Still in Wales...

Today I delivered my final course down here, this time to the staff of Mountain Training UK&Ireland, many of whom I know very very well. It was tough on a lot of levels, but feedback was amazing.

It's fair to say its been an emotional week;
Handing on the restructured organisation I've worked so hard to develop.
Listening to more members than ever laugh, feeling a palpable sense of comeraderie, sharing people I know well's tales, drinking far (far) too much. Being asked to be honorary Président, seeing so many smiles, talking about counselling for those at the end of their careers and then, moments later, mentoring for those just starting out. Both inconceivable a few years ago.

Then, after the noise and the bustle, last night I went and had a meal and some quality time with Phil (in extras) . Phil has a mountaineering CV that eclipses mine and then some, and has been one of the world's most successful cameramen. Then a moment, and so so nearly gone. He is now rehabilitating from an ABI (acquired brain injury), confined to a wheelchair, quite literally looked down on. His experiences since his accident brought tears of anger. Sharing our tale with each other brought tears of sorrow. But time spent with Phil brought many many many tears of laughter, a bright burning soul.
He broke so many of us on Sunday morning when he told us how he'd awoken and just sobbed for an hour in bed remembering the previous night's gala dinner where we'd made him a guest. The simple act of being spoken to like a mountainneer again, even like a person again, that was the highlight of his year.

Last night we sat up till late - many of Phils filters are gone, he laughs quickly and long, tears come easily, it's the happiest thing in the world to sit and hold his hand in embrace. I hope with my everything that he learns to walk, climb and soar again, but I also hope he remains this unfiltered - emotionally honest and true.
We live in an age of cheap transitory celebrity, the banal often burnished for it's moment on the idiot box. Phil is the real deal, a real inspiration as he climbs his way back, the hardest mountain of them all.