Thursday, August 28, 2008

Greatest Love, Biggest Fear

It's been a while, but I finally got back out there.














I was ready for it. Mountains. Trees. Waterfalls. Wildflowers. Little scurrying friends. (Luring them with our best marmot impressions.) Views so wide you can breath deeper than you knew possible.

Except for the good old-fashioned panic attack in the middle of the first night when I woke up and freaked out that I was in the dark woods without walls to protect me from boogie-men. Vulnerable and exposed in the big dark unknown. But that's why you have best friends who you can show all the dark corners of your soul to. Who have seemingly limitless patience right when you need it, even in the middle of the freakin' night. Who tell you funny stories until the tranquilizers kick in.

So continues my battle to not be held prisoner by fear of the dark. Determined not to let my love for being outside be taken away my fear of being outside.

Even after living through a nightmarish visit from my own private demons, morning always feels fresh again. Thank god. We set out on what was supposed to be a relatively good, but super easy day hike (trying to be easy on my knee), but we slightly misinterpreted the hike description and serendipitously ended up in THE most beautiful picnic spot I've ever seen. We ended up with a 360 degree view of Baker, Shuksan, and other peaks all around us. Magical.

Later we tried to figure out how the Yellow Aster Butte trail head could have dared to actually lead us to a place called Yellow Aster Butte instead of the other place called Twin Lakes that we thought we wanted to see. Yes, we are that stupid sometimes. And that lucky.

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