Article: Majka Burhardt from Men's Health

I was trapped in a tent on a glacier for two weeks with a man I barely knew. We were in Alaska to climb Mount Hunter and an unexpected warm front melted the ice off the face we had come to climb, making travel impossible. Our tent was roughly the size of a twin bed and, as the sun beat down on us, we were forced to strip off layers until we were in only our underwear. That lasted until the first afternoon.

For the next 14 days, I watched the glacier soften and the man harden and didn't care that the climb was fast becoming a distant goal. By the time we came home, I was ready to follow him anywhere. Maybe this would have happened with any combination of man, woman and a very small space. But I think it had to do with this particular man.

This particular man was a mountain man. I'd met him two months earlier. I was taking a year off from varsity and looking for climbing partners – especially ones who were a bit older and had dark hair, chiselled triceps and squint lines around their eyes from too many days in the sun.

I found this man outside an Italian bakery. When he said he was looking for a partner, I said yes without hesitation. He woke up every morning with a new perspective on each day, always concocting new adventures. When I was disappointed that we couldn't make that climb, he created a new thrill just for me: wearing only his mountaineering boots, he'd stand outside the tent door and rub snow on his body until it melted into water, running down his tanned skin. Then he'd crawl inside our little home and not let me touch him until I went outside and did the same.

We spent our first year together camping out of his Saab. We've made love at 5 500m and at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. We've climbed in Ecuador, Nepal and Bolivia. After eight years, he still takes the middle seat and always gives me the first shower.

Now we have a home in Colorado. Five years of marriage and a place to hang our ice tools have changed us: our outdoor pursuits are closer to home. Although I haven't seen a snow strip-show in a while, other things keep me reaching for his hips. Like the way he waters our trees, the way he hangs the hummingbird feeder outside two months before they visit – just in case. The way he does all of these things in an old pair of jeans and a too-short T-shirt that rises high onto his ribs as he works. And especially the way he acts surprised when I meet him outside with an ice cube in hand and remind him of the way we met.

What women want - 1
What women want - 2
What women want - 3