[pct-l] One story of the decision to go hiking...

[Jeffrey Olson]

This is one story about the decision to do a long hike.  Any others out 
there???
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My girlfriend and I had moved in together in November 1991 and rented 
house in Duvall, WA that within a year was to be torn down for a 
subdivision "in the forest."  She had four kids that lived with their 
dad.  She had her first kid at 20 and the twins at 24.  She was the 
oldest of four kids.  Her mom was 16 when she was born, and 21 when the 
fourth was born.  Jane never had a childhood or adolescence.  She took 
care of kids - that was her job.  She was 32 and I was 39.  I'd found 
out the previous week I had been admitted to the MSW program at the 
University of Washington.

We were sitting in a Mexican restaurant in town on March 1, 199, waiting 
for dinner to appear.  I'm a philosopher at heart so questions of 
meaning and purpose and the future were always "UP!"  Janey made the 
comment we didn't have a "couple project."

This concept was new to me.  I thought being a couple was a project.  
Apparently there is more involved.  Not only do you work on the 
relationship - constantly, but you have something you do together as a 
couple that involves experiencing something that is the two of yours, 
and no one else's.

I'd thought I was doing good in the "being-in-a couple" part and had the 
rat in a well-lit room feeling - I can't escape!  Scurry, scurry scurry...

I'd done a long hike on the Tahoe Yosemite Trail back in the 70s, and 
that had stuck in my history like a beacon without enough amperage.  I 
had always wanted more.

I asked if she had a pen - she has a purse so she has the world at her 
fingertips - and I began figuring out the spring and summer on a 
napkin.  She asked what I was doing and I asked her to wait a minute.  I 
had to start grad school on the first of October.  If we started hiking 
on June 1 we could hike from Lassen to Whitney - 750 miles - in 75 days, 
enough time to get back to reality and rent an apartment in time for me 
to start school and her to find a job.  (Her school time would come later.)

Our food arrived and she asked me questions about backpacking.  She'd 
never done it before.  She'd not done much day hiking.  She looked at 
the napkin and asked about details - what to do with our meager 
possessions, her dad who was dying of colon cancer, etc.  By the end of 
the meal we were both heady and excited and that much more in love.  We 
had a "couple project" - a hike from Lassen to Whitney.

We spent the next three months preparing for the trip - a story in and 
of itself.  On June 7 we left Hat Creek heading south, her pack weighing 
56 pounds, mine 72...

Jeffrey Olson
Martin, SD