Rocky Mountain H--oly crap!

In less than a week, I will leave to take my first solo vacation that does not involved visiting family.  Technically, I am still visiting family for the first few days, but after that, it is just me, a backpack, an REI guide, and about 8 women I have never met before hiking through Rocky Mountain National Park.  Oh, you didn't know I was this adventurous? Believe me, neither did I.

Last summer, I got wistful thinking about the boy graduating and the bulk of parenting behind me. (never over, but those formative years are done).  I thought that if I was this sad about it a year in advance that I would be a mess come actual graduation.  What could I do to change this narrative?  A friend suggested that I do something I have never done, something for just me, and the solo vacation idea was born.

I love to hike, so make it about hiking!  I have no natural sense of direction and a completely irrational fear of bears, so it had to be a guided hike.  Plus, as a woman, I have a healthy fear of hiking on my own due to serial killers, rapists, and misogyny.  Hello, REI guided tours!  I also flatter myself thinking if I was in a co-ed group of hikers that I would have to fend off the tiresome advances of my fellow hikers, so an all-woman group it was.  

I know this fat bastard is just waiting for me.

At first, I chose and paid for the REI trip through Yellowstone.  I couldn’t wait.  It was rated Difficult.  I know difficult; no problem.  I started buying supplies, thinking about how to get in shape, eating right during soccer season because I figured the less I weighed, the less I would have to haul through the mountains.  I, um, got a map of Yellowstone and plotted out my hike.  I watched the news from Yellowstone about bear attacks.  I was prepared.  However, two months before my trip, REI emailed to say that they could not get backcountry permits and the trip was off.  This news came at the end of the school year and I was beyond fragile at this point, so I wept my sinuses out.  The bitter disappointment!  What had I logged all those calories for?  I have to say that REI was great about reaching out, listening, and then helping me pick another trip to take within days of the cancellation announcement.  With some time to reflect, I really think it was the world watching out for me.  Have you seen what a terrible mess Yellowstone is right now?  Also, I don’t think they were lying about the difficult rating and while I have prepared and trained, I have a feeling that their difficult might be more difficult than my difficult.  

Me, my backpack, and a group of women set to take on Rocky Mountain National Park.  I can’t wait!  I also can’t believe it!  And is it grows near and I have packed and repacked my backpack 82 times trying to see what I need, what I don’t, necessity vs luxury, I am getting very, very anxious.  I love to hike but do I love to hike with a 45 lb pack on my back for four days?  I have camped twice in my life: once was terrible and prevented me from camping for another twenty years, but the last time was great!  But, even great, my body was really sore from being on the ground over night.  Will I be able to move after three nights on the ground?  What if all the women in my group hate me?  What if I hate all of them?  What if I am too scared to get out of my tent to pee at night and get a raging UTI from holding it in and then have to hike with a raging UTI?  What if I have seriously overestimated my physical condition to do this?  What if, what if, what if.  

What if I am stronger than I think?  What if I see things I have never seen before?  What if my kids step up and take care of themselves and each other while I am gone?  What if I find purpose, a sense of self, and the room to breathe in this busy world?  What if this is my “Eat, Pray, Love” (minus the love) meets “The Wild” moment?  What if my legs and lungs burn with every step, but I keep stepping?  What if, what if, what if?

The last time I was this adventurous, my friend Amy and I got into her Plymouth Laser with AAA maps and drove from Buffalo to Dallas.  No cell phones, no GPS.  Two dumb teenagers in a car pointed south.  We made it there and back and only got a little lost in Indiana for about an hour or so.  We made it then and I will make it now.  I don’t need to lead or be at the front of the group, I am happy somewhere in the middle.  I don’t need to make friends because I like my own company.  I don’t need to be a rockstar backpacker, I just need to do it.

I will continue to worry just a little because that is how I am wired.  I will lie awake and worry about small things and big things and google “bear attacks RMNP”.  However, I will also let myself stop to think about how amazing this will be.  How I have waited a very long time to do something as adventurous as this and how I deserve it.  All this will happen as I pack and repack my backpack another 82 times.  The one thing I never waiver on taking?  A journal to record it all.