Trustees of Reservations, a director of Corning Incorporated, and serves on several other nonprofit boards. He lives in Massachusetts, with his wife, Jill.
French applied the "Page 99 Test" to The Gap Years: Climbing, Skiing, and the Journey Back, his first non-business book, with the following results:
From page 99:Visit Tom French's website.Meanwhile, I had been fine-tuning other aspects of my health preparations. Ever since returning from Aconcagua, I had wondered why, after performing strongly lower on the mountain, I had been so acutely affected by the altitude on summit day. This prompted a memory from years earlier on Denali, when our team had passed through the fourteen-thousand-foot camp on the West Buttress the day after summiting via the West Rib. A high-altitude research team, set up in a park rangers’ tent, had asked to measure our blood oxygen levels, starting with the team member who had dealt best with the altitude up high. I was flagged as that person. Yet, when our oxygen levels were compared, mine was by far the lowest. It was a curiosity that I didn’t dwell on at the time. Now, preparing to head to Everest, where performance at extreme high altitude would be crucial, I tried to connect some dots.When I first heard about the Page 99 Test, I was excited at the prospect of applying it to The Gap Years. When I flipped to the page to see what awaited me, I was disappointed to find it less representative of the book than hoped. The page describes dealing with various personal health issues as I prepare for the first of two attempts to climb Mount Everest. One of these is trying to obtain a Covid vaccination before departure, just as the vaccine is becoming available to the general public. Another is reconciling my blood oxygen levels at various altitudes with my actual performance at those altitudes. The majority of the book contains accounts of expedition travel, cross-country ski racing, and mountaineering worldwide, interspersed with reflections on spiritual fulfillment found in the outdoors and contemplation of the pursuit of life meaning. Page 99 is far less lyrical. Just practical details. Not the book’s best foot forward.
That said, page 99 has its place in the book, and it is indicative of an important sub-theme of The Gap Years: the interplay between physicality and spirituality. The book describes journeys to the summits of the world’s highest mountains, in a quest to embrace spirits rarely encountered. These outward journeys are powered by inward journeys of preparation, to restore a sixty-year-old body to top physical condition, and to prepare for extreme athletic challenge. The physical journeys are not only practical, but also in their own way spiritual. For someone whose youth was defined by endurance training, returning to it was a voyage of rediscovery and deep meaning. As meaningful in many ways as the summits themselves.
Some of my favorite passages in the book describe the interplay between physical activity and the natural world: the “Zen-like exchange of moist breath and frigid air” while ice climbing, or, while cross-country skiing, “feeling the freedom of moving swiftly through crystalline winter beauty, of pride in one’s body, of sharing the experience with close friends." These moments, verging on spiritual, depended on my body being able to perform at an extremely high level; something that can’t be taken for granted in one’s sixties. Climbing high mountains at this age also has unique risks. Death rates on Everest increase markedly for climbers over sixty. There were many reasons why getting practical health details sorted out was important.
In summary, page 99 of The Gap Years is not particularly gripping, and is not indicative of much of the broader focus of the book. But it refers to some practical details that really mattered, and it hints at an inward journey that is central to it.
--Marshal Zeringue
Posts
