The thud and bounce of my skull, my head lands now in the usual spot at the foot of the mountain. Around me crash the ropes and pulleys, the carabiners and anchors I thought would surely hold me to the peak this time.

Wait just one sec, while I brace for the wave of pain, from my stone-scraped fingertips and torn nails to my twisted joints and battered body. Perhaps I’ll cry, or I’ll manage not to. It’s almost nice to lie here just a moment, to pretend I don’t have to get back up again.

But, of course, I do.

I know that when I open my eyes, all that will be waiting for me is the mountain.

There’s not exactly a rock; I am the rock. By now, I know that if I am to walk, it will only be uphill, pushing, struggling, enduring, sweating, until that inevitable trip and then the shove of gravity, cracking and shattering — unraveling, destruction, damage, loss.

By now, I know the longer I lie here, the worse it will be. I must staunch the bleeding. I must survey the disaster. I must gather my tools and try again.

But first: “Alexa, order me bedazzled trekking poles.”

Sequins for my hiking boots: add to cart.

Pom pom fringe for my pack: add to cart.

Cat eye sunglasses like a costume over my eyes: add to cart.

That which glows, sparkles, changes colors, launches confetti, smells like a field of lavender and lemons. I’ll need that same-day shipping, please. I’ve got a mountain to convince myself to climb.

Camus says, “There is no sun without shadow and it is essential to know the night.”

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

He says: crushing truths perish from being acknowledged.

And so I acknowledge: it’s halfway through my life, and by now I get it: This is what it’s going to be like, no matter what I do out there. This, this is the rock I’m carrying in here. This is place I will never not fall back to.

He says one always finds one’s burden again, so let it find me it in a chiffon dress that billows in the winds, earrings that dangle and graze my face on the fall. This hair in the dirt will be as blonde as I please, with that perfect curl. May my shiny nails delight me. May my socks make me giggle. May my perfume, for just the moment I spritz it into the air around me as I take a deep breath before I start again, make me feel like one of them.

Camus says the struggle toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. But I, thank goodness, am a woman. Glitter my tired eyelids, turn the volume up on my pink headphones, and load my bubble gun.