"But isn't it great to look back, once it's over, on something really painful, some huge challenge you had to face, and to say 'Yeah, I climbed the mountain'?" Bridget asks me.

Indeed, I have thought a lot about mountains. I thought about cross-country and the epic, nostalgia-shaped hole it left in my life (a pleasant hole, though sad). Mount SAC. Mount Doom. I know that feeling Bridget is describing. It's not a coincidence that she was a runner too. There is pleasure in remembering the agony of the struggle. But only, really, when the struggle means something. I'm not talking about saving the world here, or even winning the race. You know if your struggle means something. You just know. Even if it just comes down to not waking up every day wishing you hadn't, to not loathing of the sight of your own skin. That means something. I've overcome too much, at this point, to be stirred by the challenge of an academic test.

"It is," I say. "It is a great feeling, and everyone has to experience it. But...I have climbed...several big mountains already. Real mountains, I can't even..." I sniff and swallow and press my palms against my eyes for a moment. The alkaline drip of bitter memories mingles with overpriced pizza grease. Press the shame back, back, back into the dark center of your skull. Close the door. Exhale.

"I've been there," I say. "More than once. I've done that. This, for me, is not that."