Date: 2012-04-26
From: Big Stamp

To: Nolichucky River
Miles today: 17.8

April 26, 17.8 miI woke up in terror. The wind was blowing all four walls of my tent inwards on itself so that I could barely breathe and I could feel no space that wasn't collapsing in, encasing me. I heard the amazing roar of the storm all around me and the fibrous snapings of my cheap tent poles as they bent above me. Even though I lay on the ground, I was buffeted back and forth on my mat, which I felt was very wet. My thrown out hand somehow passed over my flashlight, which had been tossed to the ground from its usual space above my head in the webbing. I turned the nozzle at the end and focused it into a finite point. I could see. It was like waking up in a sinking sail boat. Water was coming in fast, I didn't understand from where. In fact I sloshed about in about six inches of water with every movement I made. My first thought was to save my food, mainly keep my precious bread from getting wet, but although it was relatively safe in its plastic wrap with the twist tie there was nowhere safe to put it. My pack was soaked, I'd left it open, and all the muddy water flooding my tent had entered it as well making it heavy and turning it a blood red color. ¢Oh no! Oh no!¢ I muttered aloud, shaking with fear. An assault of wind gail blew in on the side of me, the strongest yet, and I cried out as I splashed to the floor, dropping my flashlight somewhere in the water. I struggled to sit up, but didn't know what to do next. Go outside? Abandon my tent? Or would it be even worse out there? Of course it would. A very close beam of lightening lit up my plight in a stark strobe light. ¢AHHHhhh!¢ I wailed, so afraid that I was beyond reason. Catatonic. I couldn't move. My fumbling hands grabbed for the candy bars and I unwrapped and ate one after the other. I couldn't do anything else. Are you hungry now, bitch?¢Oh fuck! FUCK!¢ I tottered over the edge of sanity right then. I'd been dancing along a cliff face recently, trying to enjoy the darkness of my nightmares, of my madness. But in that moment I felt, not fear of dying, but fear of being. ¢Oh. Uh-uh-oh. Oh!¢ My inhales and exhales wracked my skeleton. I couldn't stop jerking about involuntarily. ¢I should have ¢ oh! I shouldn't have. Oh FUCK!¢ Then the thought of the ambivalent encounter I'd just had with the man, how it was completely painful ¢ pointless ¢ sickened me. ¢Ohhh! Oh my God!¢ I cried, rocking forward and back in spasmatic thrills. ¢I should have smoked that cigarette!¢After awhile I got a grip on myself and decided I had to do something. Staying in the tent was not an option. I had to get out of there and keep hiking. But with all my clothes and equipment soaked (my down sleeping bag was now a very heavy sop of feathers) I didn't see how that was possible. In that moment. I knew what I had to do. I'd just have to get out, wring my sleeping bag free of excess moisture, stuff my food and my tent in my pack without worrying about the order of things too much, and get the hell off the mountain. But I felt I needed outside motivation. I needed someone to tell me what to do or how to begin. I was shaken by the last twenty minutes or so, so I decided to check in with the other human being who'd camped near me last night. Seeing as how he could talk back to me. Seeing as how he was there. I managed to get out of my tent and stagger into the wind. It was dark outside but I couldn't tell whether this was because of the storm or because it was still night. I looked up and the sky looked steel grey and very close. The rain came from every direction. It was the worst possible place I could have camped. I saw that now. I saw the sick man's green domed tent about ten feet ahead of me. So he was still there. The tent was low to the ground and staked out well. This fact fueled my unreasoning hate of him. It wasn't just him, it was everything. I didn't want to ask for help but I approached his tent anyway. ¢Are you...alive?¢ I yelled out to him through the wind. Bad choice of words. God, I hated myself. I hated this. I wanted to burn something.For a minute I didn't hear any response.¢Yeah. I'm holding in here.¢¢My uh....my tent's destroyed,¢ I told him, well aware of how little he should care for this. ¢I don't know what to do, and I-¢He unzipped a fraction of his tent flap near his face. I saw two eyes and a blue hat look back at me. He was lying down. ¢Well, how bad is it? Where is it?¢ he asked me. I moved aside and pointed to my tent and then he understood my problem. I didn't want to be standing there in my short shorts in front of this stranger. But I did it anyway. And it got worse. ¢Well, what are you going to do about it?¢ he asked me. A good question. I stepped closer. ¢I don't think we should stay here,¢ I said, employing the 'we' in a kind of hinting, hopeful way. His eyes were a little wide in his head but he looked well enough. Please...please, get me out of here.¢Well...geez...¢ He seemed hard-pressed for anything to say. But he thought about it, unzipped his tent a little more, really looked at how bad off my tent was, squinting through the darkness at it awhile, then said:¢You have two options, OK?¢¢Okay.¢ I was listening.¢You can walk to the nearest shelter, which is about one mile away ¢ leave your stuff, it won't make any sense to carry it right now ¢ and ask anybody there for help. Or I could try and help you.¢¢One mile?¢ I asked, crestfallen. I was hoping it would be a lot closer than that. Maybe a ¢blue blaze¢ section or side trail to the left and through the trees, a trek that wouldn't involve climbing that horrible-looking mountain ahead of us at all. ¢So it's up that next mountain and on?¢¢Yeah, that's right,¢ he told me. ¢Could you help me?¢ I pleaded. He looked back at me, and across that short distance between us I didn't, I couldn't register anything other than my own misery. I cared nothing for his sickness or for him. I was blind. ¢Yes I'll help you.¢ He said it without hesitation. I smiled my gratitude. ¢OK the first thing you'll need to do is change clothes. Are they wet underneath your rain gear or were you able to put on your outer layer before you went outside?¢¢I don't have anything else,¢ I managed.¢What do you mean?¢ he asked. I just stared back at him, confused in turn. ¢You mean you're wearing everything you have under your rain gear and it's wet?¢ he guessed, trying to draw it out of me.¢Yeah,¢ I said. He was not amused, just flabbergasted. This didn't help our situation. ¢No, no, that's no good. What you need is an absolutely dry layer between you and your rain gear at all times, but especially in the cold. Or else you'll get hypothermia.¢ He told me all this without looking away, quite serious. ¢Okay.¢He sighed his annoyance but otherwise kept my eyes to let me know he was there, that it was okay. ¢I have an extra layer you can wear for now. You'll have to come in and change into it though. Your tent's not an option and if you were to change outside, if even a part of the sleeve gets wet, it'll do you no good.¢¢Okay.¢¢How are you feeling?¢ he asked. I just stared back at him, like What do you expect? ¢Did you walk over here alright? Without stumbling or anything? What's your pulse like?¢¢I...I dunno,¢ I laughed. The questions seemed silly at a time like this. ¢Why?¢¢Because you might have hypothermia. Feel your pulse,¢ he told me. ¢And try to tell me how many times it beats starting...¢ he broke eye contact to look down and and tap his watch. ¢Now. Start counting now.¢Feeling stupid, I squeezed my wrist but couldn't feel anything. My fingers were numb. ¢I uh, I can't do this right now,¢ I told him. ¢Can you come inside?¢ he asked me. ¢Yeah.¢ I staggered towards his ¢door.¢ ¢Woah, wait!¢ I stopped. ¢This is going to be a process, OK? The environment in here has to be absolutely dry or else it's not going to be a safe base for us to plan from. OK? I have a vestibule and you can take off your rain gear at least in there. You'll have to leave it outside.¢He motioned for me to come closer and I saw what he was talking about. The green of his tent, it's outer shell, was just the rain fly. In between it and the net of the inside dome there was about a foot of grass for me to prepare in. I ducked under the green and crawled, feeling surprisingly dry grass under my palms. I managed to be off with my rain gear but it took me awhile. ¢OK good,¢ he said. ¢Now you're ready to come in. You can sit on my mat, just so that you don't get anything else wet.¢ He'd pushed his sleeping bag far aside at the other end of the round tent and I saw where I could crawl onto his mat and have enough room. I entered. Sitting up on the mat, crosslegged, I looked up at him sheepishly. ¢Thank you,¢ I told him. ¢It's alright.¢ I found him to be a round-nosed man in his mid thirties. Blue knit cap, matching coat. Shorts that were grey like mine. We both sat crosslegged facing each other. The tent was surprisingly roomy and we could sit up without much trouble. After he felt my pulse against his timer he told me that I'd be alright. As he made me some Starbucks Via instant coffee, he talked to me. ¢It's the way things work out here. You see someone in trouble, you help them.¢I felt like a total piece of shit. Watched the water gently simmer to a boil in the vestibule. ¢Uhm...I thought you threw up in your tent?¢ It was all I could think of to say. Another bad line. ¢I did!¢ he laughed. ¢But I cleaned it up.¢Oh. I looked around the tent and it was spotless. ¢Have you...erm...done lots of hiking before, then?¢¢I guess,¢ he said, pouring out the coffee. ¢Where?¢¢New Zealand, Australia, parts of the Continental Divide Trail.¢¢The Continental Divide trail? Really?¢ I asked, fascinated. ¢Yeah, I'm from Colorado. It seemed to make sense at the time.¢¢You liked it? It was beautiful, like this?¢ He shifted me a strange look, like You're crazy. But something in his facial expression allowed me to recognize him. ¢Oh! I know you! You're Dingo. I met you on Blood Mountain.¢¢Yeah, that's right. I remembered you too after awhile. You look different.¢¢Changed already?¢ I laughed, happy I'd gotten it right. ¢But anyway, I remember you talking about Colorado, how the Rocky Mountains were so much more awesome than these rolling hills.¢¢I didn't say that!¢ He pointed a finger at me and shook it back and forth. ¢I did not.¢¢Yeah, but I could read you loud and clear,¢ I joked. ¢You said something like 'This is different from Colorado' but you hate this. Just like everybody else! Nobody sees the...the unparalleled beauty of Appalachian, man. I believe in it. Very strongly. There's nowhere else on earth I'd rather be than here.¢¢Okay, I believe you.¢ He smiled. I gratefully took a sip of my coffee. I was having a great time. ¢So, how did you get your trail name?¢ I was thinking and speaking a mile a minute ever since I'd had the coffee. It had been awhile. Dingo explained to me how he'd been scheduled to present at some white collar business meeting in Australia, but that he'd been running late. ¢Well, I guess the dingos got 'im!¢ cracked a good friend of his. He'd been told of this later, after he'd finally arrived. ¢And that's how I got my trail name¢ he concluded. ¢That's it?¢ I was almost disappointed. ¢Yeah!¢ he said, mock defensive. ¢What's your name mean, huh? It's a collection of letters, right? C.-Span? C.-Something? Is it an acronym?¢¢It's C.V.¢ I corrected him. ¢And?¢ he prodded.¢I don't really like to talk about it.¢ I looked down, mock tragic. It was like I was talking about someone who had died, but I didn't actually care. I looked back up to see this look on his face. His round, luminescent orbs of eyes had lidded down to their equivalent of fog lights. Are you serious? I just saved your ass and you're not even going to tell me your name?¢Okay! Okay I'll tell you. But nobody else. I picked my own name. I know you're not supposed to do that, but I did. It stands for Coinvolta, the name I used during my section hike in '10. It's the past participle of the reflexive Italian verb ¢coinvolgersi¢ which means ¢to be involved.¢¢So...to have been involved?¢¢Right!¢ He then proceeded to ask me something about the Italian language which I couldn't answer. He'd been to Italy and wanted to clear something up or refresh his memory. I couldn't do it, even though I'd practically minored in Italian. It felt like a long time ago. ¢Yeah, well, it's more about the sound than anything,¢ I continued on. ¢Coinvolta. It's probably my favorite word I ever ran across. But that's a very long, uninteresting story for a trail name, so I abbreviated it to C.V.¢¢Alright, that's valid,¢ he said. He encouraged me, once I'd warmed up with the coffee, to change clothes. He offered me a black thermal top of his which had been safely stowed away in a ziploc bag. ¢We're basically the same size. Or thereabouts. It should work.¢ I thanked him and felt the material. It was really light and soft. Dry. He turned his back and I slipped out of my soaking wet, yellow polyester tank and took off my pink sports bra too. The bra looked as though it had seen better days, but I actually considered it an invaluable part of my wardrobe. It dried pretty easily and was very comfortable. I'd made all sorts of slashes in it to allow for greater freedom of movement. It was personalized and tested. I set it and the yellow top outside in the vestibule. Deodorant, a whole solid of a man's brand, was one of the luxury items I'd carried with me in 2010 and carried with me now. So I didn't smell too bad. I was wondering what we should do. I wanted to hike but didn't want to impinge any further than I already had, and now I didn't want to go alone. ¢How are you feeling, Dingo?¢ ¢Not perfect, but definitely better than yesterday.¢¢What do you think happened to you?¢¢It was probably water-borne sickness.¢ He just shrugged it off as if nothing bad had even happened yesterday. I liked that. ¢Why, do you think we should leave?¢ Yes.¢I mean, what if it gets worse?¢ I argued. I wanted to hike with him. ¢Do I look alright? Do I still look sick?¢ he asked. ¢I think you'll be just fine!¢ I laughed thinking of him hiking in the Continental Divide. This was probably easy stuff compared to all that. So we mutually decided to get the heck out of dodge. I put my rain coat, which had dried in the grass of the vestibule during our prolonged coffee hour, over his dry layer but left my rain pants off. They were pretty useless as anything other than rain gear because when hiking, with bare skin underneath, all they did was restrict my movement and make me feel all hot and sticky. And yet as an extra layer for preserving body heat in the cold they were practically useless as well. I stuffed them willy-nilly into my soaking pack with everything else. I was ready to go in about five minutes. Dingo took a bit longer, naturally, because all his stuff was still in the pristine state of being worth saving. But soon we were on our way. Hiking with him that day was ardurous but it taught me a lot about myself. He never explicitly taught me anything, but one time he returned my confidence in him by saying something to the effect of ¢You've got this¢ when that was all I needed to hear. My knees were definitely suffering from having to carry a wet sleeping bag and all my wet gear. I can't imagine how many pounds it actually was and I don't care to. The adrenaline kept me moving. At bad moments we'd stop, he'd share some sesame rice cracker wasabe mix with me, and then we'd keep going. For seven miles we climbed down the gigantic mountain Big Bald had been the top of. My going was difficult but Dingo readjusted the velcro pads along the spine of my pack to allow for more length and flexibility for the straps at the top. It was the real beginning of my learning how to use my pack to best advantage. And this happened well into my hike.In the mists we passed by huge structures of rockface, wove in and out of tunnels. My feet slid out from under me in droves of greasy, black mud the storm had left. We'd passed by the shelter ages ago to regroup and I offered him a banana. There had been nobody else there and no entries in the register. I was really glad I hadn't forded on alone only to find no one to help me.Dingo told me stories about his hiking adventures in Tibet. We were on the topic of smoking cigarettes, he encouraged me to quit, then he told me that the only time he'd ever smoked tobacco was when he was practically forced to in a Tibetan jail. There was some negotiation going on, he'd been offered a sickeningly strong rolled cigarette when it would've been poor form to refuse it, and he'd nearly passed out from the head rush. The last mile or two was gorgeous. Still downhill, I had to watch my footing, but the slick mud had changed to light-colored pebbles and sand. The trees were magnificent, upright wonders with sharp, sepia bark strips which looked as though they were pasted on like so many vertical, jagged dragon's teeth. In complete wonder, I fell silent. We walked on together, peaceful pilgrims of the wild.When we finally reached the road at Spivey Gap we'd descended a total of 1,316 feet. The trees had covered us from most of the storm while we were hiking, and now we found the weather not nearly as ominous as it had been. We stood at the road waiting for cars in order to hitch to town. There weren't many. An old man named Pops showed up, heading north, and he stopped with us awhile, ¢Just to keep us company.¢ Man, he could talk! He probably talked for about two hours straight about all sundry sorts of things. He was planning on writing a book about it all. He'd driven a bus all over the country with his wife for ten years straight during the sixties. He had five children who were all geniuses in their fields. He'd been in the army, himself, when he was there age. Not much success at it. In fact, he'd been kicked out. He explained all his antics in detail. I listened to them all, delighted, as Dingo wandered up and down the road trying to get service on his phone. Nobody really had a plan. An entire family of hikers, the first I'd seen, also showed. The very handsome father, surprisingly young considering the age of his eldest boy, introduced them all as the Rainwaters. I guess they'd chosen their own name too. For Pops this meant more people to talk to, so we all listened in our several ways. The smiling, plump mother wiped the mud off her nine year old's knees. The seventeen year old slipped me sly looks and piece after piece of candy. I don't think anybody was looking forward to more hiking after what we'd just been through, so we kept each other company in this way for quite some time. Dingo came back with the information that a Miss Janet was coming to save us. This news roused the rest of the company to high spirits. Apparently they'd met her before. They described her as a ¢Trail Angel¢ or someone that selflessly went to extreme lengths to help hikers all along the trail. She'd take us into town. Dingo turned to me and told me he was going to keep hiking, but that maybe he'd see me further along down the trail. What, you're going to leave me now?I had no right to keep him, nobody has that right. It was an irrational hypocrisy for I both wanted him with me until Katahdin, the northern mountain terminus of the trail, and also knew I preferred to hike alone. In parting he gave me twenty dollars with the hope I'd be able to dry out my stuff and stay somewhere in town. I thanked him again and he left. Pops, the Rainwaters, and I waited a long time by that road. All of us needed to go into town. We calculated that we'd yellow blaze about ten miles. I felt vaguely guilty about having done it so much recently, but I knew there'd be plenty of hiking ahead. Yukon, the built bearded man with the leather hat, showed up with two other tall, strapping men. They saluted Pops and they all squared off for awhile, swapping stories. I learned that all three young men had been marines. I hovered shyly outside the circle, not saying anything, trying to keep it covered up and ambiguous in my hooded rain jacket, but inside I burned with desire for all three. The rain ran down from my nose to my full, pink lips. I kept my hands in my pockets. But my eyes admired, feasted, would clasp just by a look. It was really getting to that point where I needed to take care of something. I kept my hands pressed together, prayer style, in my lap all the way to town. Four of us were in the back of Miss Janet's maroon-colored Cadillac which she called the Bounce Box. The ceiling lining was torn in several places and it waved back and forth like so many curtains as we cut the close curves through the rocks on the way to Erwin, Tennessee. I sat next to Mr. Rainwater and stared at my thighs. When we pulled up at the Holiday Inn, Miss Janet assured me everything would be alright. I could just go into room 105, here's the key, I could stay if I liked, but wouldn't I like to stop at the Walmart after a shower? Perhaps a laundromat? ¢There's nobody in the room at the moment,¢ she assured me. ¢So you can have it to yourself for about an hour. I've dropped off three of the boys that are staying there, all hikers of course, at a restaurant, so they'll be there awhile. What do you think you'd like to do for tonight?¢¢I'll stay if I can!¢ I replied gratefully. A hot shower and a clean bed sounded heavenly just now. And to have all my clothes washed? That would be the first time since I'd begun hiking. Not to mention my sleeping bag. I was ecstatic. I found the room full of hiker's things. Trekking poles, three sets, several mail boxes full of food, three packs in the corners. I smiled and wondered what they were like, where they were from, as I set about putting my own filthy, lumbering orange pack next to a lightweight Osprey, gray. With all the wealth around me it was difficult not to take a cliff bar or two for myself, hide it in my pack for later or something. But I would never do that. I'm not a thief. I reassured myself that I'd be taken care of later. I had that twenty bucks, that was certainly a score! We'd go to Walmart, I'd stock up, dry my things...it would all work out. I believed. Peeling my wet clothes off in the bathroom I noticed all sorts of brown flecks all over my body like so many tiny freckles. I was covered from head to toe with dirt, small pieces of wood, and sand. The water ran black, once again, in the shower. It was the second one I'd had in a little over a month. One brief go over with lather from the shampoo all over my body wasn't enough, I discovered. I had to rub off excess skin and grime by scrubbing hard with a hand towel. No, this was not the time for masturbation, I reasoned ¢ even though I had the room to myself. Many such seeming ¢perfect opportunities¢ are wasted on me. The truth is I never really learned how. I got much more pleasure out of blow drying my hair after I was all clean. Walmart to Wendy's to the laundromat. It was heaven! My twenty bucks went a long way in ramen noodles, a philly cheese steak, an entire half gallon of cookie dough ice cream, and a spicy chicken sandwich, with enough quarters left over for a multiple round of attempts at getting my bag dry. Miss Janet dropped me and another hiker named Rusty off at the place with a set of six colorful tennis balls. She told us each to put three of them in there with our bags in order that they should bounce back to their full fluff. I was to learn the actual resillience of down bags, despite every warning hikers had given me. Though it did take a few cycles. A lot of hiker wisdom is like that; it prepares you for the worst which never happens, or it doesn't inform you at all as to the difficulty of what's actually up ahead. I sat in the laundromat for hours with Rusty enjoying my sandwich and fries. We were both drinking beer from a six pack he'd bought and he told me about the vacations he'd been on to Ireland and Scotland and the middle east after he'd retired from the army. He said he was a green beret.¢What does that mean?¢ I knew my friend Paul had been one as well. Rusty avoided answering my question directly. Deftly, he directed my attention somewhere else. Photos, he played music for me on his phone, he told me he was tired of hikng. ¢You know,¢ he said, leaning back in his chair, ¢This one time I was in the middle of the desert with four of my friends. We were trying to negotiate a taxi fare and my friends said we were getting ripped off. My best friend broke the window of the cab trying to get at the guy driving, and he did. He must have got his nose broken. He just wouldn't stop.¢ I wasn't sure what to say so I didn't say anything. I just looked back at him, trying to support him any way I could. I could tell that the event had affected him a lot.He said he'd go back home soon to his family to take over a business venture for his father, who was badly in need of help. ¢See, I don't have anything to go back to,¢ I told him. ¢It's weird. I might leave, or I might not like the trail as much as I do, if I felt like I had a purpose back home.¢¢Yeah, that's how a lot of people feel,¢ he said. For awhile we just listened to the sound of the tennis balls bouncing in the wash. 0Back at the hotel I found the three guys already in bed watching TV. I slipped in next to the solo hiker at the bed farthest away from the door, happy and drunk and glad to be in warm, clean clothes. For awhile I couldn't help but prattle on about this and that. The one who conversed with me the most was actually facing away from everybody, staring at the wall on the far end. Somehow we got to talking about a hiker named AWOL who had written a very disparaging book about his thru-hike experience as well as a vastly popular guide book designed to aid in thru-hiking complete with maps and an elevation chart. I'd seen this strange book before. Everybody seemed to have it. It was bright green, and when you opened it it was full of irregular heartbeats, the visual data of what we hiked everyday. Sometimes it would flatline only to raise abruptly again in a series of peaks or slumping rounds. It was something I didn't completely understand, and so I said it fascinated me.¢Lies, it's all lies!¢ moaned my faceless conversant. ¢What do you mean?¢ I laughed. ¢Liiiiieeeees!¢ I let it go. I got up once to eat more ice cream and turn off the lights. We all slept well that night on well-deserved, soft beds.