Then there was the time I got home from a Himalayan trip a week or two later than I'd counted on. My plane tickets got me back down to New Mexico, but my guiding job is in Washington and I was supposed to beat feet to get up there so that I could fly out for Alaska. I started driving and driving and driving, adding road lag to jet lag.

I'll tell you, they have some fine all-you-can-eat salad bar and steak places in Northern Utah. I was stopping in every one and looking forward to the next when I caught some chilling news on my car radio: avalanche on Mount Rainier, with climbers in it. I pulled over immediately and called the guide service I work for, found out that it was indeed one of our teams but that they didn't have any details on it yet. I told them I'd be at Paradise parking lot by morning, hopped in my car and gunned it up the interstate.

The next few hours saw me thinking about a lot of things. I convinced myself that some of my best friends were dead. I thought of all the folks who'd be springing into action and trying to help and I considered myself far out of position. But, I went over the mileage again and I knew I could be there... it wasn't going to be a problem staying awake. And with each of these thoughts, I pressed on the gas a little more. Until I was actually going the speed limit for a time.

Which, I remembered too late, was not a thing that particular car was known for in states with high speed limits. A little ways into Idaho, the engine kind of fused and melted and I coasted as far as I could on the shoulder. I got out and raised the hood, got my hands a little dirty and burned and then shut the hood. I stood there with that car and thought about how many Western roads we'd broken down on before and how it was always something of an adventure.

It wasn't an adventure there in Idaho. All my climbing gear and living stuff for a summer was in that piece of junk and I didn't know what was going on the glaciers of Mount Rainier. A few folks stopped and said they'd call for help, but hours went by. I was leaning on the car when the sun went down. I guess it was very beautiful. But I didn't think so then. And I didn't think guiding was so fun then with my guts all knotted up and my mind drifting to every worst case scenario I could drum up. I didn't think that the mobile lifestyle was a good one and I didn't think the empty pockets that always had me in busted down autos were very fun any more. Then it was dark and I just felt like a fool...

It was late when I finally got towed into Burley, Idaho and got in a motel room with a phone. The news from Rainier was bad, there had been a fatality, but when I say I was relieved, I hope you'll understand that I was afraid there'd been many. I slept the night and resolved to make my life better in the morning.

When I got to the dealership, the mechanic had already opened her up and finished laughing at what he saw. Fighting back a grin, he said it might not be worth fixing. I said "Have you, by chance, got any cars on sale here?" He allowed as how they did, in fact, they were all down a couple of blocks in the K Mart parking lot since it was such a big, one of a kind sale.

I went that way and sure enough, $49.95 had been knocked off of all these $25,000 machines. In that part of Idaho, a car sale appeared to consist of about 200 gargantuan pickup trucks. I asked if there were any minivans. The guy blushed for me and said, "Over there, pick any color you like." And he stifled a giggle.

Sure enough, five white ones and one described on the sticker as "Rosewood." Buying a new car in America is supposed to be a big deal. At least the car salesmen and bankers I dealt with that day thought it ought to be. But I had my mind tuned to some different realities just home from two and a half months of life and death high in Tibet.

And the last evening on the side of the road hadn't done anything to fire my imagination for the car game either. I couldn't imagine shopping for a "chick magnet." I wouldn't have known a "prestige model" if it bit me. I just wanted one that worked and that had room for all my gear…and a coffee cup holder…and a loud stereo. But I didn't care to wheel and deal and bargain, hence the roll of my eyes when the salesman said, "So, young fella, how much were ya hopin' to get for a trade in on the old one?" I just laughed and told him "take that car and park it where the sun don't shine... and here, take all my money too."

It kind of ruined the game for him, for which I felt a twinge of guilt... he just wanted to make a day of it was all. But I had places to go and more mountains to climb. I was making for the interstate finally when I spied a drive-through taco window. I brought my new Rosewood vehicle in close, pressed a button and the window went down like magic. I got a combo meal for the ride, but imagine my shock a few miles down the road when I realized there was absolutely no way to eat a taco in a new car without making a mess.

Flying to Buenos Aires en route to Antarctica, I'd been reading that magazine article and reminiscing over those old "bad days in guiding" without the slightest premonition that I was headed for yet another. I got off one plane, stumbled around trying to connect up with another, and got my briefcase stolen.

Homeless mountain guides perhaps carry a little too much in their briefcases. I certainly did. I'd been on the go for so long I couldn't even remember what was in that satchel. Address books, check books, maps, laptop computer... that kind of stuff. And not one little binary shred of data backed up. My whole office, snatched from within six inches of my elbow while I leaned over the ticket counter.

I was shocked, for about five minutes... then the shoulder that the briefcase had been weighing down started feeling a lot better. I realized that the great load of work and emails I was so far behind on was now totally the responsibility of some Argentine bad man. I was free.

I did report the theft to the airport police in my lousy Spanish. A great big guy with a theatrically drooping mustache and a shiny badge came out at one point and hearing that I named my profession as mountain guide, started chuckling. The other officers looked up at him a little surprised... this wasn't exactly petty theft... I was a polite foreigner in distress, it was a fine computer, my office, all that. He saw our reaction and acted out for me his vision of a climbing guide, scaling something and all the while working away at a keyboard. And sure enough, that got me laughing. He had a point. It was a colossal inconvenience in the end, but that is all it was.

I can remember all too clearly a time in my life when such a perceived setback would have had me going through the med kit for a fistful of painkillers and some razorblades. In this case, within a matter of days, the cold and wonderful ocean off Antarctica was smacking me in the face as waves busted over the sides of the Zodiac raft I was sporting around in. Leopard seals were checking us out, whales were spouting and splashing around the boat, and I was surrounded by best friends and headed for long and fun days of skiing and climbing on mountains the world doesn't even have names for yet.

That was when I remembered that magazine article about what a good life guiding can be. I never finished the article, it was in my briefcase. I hope that bad hombre with the sticky fingers gets around to reading it—perhaps he'll be ready for a new profession..

— Dave Hahn, MountainZone.com Columnist