in his body from riding in rodeos. 

After riding, a breakfast of eggs, pancakes, and bacon tasted delicious!

G and M handled their horses so well!!

Since the morning ride didn't last too long, we thought we'd try Hot Sulphur Springs in the afternoon. We weren't impressed with the springs, so we opted to just dip our feet in the Colorado River.

DAY 5--Steamboat Springs, CO
We had promised the kids some water fun, so we drove to Steamboat Springs to visit Old Town Resort and Spa. We ate at BeauJo's and then walked around the town for a bit.

Sights around Steamboat Springs as we walked

It is a bad idea to take 6 kids into Rocket Fizz Candy Shop.

Day 6--RMNP

We started here:

At some point, we spotted these guys,

and then went here

More driving up the mountain. 

Took some photos at Farview Curve Overlook

We made it up to here and climbed the Alpine Ridge Trail

EVERYONE had a great time up there. 

 We had pushed the kids entirely too far so we ate lunch in Hidden Valley.

During our RMNP full day, we saw marmots, elk, a ram, a coyote, and FINALLY, we spotted this dude:

Day 7--RMNP with D, and Grand Lake one.last.time

D and I drove up to see Lake Irene and hike a wee bit before heading into Grand Lake with everyone later in the day.

Lake Irene

Green River Mountain Trail

 Grand Lake Lodge, overlook

 Grand Lake

Hummingbird feeders lining the shops in Grand Lake

G thought the baskets were cool 

(as you can tell from his enthusiastic expression).

Day 8--Headed back to Golden before our flight

We had time to kill before our flight, so we went back to Red Rocks to stroll around and then ate lunch at the Bridgewater Grill near Clear Creek.

At some point, in the airport, my grumpy middle child took 29 photos of himself grinning like a fool even though he mostly pouted the entire week prior.

You cannot rationalize suicide

Ever since my own mental health breakdown of 2004, I have been an advocate for discussing and treating anxiety, depression, OCD, and whatever other mental health issues people have.

The recent suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain have social media blowing up with commentary like this:
How could this happen?
I don't understand!
Call a suicide prevention line!

My gut reaction to these is: "PLEASE, JUST STOP!"
That feels harsh, but I cannot understand people trying to rationally understand suicide and the depths of despair that make people contemplate it or do it.
There is nothing rational about it, so trying to understand it from a rational framework is pointless.
Suicide goes against every fiber of genetic imperative to survive, survive, survive.

When my cousin committed suicide, I overheard numerous conversations whereby family and friends were questioning "why."

Thank your lucky stars if you don't understand why.

Even posting the suicide hotline number omits the truth, which I know personally: You can call a suicide hotline number, and maybe it will provide some relief. But feeling so despairing that you call a hotline puts you in touch with people who are rational and who may or may not understand from personal experience the despair of mental health issues. If you are so despairing that you call the hotline, it may not do any good.

When I called a suicide hotline, I spoke to someone completely rational. She made complete rational sense.
And she may as well have been talking to a mountainous wall of impenetrable iron because it didn't matter what she said.
I only knew and believed what I felt and what my own brain was telling me.
Which was completely irrational.

I did not attempt suicide, but I was feeling desperate.
I reached out to a suicide hotline because I didn't know where else to turn, and it was anonymous.
Eventually what did work was telling my husband that if he didn't take me to the doctor that day, I was going to end up in the hospital.
That doctor visit began a long, slow process to mental health "remission."

I am not cured, nor will I ever be.
I now have a child with mental health issues, which sometimes worsens my own mental health issues.

Depression and anxiety and OCD and other mental health disorders are isolating, and those in the public eye may be worse off than the rest of us because they are isolated already as a result of their celebrity.

Your job doesn't love you

Even before I had a family, I knew I would put family before everything. 

It is why D and I have lived on one salary (his) our entire marriage, and why I squirreled mine away in the almost seven years before we had kids: so that I could be at home and be available to my family.

I haven't always loved or even liked this availability. It is frequently a pain in the neck, and there are many, many mornings when I am glad I am subbing so that I don't have to be around for the getting of the boys on the bus. 

Part of the reason I have not gone back to work full-time is that even though I would love teaching full-time and planning instruction full-time, I would hate the grading papers and the meetings and all the other things that would infringe on my availability to my family beyond full-time. 

A strong work ethic is important, but a job will replace you in a heartbeat. Your family cannot.

If I die, there will be other subs to take jobs and other writers to write pieces. 

My employers will adjust rather quickly.

My family, on the other hand, would not. 

And so this is why my family comes first.

Given this, you can understand why I COMPLETELY LOST MY F*CKING MIND when D told me that he is expected to take his laptop on vacation *just in case.

He hasn't been asked to do that before, and I can assure you that he isn't gonna start.

His work may want to interfere with HIS vacation, but they sure as hell aren't going to interfere with MINE, and since we're a package deal, they can [insert crude sentiment here].

Vacations are sacrosanct for me.

I don't work, and neither will D.

I don't check in.

I don't email people. 

I barely check social media.

Vacations are for experiencing and living in the moment, for living deeply and sucking the marrow out of life. 

His employer has known about this vacation since January, so they have had plenty of time to plan or adjust or whatever they need to do to deal with D's absence.

And if he is so blanged important to the functioning of the company, they need to pay him a hell of a lot more.

I told him to tell them that he is a doing a trial run that week for when he dies.