High on the Mountain, Wind Blowing Free

Last Thursday, Bill and I had engagement pictures taken by Alison Little.  It was spur of the moment, but I'm so glad we did it.  I had agreed to be a model for her explorations of depression and anxiety, so she offered to take some photos of the two of us.  What a treat! 

We met up on Whitetop, our state's second highest peak, and her favorite place.  The wind was blowing wildly and fitfully, but it was so much fun.  This metal map needs its own post, but suffice it to say that it has Whitetop and Elk Garden, my favorite places.  Bill made it very early on, and it is a map to my heart.  He's a machinist, and this is his masterpiece.

I am SO giggly, have been for well over a year now, and SO self-aware, but Alison did such a wonderful job capturing the two introverts that we are.  Cameras make us both want to hide, as much as we enjoy taking pictures.  These are probably the first pictures of myself that I have truly loved.

 
See?  I'm not hiding!  It makes me smile so widely to think of it all!

This picture might be one of my favorites.  I feel so safe and so loved.  It is beyond anything I could have imagined for myself.  My children are so happy and loved, too.  All the years of loneliness and longing have melted away and make sense now.  I had to walk that trail so I could get here, and I am so excited to see what is ahead.  I am old enough to know that life doesn't get any easier, but it surely is sweeter these days.

Revelations

Last June, I walked to Rowlands Creek Falls again.  I had been there with the children the year before, and it sparked so many memories and reflections in those early Autumn days.  For weeks, my dreams took me to other places and times, and then mixed them up.  The past became my future, and I wondered how that could ever be.  It filled my drifting mind and showed me small glimmers of hope.  This hike was a chance to consider all of that again.

  
I was looking for the elusive bottom of the falls, as they are 150' long.  I had various attempts at bushwhacking, all fruitless and a little precarious.  Did they stretch the hillside and make it steeper scrambling back up?  All the same, I did carefully make my way down to enjoy it all.  I had wonderful empowering revelations along the way, chances to consider the new life before me and marvel at it all.  Joy mixed with pain, as a fair part of the Summer was.  I was so anxious to see what was ahead.  Optimism and caution wrestled back and forth. 

Standing in Rowlands Creek, my beloved sandals gave out.  It wasn't too bad--they were still able to make the walk in one piece.  But, retirement was swift.  As good as I am at getting rid of things, I put these in my archives, a memorial to many adventures.  It was almost a moment of jubilation, and I laughed at myself.  So much laughter in the months to follow.  After fifteen years, a new chapter was beginning.

Long Under Grass

No, no, there is no going back.
Less and less you are
that possibility you were.
More and more you have become
those lives and deaths
that have belonged to you.
You have become a sort of grave
containing much that was
and is no more in time, beloved
then, now, and always.
And so you have become a sort of tree
standing over a grave.
Now more than ever you can be
generous toward each day
that comes, young, to disappear
forever, and yet remain
unaging in the mind.
Every day you have less reason
not to give yourself away.

~Wendell Berry



After I stepped away from this space, I walked mile after mile, both behind a mower and on the trails that link our forests and streams.  Old friendships were rekindled, and new ones were forged.  Some of you, if you are still here, followed me on Instagram and saw the wonderful waterfalls and wide vistas.  I stood in countless streams, full of longing and doing some hard inner work that helped me to grow so very much.  It was a summer that I knew would never come again.

I completed the 52 hikes in record time, about six months after I began, and have kept going toward 100.  There were no repeats on any of the hikes, and I revisited some places I had not been in fifteen years.  One hike included 600 stairs, while others required climbing boulders down to see waterfalls.  A couple were easy.  I lost twenty pounds and gained a lot of grit.  I did a lot of looking back as I found my way forward.

On hike 33, I met the man that I am marrying in six weeks.  That was on the Endless Wall Trail above the New River Gorge.  I asked him to take my hand as I stepped over a precarious crack in a big rock.  Something in my heart never wanted to be away from him, and we have been practically inseparable ever since.  Our first date was hike 35 and Bill told me he loved me on hike 37.  He proposed at the Snail Place on a snowy evening in late January.

It has been a year of miracles, nothing else.  I cannot tell you how full of wonder the whole experience has been.  My faith that was lukewarm has been renewed, and I can say that God hears our deepest longings, even when we think we're the only ones.  There have been plenty of challenges, as life never stops, but the way has been easier to bear than it ever has.  I tried my best to go into it all with my heart and eyes open, and I have been richly blessed.  My children have found someone with whom their hearts are safe.

It feels like many things have come to fruition that were decades in the making.  National Forests and public lands have figured heavily into my story.  The renewed love of place that I experienced a few years ago has grown stronger.  I hope to share some stories of my hikes in this space, even as I am in the throes of moving, wedding planning, and work transitions.  A little quiet time each morning to write and reflect is still so nourishing to me, and our memories fade so quickly.

I hope to see you all soon!