It poured all night last night, the lightning struck every few seconds, bright white. Thunder followed just a few seconds after. The storm had centralized right above us. I was convinced we were going to die in a flash flood. In the midst of it, I smelled smoke and convinced myself there was somehow a wildfire somewhere close to us.
Oh no, we’re going to die in a flash flood wildfire!
Later I realized it was just Pneumonia smoking a cigarette.
We started walking, the rain held off. The Henry Mountains in the distance were covered in snow. We were grateful to find a faint cow track making it easy to follow a somewhat trail for the majority of the time before it connected to the creek bed. Once there, we followed it all the way down to Bullfrog Road where that local had driven me as he pointed out all of the canyons I would’ve descended down. I felt so grateful I went through the section. I didn’t know how I would but I felt in my core that it would occur, whether through stubbornness, through trial and error or simply letting fate do the work. Just how sometimes all I needed was a sandwich to keep me going, just the same, sometimes all I needed was a partner to help me through the difficult stretches. I overcame a challenge I didn’t even know I struggled with: to ask for help when I felt I needed it.
We hitched a ride on the back of a pick up truck just before the Burr Trail Switchbacks. Our feet were drenched in muddy clay and our legs cut up/scraped from bushwhacking. We were cold but happy to be making progress back to civilization. At the top of the hill, we got picked up by a group of people on a travel trip. It was very obvious they only picked us up because the driver felt bad and his conscience told him that we might have been stranded in the middle of nowhere. Everyone else in the car didn’t even speak a word to us, probably assuming we were homeless and a nuisance in their space.
We made it to Escalante and there we took a nero and a zero as we waited for the weather to pass. We knew it was going to be snowing/raining and could feel the rapid temperature drop before we went to bed last night. During our zero, we splurged on food and binge watched Breaking Bad. Just as I was about to fall asleep the first night, Pneumonia made a move on me.
I pulled away from him and said, “That’s a stupid idea.”
I didn’t mean to blurt it out like that but I just didn’t view him in that way. To spare his feelings, I said I was open to cuddling. Later I expressed that I was apprehensive with hooking up with people on trail after V.
“Well you don’t have to worry about that from me,” he said, “because I’m not looking for a relationship.”
“Neither was he,” I said, “in fact, he was very adamant about that.”
I started to feel things were wavering after that moment unfolded. The second day we were in town, I cried all morning as I got the message it was time to separate with him. I felt terrible as I knew he flew all the way out here to help me through the Hayduke but I couldn’t push forward when I knew there was a hidden agenda for him to hike with me. I cried out of frustration and feeling torn. I wanted so desperately to continue on my trek but I really couldn’t go against what my heart was requiring of me. I didn’t want to hurt myself like that.
The owner at the Inn saw me walking back, completely in tears and we had a one on one conversation.
“You know what you have to do,” he said.
It’s true, I always did. The message was clear, but once again, my ego wanted to make a sob story out of it rather than face the reality of the situation.