Several days ago, I was hiking in an attempt to outwalk an ominous looking cloud. There were reports that thunderstorms from Tropical Storm Andrea (was that her name?) were producing heavy rains, hail, and possible tornadoes. I had taken precautions the night before (and found a 2-person tent to share), but the storm had stalled out. Instead, we got hit at about 9 AM. About 90 minutes after I had started hiking.
The people I had camped with the night before were all faster than I was because my knee was starting to hurt so badly. They had all gone on ahead of me when the skies opened up and the wind suddenly flared. I heard what sounded like tornado sirens going off in the valley below me though I didn't see any funnels. The skies were ominous and dark. The rain just pummeled me. The wind was so strong, it ripped the belt off of my poncho which left my poncho flailing around my, making it even harder to navigate the rocks or to keep dry. I wanted to move faster, but my knee twinged with pain with every step. Needless to say, I was not in a good place.
As I struggled to walk, I became more and more afraid. I thought about what would happen if I slipped and tumbled down the hillside or had a tree fall on my head. It could be days before anyone found my body. I'd be lying there all alone, no one would know where I was. The folks hiking with me weren't close enough to wonder when I didn't show up at the next place. They'd just figure I had stopped to wait out the storm and keep on going. No one was behind me that was expecting to see me further up. I was alone.
Now, it wasn't the dying or the pain or the weirdness of being injured on the side of the hill that frightened me. It was being alone. I was afraid of facing all that weirdness alone. I really needed to get to a place where I would be with people. I climbed up to a road and hitched to a wayside, and then to the nearest hostel.
Funny thing is that I'm not alone in feeling that way. Several days ago (after I had survived the thunderstorm, and got a brace for my knee), I was talking to a hiker who had actually gotten off the Trail with no intention of coming back. He said he had hiked for almost 2 weeks without seeing any of the people he had gotten to know earlier on the Trail. He was SOOOOO lonely, and he just couldn't stand it anymore. So he left. Went home to his girlfriend. Then, two other hikers called him and convinced him to come back.
So I started asking all the hikers which ones had either gotten off the Trail to visit home or who had a loved one come visit them on the Trail (maybe to take a mini-vacation from the Trail, only closer to it than their home is). Almost every single person had done that at least once, if not multiple times. Huh. It had never occurred to me that I might need loved ones - not just to help with stuff like mail drops or goodie packages or a phone call. No, but I would need loved ones to simply be just that. Someone who loved me so I wouldn't be alone. Let's just say I definitely had the "Virginia Blues".
I stayed in a hostel a couple of nights ago. It had a phone on the wall with a sign: "No hiker hikes alone. Call your support. It's free here." Interesting thing is that I didn't take advantage of that. I was too busy looking for the hole in my sleeping pad and getting my food ready for the morning. Internally, I was fretting because I knew that I'd be losing my current hiking buddy in the next few days and I'd be alone. Again.
What I'm realizing is that I don't want to need other people. I should be better than that. I should be self-sufficient, self-reliant. I shouldn't be an imposition on others.
But that's a load of crap. People need people. And try as I might to be better than that, I'm still people. My damned self-sufficiency keeps me isolated from others as I strive to be needed, but not to need. This needs to be fixed. Finding that balance of being in community without being a drain to that community. Previous to this Trail, any thought of asking for help was a mark of shame upon my very soul. No self-respecting Midwestern, middle class, liberated woman should need any help. I should be strong enough to handle anything. But the Trail has this desire to help. It's a community unlike any other. Maybe you are hiking alone. But you are never alone. And loved ones back home are as much a part of this journey as any other.
I don't know yet what will need to change to recover from my DSS (damned self-sufficiency). I'm sure I'll still be Midwestern, middle class, and liberated. But, perhaps, I will allow people to be needed by me as much as I try to be needed by them. Perhaps, someday, I will grow past my DSS enough that the previous sentence won't even be necessary. It will simply be a matter of being rather than a matter of need or of efficiency. It will be a place of abundance instead of being just sufficient enough.
I needed people that day on the mountain in the storm. I needed to realize I was too weak, mentally and physically, to keep hiking. I needed to be OK enough in that weakness to admit I needed a ride, admit I needed a break, and admit that I needed to yellow-blaze past 30 miles of the Trail. And, no, I have no intention of going back to hike those miles, just to say I walked past those white blazes. That is part of the healing process away from my DSS. Yup, I may have failed walking those miles. Yup, I took a car (that's what yellow-blazing means - hitching down the Trail instead of walking). Yup, some people may be disappointed in my choice. Yup, I needed some medical TLC. And Yup, I needed impose my needs on others so they could help me get back to the place where I could continue my journey on this Trail. I am so thankful for the couple that gave me a ride to the wayside, to the employee who gave me a ride to the gap where I could easily walk to the hostel, and to the owner of the hostel who convinced me to take a day off to just heal. As I tried to earn my "day off" by doing laundry and cleaning the hostel, he told me to stop and simply take a nap on the couch. Begrudgingly, I obeyed. That was a much-needed nap. And when I awoke and was considering hiking out because I 'should', two hikers I knew from before showed up, and that was what convinced me to take the rest of the day off, go into town and get the knee brace.
And ALL of that is what has allowed me to shake off these blues and continue hiking. What a journey.
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