THERE WERE 14 SUMMITS LEFT—all but one in the San Juan and San Miguel mountains, in the southwestern corner of the state. I decided to start right in with two of the most difficult: 14,159-foot El Diente and its parent peak, 14,246-foot Mount Wilson. I waited until March for the snowpack to settle and for my fitness to build, but I couldn't shake the visions: I would see myself reaching for a placement with my prosthetic tool, only to have it slip off the rock or pop out of the snow, and then I'd be falling . . .

By the light of my headlamp, I left the base camp I'd established at 12,000 feet and strode quickly up the basin, crampons biting on the compacted snow. Climbing the 30-to-40-degree slopes was fun and easy, and I even wished I'd brought my skis up from camp. Then I started up a many-fingered gully that led into the Organ Pipe gendarmes, dozens of towers that stand like ranks of soldiers on the summit ridge.

I picked my way through large rocks perched upon larger rocks, at one point poking my foot down into a snow bridge and exposing a gap that plunged a hundred feet down the side of the ridge. At the last Pipe, a series of sills hung over the north face; with my body extended and my prosthesis reaching out of sight, I made a committing and unbalanced move. All the visions and fears crowded in on me; the rocks of the north face waited on the other end of a hundred feet of air. But my tool held, my weight shifted, and I was clear. I'd passed the crux.

Ten minutes later, after plowing through the great solid pillows of snow guarding the summit, I stood atop my 46th winter solo fourteener. The sobs that choked my throat reflected all the doubts, worries, anxieties, and uncertainties of the previous ten months. Looking down into the canyonlands where my accident had taken place, it was as though I could see the direct path of my rescue, rehabilitation, and recovery arcing up from the red desert straight to El Diente's summit.

But there would be no gimmes. The next day, a few hundred feet from a reachy and difficult move at the summit of Mount Wilson, I noticed that the wrist of my prosthetic mountain ax was packed with snow. I whacked at the casing with my handheld ice tool enough to free the release button. But then the mechanism nearly fell to pieces. Of the six screws that attach the ax to the prosthetic casing, two were backed halfway out, three were loosened to their last thread, and one was simply gone.

Crap. Now, in the freezing thin air 14,000 feet above sea level, I had to disassemble the wrist, reseat the parts, and resecure the screws. It was like trying to sew a button on a shirt with one hand while wearing a mitten. The delay maddened me, until I realized what might have happened if I hadn't checked my prosthetic gear. I would have been up on that full-stretch pull-up at the summit, my feet dangling over the chute into Bilk Basin. With all my body weight hanging on the ax, I could've easily pulled it apart.

Whoa. This wasn't going to be easy. But I could do it, and I would finish.