It’s about 1:00pm on a Friday afternoon, my 47th birthday, and we are only about 6 miles into our 30 mile hike up the Art Loeb Trail in the Appalachian Mountains; and we had already gotten lost. I had called myself training for this hike for about 6 weeks now; and I was already hurting. Of course, it’s kind of hard to train for mountain hike in the Mississippi Delta; but I thought it would help more than this! Every inch of my ass was throbbing; and I kept checking my inner thighs to see if it was blood dripping down my leg from them rubbing together; or if it was just sweat. It felt like the friction from my thighs rubbing was about to start its own fire; but no blood. I kept calm on the outside; and tried to control my breathing. But on the inside, I was already freaking out. I had wanted to do something like this for over a decade; and I it all planned out; and it was all instantly falling apart. I came here desperately seeking peace and solace in the arms of Mother Nature but, at this point, the canopy overhead was so thick as we hiked deeper into the mountains, that I could barely see the sky! My heart was crushed; and my soul was blind to any beauty left in the world. I was old. I was carrying a rose from my best friends casket on my backpack. I was in the most emotional pain I had experienced in a long time; and now every muscle in my body was shaking from pure physical exhaustion. ‘It couldn’t possibly get worse,’ I thought. “Mom, the damn sole of my hiking boot just came completely off!” Of course it can get worse.
So how does a 47 year old woman, heartbroken, and at her very bottom, find herself lost in the Appalachian Mountains with her daughter wearing only one boot? Well, to answer that, we have to start at the very beginning. Not just the beginning of the day; I mean the very beginning. We have to go back to a time before married the best man around (my Slingshot), back before children, back before my first marriage, back before both my best friends died unexpectedly; and I went from a trio to solo.
I’m weird. I’ve always been weird in everyone else’s eyes. In my eyes, I’ve just had an intense urge to try everything and anything to avoid the mundane days of living in the Mississippi Delta. While I appreciate the purples and reds that paint the sky with a Delta sun set; and the millions of stars that sparkle in the night, the expansive Delta crop fields that stretch to the horizon can feel somewhat smothering. When dirt is all there is for as far as the eye can see, the Mississippi Delta can make you somewhat of a prisoner of the system with literally no hope for change in sight.
I’ve never been content with my surroundings. So I’ve always wanted to experience new things, whether it be a new hairstyle, new music, new religion even- which is the most taboo one could ever do in the middle of the Bible Belt. But, I can’t help it. I am who I am and my friends (as small of a group as they are) have always just accepted my weirdness. They embraced it actually and we had lots of plans to grow into old women and do weird things together and go on weird trips together.
We had so many plans, but it always seemed like something would come up and we would have to put them off until “next year”. And haven’t we all been there before? “Let’s take a girls trip to the beach this summer!” And then a month later, “Sorry. Brian’s got to get braces; so I won’t be able to do a girls trip after all. Maybe next year.” Over and over again, this is what would happen. And then, Eden died at 37 years old and shook everything up. But, still, we were moms and wives now and everything else took a backseat. And again, plans were made; but most were cancelled almost immediately. And then, a few weeks ago, Vickey died at 47 and shook my world yet again. The trio was now solo.
When your two best friends die before the age of 50, there is one glaring lesson you learn- the freaking dishes can wait! The dishes can wait, the overflowing garbage can isn’t going to hurt a fly, and while your kids need you to be present; they don’t need you to hover over their every move. In fact, your kids need to see you thrive and enjoy life to its fullest. Otherwise, they will only grow up worrying about the damn dishes too. Easier said then done. I know. I spent the first 47 years of my life, putting off all the adventures my little weird heart desired to make sure the dishes were put away and the floors mopped; and my kids will tell everyone that I was a “Helicopter Mom”. And I don’t regret any of that. I only regret missing out on those plans that got cancelled as a result.
So, that’s how I wound up lost in the Appalachian Mountains with 4 ounces of water and my daughter with one boot on. I had wanted to go on a solo hike for over a decade now. Growing up in the flatlands of the Delta, I was always fascinated with mountains. They seemed so majestic against the horizon, yet so mysterious. I always wanted to know, ‘What goes on amongst those trees?’ I knew people lived up there, hidden from the world. And I am absolutely convinced Bigfoot is there somewhere! So, I’ve always wanted to go hiking up a mountain. And this year was the year I was going to do it! I had found a trail (of course being a newbie to the whole scene I chose one of the most difficult trails around- The Art Loeb Trail); my husband bought all the gear to cover any possible emergency scenario and I had taken vacation time off from work. I was set. Then a couple days before I was to leave, Vickey didn’t wake up.
For a day or so, I couldn’t fathom leaving. But, as I watched them lower my best friend into her grave, all I could think about was all the plans we had made; but never got to do together. I took a rose from her casket, attached it to my backpack and hit the road 20 minutes later. At the last minute, my daughter decided to come with me and met me there.
We got off to a great start; but things went south fast. I had underestimated just how steep the trail would be. My backpack kept slipping, no matter how tight we tried to fasten it. The marking for the trail, the “blazes” as they are called, were white; and it was sometimes hard to tell if the trees had blazes or just random white spots on them. So, we kept getting a little turned around. We found our first water source and gained a little more physical and mental strength. Onward and upward we pushed. I’m 47 years old; and began to feel every bit of it. My thighs were killing me, the elevation was making my asthmatic lungs work double-time and there were no views! All you could see was trees and more trees. The canopy was so thick, the sun couldn’t even get through well enough to get my solar charger to work. We were losing the batteries on our phones quickly and drinking way too much water.
When we came to what should’ve been our second water source, it was all dried up. A little taken aback, but not too worried we pushed on through; hoping to find water around the next bend. It was about then that the sole of Jane’s boot came completely off. I don’t know if it was steepness of the trail, the rough terrain or just God’s sick sense of humor. But there we were, two females, 3 shoes, 4 ounces of water and 1 working phone with very little battery left. We siphoned through our emergency kit and found some gauze tape and improvised. That didn’t even last another mile, before we had to stop and retape. About 3 miles later, we took the hair ties out of our hair to hold the sole on. This method proved to be alot better and we trudged on. Hours later, still no water to be found and I was scaring the birds away as I moaned and groaned with each step taken up yet another mountain. It was getting late in the afternoon and we were exhausted.
We came to a slight clearing; still no view, but there was a nice spot to set up camp. After hours of not seeing anything else besides a snake that refused to cross the trail and let us by, we finally came across a couple fellow human hikers. When we asked them about the nearest water source, they informed us that we would need to get off the Art Loeb and follow another trail with orange blazes for a few miles and we would find a nice creek with plenty of moving water. As the sun was falling behind the trees, we set up camp, ate a nice dinner of tuna and jerky and called it a night. Is it spooky sleeping on the side of a mountain, amongst bears and the bigfoot that has continued to allude us? Of course it is! We even pulled up our campsite and tried to make a quick dash off the mountain when we were certain we heard a skinwalker laughing. But, after just a few yards back into the forest in the pitch black night, we quickly decided that we would go back to the clearing and hunker down for the night. We popped a few Valerian Root capsules and knocked ourselves out, with the intention of waking up at dawn, finding water and getting the hell off the mountain!
After eating more jerky and putting Jane’s boot back together again, I left a couple petals from Vickey’s rose; we headed off. After a couple miles, we realized that a couple miles to mountain hikers meant about 4-5 miles in our terms. But we could hear water running and were on a decline, which made all the difference in the world to us physically. So we trudged on with more enthusiasm than the day before. And just like magic, there it was! The cutest little creek with running water and nice clearing big enough for sun to come through! As I filled our water containers and filters, Jane worked on chasing the sunlight to charge our phones. I dropped a few more petals of Vickey’s rose at the creek. We ate yet more jerky; replenished our souls and our bodies and embarked on a new mission to getting off the mountain. We weren’t even worried about the boot any more. The trail was leveling out and that had to mean that we were coming off the mountain. We still had no view; so we couldn’t really tell. But the water was getting louder and louder and we knew there was a river at the bottom of the mountain. We turned the corner, and there is was….. a dam. A dam and a river- it was a dead end and we had no idea where we were. None of the trees had any colored blazes on them and we were stuck again.
This would be the moment Jane finally lost it. “Where the hell are we? I want off this damn mountain! I can’t take it any more! This stupid solar charger is shit. My boot sucks! I am sick of jerky and tuna. I just want to go home, eat a pizza and take a shower!” Even Vickey lost it! I bent over to put the food back in the backpack and most of her rose petals dropped to the ground. “Give me a minute!” I yelled, “Vickey fell!” Jane retorted, “Even Vickey wants off this mountain!”
We crossed the river, and got to the bottom of another mountain, Jane’s foot soaked to the bone. A few hundred yards later, we came across our new best friend, David, who led us off the mountain and back to civilization. Coming out of the mountains, Jane hobbling on one boot with a dirty bandana holding the other one together, holding the solar charger over her heard, me limping and groaning with every step, we looked like we had just stepped off the set of the next “Wrong Turn” movie. David, our new best friend gave us a ride back to our car (which would’ve been a 20 mile hike back) and we were home free!
The next day we drove to the other side of the Art Loeb and hiked Black Balsam, which was our goal to begin with. As I stood there, over a mile in the sky, trees below me, a city in the distance, I began to feel tears stream down my face. I didn’t even realize I was crying. It was beautiful. There were other hikers there too, but no one was speaking. No one, except a man that appeared to be in his 60s. He was openly crying and just kept saying aloud, to no one particular, “We are on top of the world. We are on top of the world. This is beautiful. It’s just so beautiful.” And it was. It really was the most beautiful moment I had ever shared with perfect strangers.
And, even though I came home with blisters on my feet and thighs; and Jane came home with one less shoe, I would do it all again. Even as I cried out from the physical pain of climbing those mountains, I felt more alive and closer to my best friends than I ever did. They were both there with me. We had finally gotten to go on an adventure together.
Lessons Learned From The Rainbow 