I have to tell you, though, there's something about being out in the middle of nature that revives me in a way nothing else can and being alone with my husband was just a bonus. Clearly, I can't run at his pace, so I had a few hours to myself, and I couldn't help but think about one of the most life-changing experiences in my life.
When I was sixteen, I signed up for a 33-day survival course through the Colorado Outward Bound School. I had seen an advertisement for it in a magazine four years earlier, and I remember telling myself I would do this one day. Sixteen was a hard age for me. I was dealing with my parents' divorce, their new flames, a sinking suspicion I was on my own while the family regrouped and on top of it all, I was trying to figure out how to exorcise my own self-esteem-eating demons in a high school full of teenagers who were anything but forgiving.
Needless to say, I needed a change. I had just seen the musical Rent, and I was high on that live life to the fullest mantra the play preaches, and this was my opportunity to really give it a go. This was about doing something no one else wanted me to do, something no one else thought I could finish, something I needed to do for myself to prove I could make it through any challenge thrown at my feet. This was about finding my boundaries and crossing them with my arms in the air and my middle fingers raised in salute to all the naysayers in my life.
I was ready to get down and dirty in the muck of my life, grab hold of everything I had and say, man, this is what I want out of you. This is what you're capable of.
And, at some point during those 33 days out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by mountains and lakes and rivers and canyons, I did just that and came home stronger and more self-confident. It was in Colorado that I really discovered what I was made of. I realized I had some serious balls, and I fast became addicted to that adrenaline rush you get when you do something really kick ass, totally insane and completely out of your comfort zone. You see, when you take yourself away from the expectations of society, it's as if your mirror unfogs for the first time, and you see yourself in a whole new way. You borrow a sense of peace that seems to resonate in nature. Everything out there just clicks. There's no resistance and no competition. You just exist.
Every morning out there was the same. As the Earth itself seemed to wake up ready to embark on a new day, I would wake up to the sound of the birds chit-chatting across the trees and the crinkle-crackle of the leaves as the animals stirred under the first rays of the morning sun. I would breathe in the crisp, clean mountain air that tasted faintly of moss and ash, and I would prepare for another challenge that would test my limits.
It wasn't until the last leg of the trip that I had my own small awakening amid all this magic. We had divided into groups of seven, and we were left alone with our packs, one bottle of water each and the challenge to hike a canyon and make it to our ride home. Those few days alone were the hardest of the entire course. The sun beat down on the red canyon and literally boiled our very skin and melted our sunscreen. The water ran low and soon ran out, and the map's water sources were all dried up except for one sink-sized hole filled with sludgy brown water and some sort of swimming creatures I really didn't want to drink but was too desperate to really think about it. We were tired, sore and frustrated when we finally decided to lay camp for the night only to find our perfect camp spot filled with pissed-off rattlesnakes. It was the rattlesnakes that finally broke the seam on a group filled with hairline cracks. And, it was in that moment when everything seemed to fall apart that I found my voice and brought us all back together and gave our group the motivation to push on and finish strong. It was right there that I had my first taste of what it was like to empower others to test their limits and cultivate their inner beast. As if finding my own inner tough chick on this trip wasn't enough, I now wanted to inspire others to find theirs.Fourteen years later, and I'm still hooked. Although Virginia trails hardly compare to the trails I hiked in Colorado, the feeling is still there. Running the trails empowers me to be stronger, work harder and never underestimate what I'm capable of. Out here in the middle of nowhere in particular, I feel as strong as the very trees that surround me; it's as if my roots dig deep into the dirt and spread out like fingertips grasping for something beautiful that sits just on the cusp of their reach, just close enough that the possibility exists of one day holding it. This is the feeling I knew I missed but didn't realize I needed until I returned to the trails.
Those Colorado mountains have been calling my name since I left them fourteen years ago heavy hearted and full of a longing I can only describe as a soul-ripping passion you feel when it's very dark and late and you're with that one person you can't be without. It's about time I take my life off call waiting and answer them. It just may turn out to be the best conversation I've ever had with myself.
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For more information about Outward Bound, visit their site:
http://www.outwardbound.org/
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